The rehearsal planner explained

Scheduling a rehearsal for six adults with day jobs is a negotiation that takes longer than the rehearsal. The poll goes out, four people answer, one changes their mind, the drummer has not looked, and the slot that would have worked is now taken by someone's dentist.

The rehearsal planner in expert.band replaces the poll with a picture: everyone paints the hours they are free, and the leader sees where the band overlaps. This article explains how it works, how to set it up, and what it does not try to do.

The idea: paint, not answer

A poll asks "can you do Tuesday at 7?", one question at a time. Painting availability asks "when are you free over the next few weeks?", once, and lets the leader pick. Members update their painting when their lives change, not every time the band asks.

Setting it up

Two band settings control the planner, both in band settings:

• Rehearsal planning hours: the day start and end shown on the grid, for example 17:00 to 23:00 for a band of people with day jobs, or 10:00 to 22:00 for a band of full-time musicians. Narrower is easier to paint.
• Rehearsal reminder: how many hours before a rehearsal the reminder goes out. 12 is the default.

The band's time zone, also in settings, is the zone every rehearsal time is shown in.

Painting availability

Each member opens Rehearsals and switches to My availability. The week is a grid of days and hours between the band's day start and day end. Drag over the hours you are free; drag again to clear. On a phone, press and hold, then drag. Blocks for a day are listed underneath and can be deleted individually.

The leader or a manager can also paint on behalf of a member, which is useful for the one person who never opens the app but always says "Tuesdays and Thursdays after 7".

Availability is per band. Someone in two bands paints it in each; the app does not merge a member's calendars across bands or import a personal calendar.

Good practice: paint 3 to 4 weeks ahead, and paint honestly. A member who paints every evening and then declines every rehearsal is worse than one who paints two.

The heat map

Switching to the band view merges everyone's painting into a heat map. Each cell shows how many of the members are free ("4 of 6 available"), and the darker the cell, the more people can make it. Tap or hover a cell to see exactly who is free at that hour. Members who have not painted anything are listed separately, so the leader knows whose silence is missing data rather than a no.

Reading it takes seconds: the darkest cells are the candidates; the ones that also suit the rehearsal room are the answer. When to accept "4 of 6" is a band decision, discussed in scheduling rehearsals when everyone has a day job.

Scheduling

Switch to Schedule rehearsal, drag over the timeline to pick the window, or start from a cell in the heat map. Fill in:

• the location (the rehearsal room, a member's garage),
• notes: what to prepare, which songs, who brings what. This field is where the outcome of a rating round or the requests for the next wedding go.

The form shows who is available for that window. If nobody has painted that time, it says so and still lets you schedule; everyone is invited regardless. Confirm with Schedule and notify: members receive an email with the details, and the rehearsal appears in the band calendar next to the gigs and on the band's home page.

Reminders

A reminder goes out automatically the set number of hours before every rehearsal: by email to everyone, and by SMS to members with a phone number. The SMS says the band, "rehearsal today", the time and the location. The reminder is sent once per rehearsal, even if the rehearsal is edited later.

SMS draw on the account's monthly allowance of 50, shared with availability requests and rating rounds; when it runs out the app falls back to email until the first of the next month. For a band rehearsing weekly with six members, reminders alone use about 24 SMS a month. The wider question of no-shows, and what reminders do and do not fix, is in reminders, no-shows and the cost of a missed rehearsal.

Changing and cancelling

Editing a rehearsal (a new time, a new room, updated notes) keeps it in place and notifies the members of the change. Cancelling removes it from the calendar and tells everyone. Painted availability is untouched by either, so a replacement slot can be picked immediately from the same heat map.

A weekly routine that works

For a leader, the planner takes about five minutes a week:

1. Monday: open the heat map for the next 3 weeks. Chase anyone listed as not painted, with one message.
2. Pick the darkest cell that suits the room. Schedule it with notes.
3. Before the rehearsal: update the notes with the songs that need work (the setlist for the next gig, the low performance scores from the last rating round).
4. After the rehearsal: nothing. The reminder for the next one is automatic.

For members it is one habit: repaint when the calendar changes, roughly every two weeks.

What it does not do

• No sync with Google or Apple calendars, in either direction. Members paint by hand; rehearsals show in the band calendar in the app and arrive by email.
• No recurring rehearsals. A weekly Tuesday slot is scheduled each week, or several weeks at once in a few taps.
• No attendance tracking or confirmation buttons for rehearsals. Reminders inform; they do not ask for an RSVP. If you need confirmation, ask in the chat.
• No room booking or payment.
• No cross-band view of a member's availability.

Rehearsals are also not gigs: gig availability is asked per gig with a one-tap request, described in availability requests explained. The two systems are separate because the questions are different: "when are you free in general?" versus "can you do this specific date?".

Do this today

• Set the planning hours in band settings to the evening window your band actually uses.
• Paint your own free hours for the next 3 weeks and ask the band to do the same, with a deadline of Friday.
• Schedule the next rehearsal from the darkest cell, with the three songs to prepare in the notes.
• Check that every member has a phone number on their account so the reminder reaches them.

Full reference in the rehearsals documentation. The planner is included in every plan, free for members; start the 30-day trial.