Rehearsals - making them pay

[Mickeyboro]

We have just had two rehearsals where things have not gone according to plan. Poor preparation. 
 

Do you have a pre-agreed agenda when you go in? How much time do you dedicate to new material? How many times do you run through problem numbers? How do you ensure the message gets across? Do you send out summaries of work done so it sticks?

 

How do you make it work for you? Hints and tips please!

Edited 13 hours ago by Mickeyboro

[Boodang]

Of course you're going to get a lot of replies along the lines of 'it all depends on...' and they won't be wrong. 

Golden rule obviously, rehearsals are not for individuals to learn a song, that should be prep work, so much as learning how to play the song as a band. Lessons learnt, I always would record rehearsals on a small Zoom H2n in the middle of the room and give everyone a copy on an SD so they could hear how badly they played and hopefully everyone would come to their own conclusion as to what needs working on. Easier that musicians come to that conclusion themselves rather than be told. 

[Burns-bass]

We have a really good band leader who is pretty smart. We only rehearse 3 or 4 new ones at a time and he will always expect us to have learned them. It’s good because we pretty much always will. 
 

Doing this means we only rehearse once a month. Helps that we’re all music teachers and a lot of the work we do is on arrangements. 
 

If stuff needs to be worked on then we’ll do a dedicated session to focus on certain things. Works really well.
 

 

[Steve Browning]

We rehearse at a volume whereby we can hear ourselves properly. We're not a loud band anyway, but it's important to actually hear what's going on. 

 

We also set up in such a way that we can all hear each other. In the round, generally. 

 

We usually run the sets and then do new songs. We don't add new songs constantly. 

 

I guess the number of years we've been doing this also helps. No superfluous noodling or tapping, just straight to work. Sometimes a curry afterwards. 

[Lozz196]

In my two gigging bands we had set formats, either rehearsing a set for a gig, or rehearsing to prepare for recording. If the latter the songwriters would bring the gist of the song in and then we would work on it together to get it in its final form.

 

In my non-gigging band we often suggest a new song and learn it, only for the guitarist to turn up having forgotten to do just that. In his defence he is like this throughout life, not just with regards to the band. 

[Stub Mandrel]

1 hour ago, Mickeyboro said:

Do you have a pre-agreed agenda when you go in?

 

How much time do you dedicate to new material?

 

How many times do you run through problem numbers?

 

How do you ensure the message gets across?

 

Do you send out summaries of work done so it sticks?

 

In order:

 

Yes.

 

Depends... is is a new material rehearsal or moshly a revision session with one or two new songs.

 

If we can't get it right after 2 or 3 attempts it's "go home and learn it properly before the next time".

 

What'sApp

 

Not in any structured way.

[chris_b]

IMO rehearsals are not for learning songs, but getting the arrangements right and topping and tailing the songs. If you're paying for a studio the band has to turn up knowing the material.

 

Play with guys who don't need to be told.

Edited 10 hours ago by chris_b

[BassAdder60]

We rehearse in a low cost hall and we set up as a gigging band using our normal gear. Always done it like this so we get familiar to what we sound like live. 
We agree in advance what songs we are working on and play through them a few times. It’s also a social get together so it’s fun and as enjoyable as gigging. 
We also kick around new song ideas and try them if we can in a basic format and if they look like they will work we add them to the set 

[Phil Starr]

At the moment that's me. I put the band together with lots of help from the singer but I'm the one who pushed it over the line. I'm really not sure I know what I'm doing and it's all very cooperative. Organisation is very 'loose'.

 

This is a covers band and everone is pretty experienced. We've set ourselves the target of getting 30+ songs up to gigging standard with 33songs on the initial set list. We're attempting to learn 8 songs for each rehearsal. Some are simple enough to learn quickly and some we've all played before, some a bit more tricky or only a couple of us know them and others are new to us all and need a bit more preparation so I've made sure we don't overload any one rehearsal by mixing the low hanging fruit with a couple of songs to work on.

 

I send out the list of songs as early as possible to give people a chance to prep them at home, Rehearsal is for re-hearsing what you've practiced not for learning the arrangement or chord sequence.

 

We've settled into a kind of routine, we start with a song we all know well as a warm up, Then run through the 8 msongs to see where we are with them, we'll play each song once or twice and move on if we get bogged down but it gives us an idea over which ones will need detailed work and which ones are working out of the box. We will also play through any songs we had concerns about from the week before, usually as part of the warm up. Then we take a break (there's a bar in the place we practice)  and talk though which songs we want to work on. Second half we'll work on the things we've discussed. It sounds pretty workmanlike but we're all pretty sociable and there's lots of chat whilst we are setting up.

 

I've been in quite a few covers bands, I think it's all in the preparation. Rehearsal time is precious particularly if you have a young family or are holding down a full time job. People need time to prepare so I'd expect a list of songs with keys and a few notes to go out at least a week before rehearsal. Ideally for a covers band you'd be clear of which version of a song you are covering with lyrics and a chord sheet. It's easy with a covers band as you have original recordings and I've sent out cassettes, CD's and now Spotify Playlists. There's no hope of learning My Way if everyone expects to do it their way, so it saves time to plump for one version and do that at the first run through. You can add your own touches once the basics of the song are secure.

 

One band I was in started brilliantly. The band leader arranged for us to learn four songs a week for 3 months. We had the full list up front in the order we were to learn them. Three weeks in we were running through four songs for the third time and used these to warm up. The songs from the previous week we'd fix any issues and work out starts and ends and then address this weeks new songs. A gig had been booked at the end of the 12 week cycle so nobody messed around. It's kind of the pattern I'm repeating with my new band, we took the decision to attempt 8 songs collectively given that we all knew some of the material and were experienced enough to find Eight songs manageable. Plus 12 rehearsals would have been excessive with our other commitments.

A third band was an established band, I was expected to learn 30 songs , contacted them when I was ready , one run through and we gigged a week later. We only rehearsed when we added new songs and you were expected to get it right. I loved that.

[BigRedX]

Most of the time my band book a small rehearsal room and set up facing each other. However from time to time, and before any really important gigs we book the big room and set up as we would on stage all facing where the audience would be. From experience it is important to do this so we break any unconscious visual cues that we might have been using when playing the songs and can work on how we are going to project to the audience.

 

What we actually practice: Generally we will work out a set order for the next gig and run through it to make sure that the flow is right. If we plan on changing the order from this we'll either do the whole set again in its new format if there are a lot of changes, or just the short section that has changed if we've just moved one or two songs. Then we'll work on any new songs that we have on the go, and after that if there is still time go through the set again. Often we don't use our full 3 hour booking because we would prefer to go when everything is sounding good and there is no more work to be done, rather than carrying on just because we have time that we have paid for.

[TimR]

We have a gig 15th November. Last time we played together was at last gig  on 7th June. 

 

We have a rehearsal tonight. No idea what we will do. Hopefully run through the first set and make notes of what might need revisting before the gig. 

[Lozz196]

My last gig with The Spacewasters was early Sept, we have one this Sunday and had a rehearsal on Saturday to run through the set a couple of times. More than anything it was for the 2 guitarists who in the downtime have got together and worked out "this solo is best for you/this is what I should do for rhythm underneath" sort of stuff, they got to put it into practice on Sat and the work they`ve done really went well.

[chris_b]

19 minutes ago, TimR said:

We have a rehearsal tonight. No idea what we will do. Hopefully run through the first set and make notes of what might need revisting before the gig. 

 

That's a*rse about face.

 

Come up with a set list, learn it at home and play it all at the rehearsal. Then everything has been dealt with and nothing needs "revisiting".