Band practice comes in many different shapes and sizes. Sometimes we have all the time in the world and can jam for hours in a friends basement, or garage, or private, fully appointed Pro-Tools HD-3 equipped studio. Sometimes we can't. What we are concerned with in this class is this "limited access" variety of rehearsal. By limited access I mean there are only so many hours of practice time available and there is most likely a deadline with some kind of a performance at the end. This is the way the class is structured, but you may also encounter this situation in many real world settings. Most often, the limitation is imposed by a budget, for example, someone is paying you to be a sideman, YOU are paying for studio time, you need to rent rehearsal space, the list goes on.

In this situation, you need to be able to maximize your efficiency and waste as little in practice as possible. However this can often be easier said than done. How can you be sure that you are not going to waste time when you get into the rehearsal space?

In this class, you will learn proven techniques that will yield the results you desire, if you follow the methods correctly. As efficiency is our goal, let's not waste any more time with exposition, and let's get down to it!

First of all, you should always have a GAMEPLAN for each rehearsal that includes goals and a budget of your rehearsal time.

~You would not expect to join the school basketball team, get to practice, and have the coach say "um, ok guys, what do you feel like starting with today?" Why should you approach BAND practice this way?~

Make sure that before you ever get near the band room, you make a clear list of what you expect to accomplish during your time in the room and know how much time you will spend on it. This means that you and your band mates will have to sit down outside of practice and talk to each other about what your goals and time frame for each rehearsal will be. I suggest scheduling at least one "Band Meeting Time" per week where NO INSTRUMENTS ARE INVOLVED to discuss matters relating to the band.

These "matters" include (but are not limited to):

Set list & material
Rehearsal Goals
Rehearsal Time Budget
Bookings
Promotion
Public Relations
"Artistic Direction"
Interpersonal conflict resolution
Anything else you want to talk about!

While all of these topics are important, the first three are paramount. The set list is the reason for the band. It is what people are coming to hear. Therefore the main goal for rehearsal is to

This, of course, is the ultimate goal, akin to our basketball teams goal of winning the game. You will, however, need to establish intermediate goals along the way. You cannot come into the first band rehearsal and expect to just run a 40 minute set. You CAN, however, come into that rehearsal all having learned the same 3 songs and be ready to run them.

You also need to make sure that you are not wasting any of the time we are allotted. If you know how much time you have for practice, say 1 hour, you should know what you expect to be doing at any given point during that hour. I suggest breaking the rehearsal down into timed phases as follows: