Stage Pads guide
Free worship pads in every key
A worship pad is a soft, sustained sound in the song’s key that sits under the band. Tap a key below and Stage Pads plays one, made in your browser as it plays; tap another key and the pad crossfades there, so a key change mid-service is seamless.
Play a pad: tap a key
Made in your browser as it plays: nothing to download. Tap a key to start, another to move there over three seconds, the lit key again to fade out.
The full app adds Shimmer, Strings, Choir and the pipe organ (Pro), a click, setlists and the hymn book.
What a pad does under a band
A pad fills the space between songs, under prayers and readings, and under the band while it plays. It holds the key without playing chords, so it never clashes with what the guitar or piano is doing.
Most worship pads play the root, the fifth and the octave of the key and leave out the third. That is why one pad works under every chord in a song: a G pad sits as happily under C and Em as it does under G.
Moving between keys
When the next song is in another key, tap that key. Stage Pads fades the old pad out and the new one in over the time you choose (one to eight seconds), so the move is smooth. A long press on the lit key fades the pad out altogether.
In a set, Stage Pads moves the pad into each song’s key for you when you go to the next song, so songs can run straight into one another.
Getting a pad into the room
A phone or tablet can play the pad straight into the sound desk with a headphone or USB audio cable. Turn on the low cut in Settings to keep the pad clear of the bass guitar and the low end of the piano.
With an in-ear system, Stage Pads Pro can split the sound: the click and spoken cues in one channel for the band’s ears, the pad in the other for the room.
The sounds
Warm is a soft, wide synth; Air is breath and a fifth; Drone is the plainest root and fifth. These three are free. Stage Pads Pro adds Shimmer (bright and an octave up), Strings, Choir (voices on “ah”) and the pipe organ from Yuzool’s cathedral game, and lets you layer two sounds with a mix.
Questions
Are these worship pads free?
Yes. Every key and three sounds are free, with no account and no downloads. Stage Pads Pro ($2.99, once) adds four more sounds, layering, spoken cues, the in-ear split, drum loops, share links and unlimited songs and sets.
Do I need to download pad files?
No. Stage Pads makes each pad in your browser from oscillators, noise and filters as it plays, so every key is ready at once and nothing has to be downloaded first.
Which key pad should I use?
The key of the song. Pads leave out the third, so a pad in the song’s key works under all its chords. For a song in a minor key, use the pad of its own key: an E minor song takes the E pad.
Does it work on an iPhone?
Yes, in Safari. The sound plays even with the ring switch on silent, and Stage Pads keeps the screen on while it plays, because iPhone stops a web page’s sound when the screen locks.