How To Conduct A Rehearsal

[bassman]

I've got a bunch of questions about how to organize band rehearsals. Before I go there, let me define my terms. "Practice" is what you do on your own to develop skills on your instrument or to learn a song in preparation for a gig or rehearsal. "Rehearsal" is what you do when you get together with the full band and try to put it all together.

Our band rehearses once a week almost without exception and occassionally adds an extra session before an especially important gig. (We gig about twice a month). Does that sound about right? Are we slackers? Do we have OCD?

We stand around in as close to a circle as our rehearsal space allows. We make no attempt to replicate our performance configuration. Does the extra communication that affords offset our lack of practicing showmanship? How do you arrange your band members during rehearsals?

We rehearse at levels that seem pretty loud. They are basically performance levels but in an enclosed space with sub-optimal acoustics. Does anyone out there make a conscious effort to limit rehearsals to lower levels, say 50% of performance? Why, and will you come talk to my band?

How formal or conscious are you about the introduction of new songs? Do you just try to further develop songs that come up in impromptu jams during rehearsal or do you consciously select songs and expect members to come prepared to play at the next rehearsal?

How many songs are in your songbook? When you add new songs, do you drop old ones in order to maintain a standard set? Or do you try to maintain an expanding library that you can taylor to specific gigs?

How much time do you spend keeping the established songs sharp vs. learning new songs?

What else can you tell me about organizing rehearsals that I've forgotten to ask?

[Cris]

I'm probably closer to your level than most of the other musicians here, but my band has a method that seems to work for us. We have 4 9 song sets of tunes that we have down solidly that we rotate every week to keep fresh. We brainstorm a few new ideas during the week either by phone or email to each other to try out at the next rehearsal, and we spend the first half an hour to 45 minutes going over two or three of the new songs. That way we can come at them while we're fresh and at the same time enhance our rhythm and feel for each other. Then we take a 5 or ten minute break to strategize, talk about tunes we'd like, tunes we want to maybe move out of the list. Then we go through that weeks playlist, and we try to play it like we're playing out. We only stop for full on crashing errors, otherwise we try to work through and pull them out. We go through the set twice if we have time. Usually that sets us at about 2 hours and 15-20 minutes each week, start to finish, long enough to get good work done, but not so long to make it feel like work.
As for volume, we are CONSTANTLY telling our lead guitarist to turn down. I think it's something about guitar players in general

If any of you vets have any ideas, I'd love to hear them as well.

[jlev]

All the all old pros I know rehearse QUIETLY. Often with acoustic guitars, or electric with no mics hotel room volume almost, drummer playin on a snare, hat and maybe kick.

Usually in a circle, never like on stage. Everyone does their homework and uses the time very efficiently. usually just new material is looked at, unless maybe a show is being prepared.
Usually they don't last much more than an hour and a half or so. if there is a problem spot in a tune, just that part gets practiced. People bring chord charts if needed and sometimes music written in standard notation.

I think we each have a responsibility to not waste each others time. The hardest thing often is scheduling, finding a time when everyone can make it, so we need to make the best use of the time.

[Teletwanger]

My band plays live from 8-12 times a month and have about a 48 song list set that we do every time we play a 4 hour gig. We have about 10 songs that we can throw in to mix things up.
We rehearse 1 time a week.
How we do our rehearsal is:
We Go over what we need to for the songs we know. If something went wrong or was not right the last gig we go over it. Including Vocals & Harmonies.
We play at a very low volume in a circle facing the drummer so we can all talk and get things right no playing or jamming in between.
We usually learn 1-2 new songs all the way threw and then go back and work out harmonies most the time 3 part. We are lucky we all sing and all can sing harmony and know where we fit in.
The vocals are just as important and the cool guitar solo if not more!
We have a few places we play that are low key and that's where we start the new songs. It takes about 4 times playing them live and they are just as good as any in our set. We stay current and move old songs out.
I run the band so I allways talk to the band about whats going on and ask any questions. We all talk about band stuff and drink a beer.
This takes us about 3 hours.

[mothermayhemband]

Sounds like a pretty standard system here….

We too practice in a circle at a low volume. LOW VOLUME is KEY…..loud can cover a lot of bad stuff

Someone (usually the person who suggested the song) will bring the lyrics marked out with where the specific vocal parts are. We are very lucky in that our lead singer has an incredible ear for relative pitch so he will give us our harmony parts and we run thru it with just a guitar.

Everyone comes with the chord/ structure…..and since everything is open to interpretation we do not have a problem telling someone “This is what I think I heard can we try it this way”

We do covers and we try to learn whatever is hot on the Radio (Currently Magic by B.o.B.) about a song a week. The nice thing is that most of the crap on the radio now is fairly simple LOL

We rarely go over any of the old stuff as we play out on avg. 10 times a month. I make the set list so if we are doing a wedding or party and they have requested a specific song we have taken out of rotation I’ll just shoot an email and say brush up on the Big Head Todd Song (or whatever it is)

[booger]

I'm so glad you started this thread.

Practice is something you do at home, rehearsal is what you do with the band after all of you have practiced at home - IMHO. We typically play 2-4 times a month, 4 hour gigs, all covers

We typically set up & stand in the same positions as a live show, with the exception of the singers, who face the rest of us. We do this to make sure that we communicate (visually) the same way in rehearsal as we do at the show. We also talk about making our shows a SHOW, rather than a gig, but it's all talk right now LOL.

We practice too loud IMO, but if there's a trouble spot in a particular song, we do go over it a hundred times with one guitar or just the bass or whatever....at a lower volume to truly hear the vocals and how they fit with the song.

As for new songs, We typically start shooting emails and text messages to each other as soon as a gig is over. We practice them during the week, then get together for a rehearsal to see which songs will be keepers and which ones go on the back burner for a while. Usually we'll have about ~5 songs per week to try out, and 2-3 actually become part of our setlist. Then, we try them out in a live setting & see if they pass the mustard. If the song clears the dance floor, we give it another couple tries, but if it's consistently clearing the dance floor, that song is dropped from our "active" setlist. We still keep over 100 songs on our "master" list, but we only play ~40 at a gig.

As for who "approves" the new songs, nobody. We all try the new songs without any expectations and without any emotional attachment. Some songs I would rather not ever play again, but they get the dance floor crowded, so I gladly play them.

[cariedaway]

Hi, I know this is MONTHS after you posted your question, but thought I'd reply, it's an interesting topic.

To answer some of your questions:
My band also rehearses once a week. I'd say that's pretty typical, especially if most band members have "day jobs", so I don't think you're either a slacker or OCD. We too will sometimes add an extra rehearsal for an upcoming "big" or new gig. Dunno what everyone else does, but this seems to work for us.

We typically do set up in "on stage" format, not exactly but roughly. (We have a whole room to use, vs. a small stage!)

We definitely make every effort to rehearse at LOW volume, usually lower than gig volume. This is a big deal for me, as the lead vocalist and a female who's not a "screamer". My band is great, 'cause the guys really work at playing at a volume that allows me to sing and not shout or push my vocals so that I risk blowing out my voice. Also, since we are a blues-based band that also plays some country, and our goal is to play for dancers, we are pretty vigilant about keeping even our gig volume low - hate getting complaints that patrons think we're too loud.

As to new songs, our current repertoire is close to 60 songs now - I like your "library" analogy - and we do rotate songs in and out of our sets for various gigs. We continually add new ones, because it keeps us from getting stale or bored w. the material. Typically, someone will say "I have a new song I want to do" and bring in a CD for the band to hear, or walk us through the changes. We all seem to contribute to the arrangement as we work on it. And yes, once a song gets introduced, we expect everyone to practice it on their own and come back to rehearsal prepared to play it.

As to working on "old" songs as opposed to new, when I make up a set list for a gig, I will often put in songs we haven't played for a while, so in the week or 2 before the gig, we'll rehearse those, as well as our new stuff.

OK, think that covers all the questions you raised. I'd be interested to hear from others on this subject too!

[lindaherring]

I agree with JLev and others who practice in a more quiet, acoustic type setting. Maybe your band likes to jam though. I had bands for years, and we all wanted to get through rehearsal pretty quickly, so it was expected that you would come prepared, know your part, notes were OK. Hit the problem areas, have the intros and endings worked out. I liked my band to be tight on stage. Rehearsal is just a matter of what you guys want to do. I was in bands early on that practiced 2-3 times a week, plus we worked ALL the time. But I was good with once a week, or whenever we had to learn new material. I hope your band is working pretty steadily. Have fun!

[beamer]

Pretty much like everyone we rehearse at a low volume. Our rehearsal space is a small bedroom so we are in a circle facing the drummer. The one thing we do though is record rehearsal with a pocket recorder for reference later on. Helps with arrangements and harmonies and to just clean up stuff.

Bassman thanks for starting this thread. It's great.