How to Have Easier and More Effective Worship Rehearsals

Ah, the rehearsal grind! Service after service, we invest incredible amounts of time, energy, and resources. Then, even before the set’s final note stops echoing in the auditorium, we’re already diving headlong into preparations for the next round. You know the dilemma. The time consumed by creating an excellent music set sometimes leaves little bandwidth for things like training, vision casting, prayer, spiritual formation, building relational connections, and ministry.

Every week, we exchange time for excellence. But how about we get a better return on that investment? What if we could be freed from the temptation to value production over people and from the tyranny of the urgent that saps time from what’s really important?

The key lies in making rehearsals more effective.

Leaders Equip

A team of musicians is liberated when armed with the necessary tools and a clear understanding of their roles. They’re freed to take responsibility for their own preparation and musicianship. They can arrive at the rehearsal prepared for the downbeat. Instead of a rehearsal being a starting point, it can become more of a celebration of what is already working.

Provide your musicians with a common understanding of each instrument’s place in the overall tapestry of a song’s arrangement. This gives the team a shared vocabulary and a template to help guide their approach to creating song parts. Instead of simply replicating what they hear on a recording, your musicians can approach their roles with a better understanding of how all the parts fit into a consistent whole.

The end result of this approach is that the parts your musicians pour themselves into creating will blend together better the first time the set is played at rehearsal. Everything fits. There’s less effort left on the cutting-room floor. Your audio engineers no longer have to mask sonic mud generated by the accidental doubling or tripling of some parts. You won’t spend time reworking arrangements to add key song elements that were accidentally omitted. Rehearsals are faster, and your musicians are free to express their hearts effectively. That’s a huge win.

Check out these related articles that provide musicians with a starting place in understanding their roles.

The Eight Musical Roles in a Worship Band

How to Play Compatibly in a Worship Band

Communicate Your Plan

When you communicate a clear plan and provide your team members adequate preparation time, they can arrive at rehearsal ready to play and blend together smoothly. You create a domino effect: effective planning results in effective preparation, which results in effective rehearsals, which results in effective services. The end result is that ministry, connection, and growth thrive dynamically as your team members serve.

Announce clear rehearsal load-in and downbeat times and talk with the appropriate people so that technical issues are handled before musicians arrive. Allow reasonable time for your musicians to memorize music or learn new arrangements. Address lateness issues privately. If someone has an excused lateness due to work or another conflict, then let the team know to avoid frustration.

Your musicians need clear marching orders. Notate specific arrangement instructions using master song charts distributed through a platform like Planning Center Online (PCO). This ensures that musicians know their roles and helps prevent them from playing over one another or creating musical gaps and missing parts.

In addition to providing a chord chart and a target version, team members need to know which element of the song you want their instrument to fulfill.

For example, simply requesting they “please play the electric guitar part from the original” misses necessary information for the guitarist to prepare successfully. In modern worship music, there are often multiple electric guitar parts, and some of those parts may actually be compilations of numerous guitars layered in the studio to sound like a single instrument. Consider offering a more specific instruction like, “Play the lead guitar hook in the intro, the pad in the verse, the muted arpeggiation in the bridge, and the power chords in the chorus.”

Sweetwater affiliates with online tool providers who can help make planning easy for you and your whole team. WorshipOnline.com provides Omnisphere keyboard patches and song rehearsal training for each instrument with parts that blend well together, including vocals. In addition to artist-original tracks, MultiTracks.com provides keyboard MainStage patches, drum samples, guitar profiles, and rehearsal tracks and charts that integrate with Planning Center Online to automatically transpose to your selected key and generate rehearsal tracks for each instrument. WorshipTutorials.com provides Line 6 and Fractal guitar patches and lessons as well as the bonus patches in Sweetwater-exclusive Line 6 worship bundles. These resources have been great help in facilitating my own teams.

The key is to create a distraction-free experience so everyone can focus on the primary goal. It all starts with planning and using great tools.

Shop keyboard controllers

Shop guitar processors and amp modelers

Be Prepared

Help your team understand that the reason for preparation extends beyond making music. You want nothing to distract from what the Lord is doing. That goal is worth the investment of learning parts at home and making the most of limited rehearsal time.

How you prepare sets the bar. In addition to having your musical parts ready, you model the importance of preparation by having prayers and exhortations planned ahead of time. Your words can be honed for full impact. The team can see the fruits of your deliberately and proactively seeking the Lord about what to say to the congregation. Stewarding each second of the set teaches the musicians and technicians to honor what the Lord wants to accomplish with that time.

As musicians prepare parts, remind them to add variety. Help them think of layering a song part as reverse engineering. Have them start by playing that song section at its biggest moment. Then remove some of the notes and scale back the dynamics. That becomes how to play that section at an earlier time. Remove more for the time before that and so on for each time that particular part is played. This will develop a fairly scaled-back first instance of that part with plenty of headroom to develop dynamically throughout the song with no two places being identical. Not only does this create more engaging song arrangements for the congregation, but it helps your musicians maintain interest.

Even when musicians have learned their parts well enough that they can’t play them wrong, there are always surprises along the way.

Prepare for the unexpected by incorporating some flexible time into each stage of the rehearsal process. Maintaining a clean stage not only demonstrates care for the venue but also speeds up setup and reduces the risk of accidents. Have the sound console set up with virtual soundcheck files and complete line checks before the musicians arrive. Ensure that each musician is trained to set up and pack away their gear, allowing the audio team to focus on troubleshooting bigger issues. Keep an organized storage space nearby for quick access to equipment, tools, and sorted cables. Having essential details like IEM channel lists ready helps keep things moving and communicates the importance of being ready.

Be Considerate

Several key principles extend care to your team. Communicating expectations clearly enables both new and existing team members to plan for adequate preparation. Balancing new material with familiar songs from your repertoire helps keep personal preparation and rehearsal length manageable so that your musicians can focus on worship and connecting with the congregation during services instead of being distracted by searching for unfamiliar notes. Distributing tasks among team members helps share the workload effectively and creates opportunities for people to serve in meaningful ways.

Likewise, your team members can extend consideration for one another. Punctuality respects everyone’s schedules and minimizes wasted time. Additionally, musicians must strive to play in tune and in time, utilizing tools like tuners and a metronome or click. Mutual respect includes learning everyone’s names, lending a hand, not noodling, and listening to one another. Honor each other by developing parts that avoid overplaying and leave space for others to shine. Team unity grows when everyone supports one another, celebrates each other’s achievements, and maintains a positive attitude.

Be Proactive

Many rehearsal killers can be disarmed before they even occur. Your intake procedure and materials for new musicians should clearly communicate elements including being punctual, avoiding noodling, taking notes, maintaining tuning, testing gear, ensuring charged batteries, knowing when to experiment musically, maintaining appropriate volume levels, minimizing phone usage, and understanding the director’s cues. When you know that rehearsal issues that only involve a subset of the band may arise, consider scheduling a separate sectional rehearsal either in person or using online platforms like JamKazam, Jamulus, or SonoBus. Additionally, consider providing separate opportunities for team activities that would otherwise encroach on the preparatory focus of rehearsals, such as connection time, meals, prayer, or studying together.

Be Proficient

Mastering your instrument, tones, patches, effects, and hooks requires a commitment to excellence and continuous improvement. Taking lessons, expanding your repertoire, and honing your skills move you beyond simply preparing for performances; they are essential to effectively enriching the music. The better you become, the more you can offer. It’s crucial to understand how to complement and influence the song rather than overshadow it. This involves mastering techniques such as blending with other players, standing out when necessary, and knowing when to exercise restraint as you contribute meaningfully to the overall sound and success of the team.

Similarly, when musicians know their musical gear, rehearsal time can be optimized. Gear should be configured for swift load-in and strike. Everyone should be proficient in handling their gear and coiling cables properly with the over/under technique — even vocalists! Additionally, using reliable equipment, such as Mic-Eze mic clips instead of lower-quality alternatives prone to malfunction, is crucial for maintaining consistency and reliability during performances. Eliminating faulty gear is equally important; there’s no need to waste time searching through a pile of faulty cables when the pre-service countdown has started. Moreover, having gear redundancy for all mission-critical items ensures that technical issues can be swiftly addressed without disruption.

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A significant part of rehearsal is interactively listening to one another. Everyone needs to hear well enough to play well together. Train your musicians to balance and pan their in-ear mixes then leave the monitor mix alone once dialed in so they can blend dynamically together.

Check out these articles on effective IEM mixes:

4 Musician & Mixing Steps for Pristine Live Worship Sound

How to Move Your Team to In-ear Monitors

Ask Good Questions

Occasionally asking the right questions can improve rehearsal efficacy. A debrief time builds a team reservoir of grace and trust for addressing challenges and allows people to leave the rehearsal knowing that their investment of time and effort is valued and will earn a good return. The team may provide observations and solutions that you may have missed.

Consider rehearsal questions like these:

What could better help you play to the best of your ability?What could better help you prepare before arriving at rehearsal?What is important for you to have accomplished by the end of rehearsal?On a scale from 1 to 10, rate whether the time spent during the rehearsal was worth the effort you spent preparing for it.How much time do you spend preparing for the rehearsal?What procedures do we use that create bottlenecks, add steps, or waste effort?When you leave rehearsal, on a scale from 1 to 5, how well do you know how to prepare for the service?

After a service, I like to ask these three enlightening questions that can impact the next rehearsal:

During this round of prep, rehearsal, and service, what did you see God doing?What worked?What didn’t?

Your questions help teach your team members to be more self-aware. Besides, the answers may just lead to something special.

Take the Next Step

Modifying your approach to rehearsals can improve your productivity as well as recapture time for addressing your bigger goals. It values your musicians and communicates your desire to see them thrive and be successful.

For a glimpse into how I prepare teams, check out this article:

Planning My Favorite Worship Band Rehearsals

If you’re facing a technical challenge or would like to get excellent, professional advice on the gear to help make the most of your rehearsal time, then call your Sweetwater Sales Engineer at (800) 222-4700!

Related InSync articles:

5 Stage Products That Will Improve Your Performance15 Tips for a Smoother Soundcheck – from the ProsGetting Started with MultiTracks.com in WorshipSound Communication for Live WorshipStep-by-step Guide to Productive Rehearsals

Video Clips from the Sweetwater Shane and Shane Workshop:

Approaching Rehearsals as a ProducerArriving to Rehearsal PreparedHelpful Tips for a Productive Worship RehearsalSetting the Stage for Productive Rehearsals
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