Rehearsal etiquette: the unwritten rules

Every band has a member who noodles between songs, one who arrives at the start time and sets up for twenty minutes, and one who gives feedback by sighing. None of them think they are the problem. Etiquette is the set of rules nobody wrote down, and writing them down is the fastest way to a better band.

Volume

The rehearsal room is smaller than the stage. Playing at gig volume in a 25-square-metre room means nobody hears the vocals, the drummer plays harder to keep up, and the band rehearses a balance it will never use.

• The drummer sets the ceiling, and sets it low. Lighter sticks, a smaller kit, rods for quiet work. Everyone else fits under the drums.
• Amps at knee height, facing the player, not the wall. A guitarist who cannot hear himself turns up; a guitarist who can hear himself does not.
• If the singer asks for less, the answer is less, not "turn the vocal up". The PA in a rehearsal room has a limit, and the singer's voice has a harder one.
• No volume changes between songs without saying so. The classic: guitarist turns up 2 dB per song, by the end of the evening the band is twice as loud and nobody knows why.

Noodling

Playing while someone else is talking is the single most disliked behaviour in rehearsal rooms, and the person doing it never hears it. Rules:

• When the person running the rehearsal speaks, hands off the instrument. Literally: hands on knees, sticks on the snare.
• Between songs, silence. Tuning happens with a silent tuner. The riff you just thought of can wait until the break.
• Warm-up happens before the start time, in the corridor, or at home.

If it helps, make it visible: the person running the rehearsal raises a hand, and the room goes quiet. A band that can go from full volume to silence in one second is a band that can also end a song together.

Phones

Phone on the amp, face down, sound off, unless it is the tuner, the chart or the recorder. Anyone waiting on a genuinely urgent call says so at the start. Reading messages while another section is being worked on says "your problem is not my problem", and everyone sees it.

Punctuality

Start time means first downbeat, and everyone knows the difference between "I was there at 19:00" and "I was ready at 19:00". Practical rules:

• Arrival is 20 minutes before the start time. Set-up, tuning, a coffee, a word about the agenda.
• Whoever is late sets up in silence while the rest have started. No stopping the song to say hello.
• Being late costs money, and it is fine to say so. A room at 20 EUR an hour and four people waiting is 20 minutes of everyone's evening. Some bands charge a symbolic late fee of 5 EUR into the kitty; it works better than it should.
• Tell the band before, not after. "Running 15 minutes late, start without me" sent at 18:30 is a courtesy. The same message at 19:05 is an excuse.

Being late to rehearsal predicts being late to load-in. Fix it at rehearsal, where it is cheap. If it does not get fixed, the wider question is in reminders, no-shows and the cost of a missed rehearsal.

Preparation

Arriving without having done the homework is a form of lateness: it moves the learning into everyone's shared time. The unwritten rule in professional bands is that nobody ever learns their part in the room. If you have not had time, say so before the rehearsal so the agenda can change, and do not make the band discover it in bar 3.

Giving feedback

Rehearsals fail on feedback more than on playing. The habits that work:

• Say what you heard, not who did it. "The chorus felt rushed" rather than "you rushed the chorus". The drummer knows who you mean, and so does everyone else, and the sentence is easier to act on.
• One thing at a time. Three notes per stop is the maximum the band can act on. Five notes is a list nobody remembers.
• Ask, then suggest. "Are we going to the bridge after the second chorus?" gets a better answer than "you went to the bridge wrong".
• The person running the rehearsal decides. Everyone contributes an observation; one person decides whether to stop, repeat or move on. Feedback that turns into a debate is the sign to play the section again instead of talking about it.
• Praise specifically. "The stops in the second verse were tight tonight" is information. "Sounding good" is noise.
• Personal notes go one-to-one, after. Pitch, timing, and anything about somebody's playing that they might find embarrassing: not in the room, not in the chat.

Feedback that arrives as sighing, eye-rolling or a comment to the person next to you is the beginning of every band argument. If you have something to say, say it to the room in one sentence, or to the person after.

Respect for time

• The rehearsal ends at the stated time. The person running it ends it, even mid-song.
• Breaks are ten minutes, with a timer, and everyone is back when the timer goes.
• Nobody is asked to stay to help pack down if they have said in advance they must leave; everyone else stays until the room is reset.
• Meetings and decisions happen in the last ten minutes, on the agenda, not in a 40-minute discussion after the last song when half the band is packing. Bigger decisions go to a band meeting.

The room

Leave it as found: cables coiled over-under, mics in the case, stands lowered, chairs stacked, bottles in the bin, heating off, lights off, door locked. Shared spaces have been lost over a kettle left on. Check the rehearsal space rules for the room you rent, and follow them even when the other bands do not.

When someone breaks the rules

Say it once, in the room, lightly: "Hands off while we talk, please." Say it a second time one-to-one. The third time it is a band conversation. Most people break etiquette from habit, not intent, and a band that names its rules gets compliance from the mere naming.

The one-page version

Put this on the wall of the rehearsal room:

1. Arrive 20 minutes before the start. Start time is the first downbeat.
2. Drums set the ceiling. Nobody turns up without saying so.
3. Hands off when someone is talking. Silence between songs.
4. Phones face down on the amp.
5. Homework done before the room, or say so in advance.
6. Say what you heard, one thing at a time. The person running it decides.
7. End on time. Reset the room.

Do this today

1. Send the one-page version to the band and ask for one addition or one objection from each person.
2. Pick who runs the next rehearsal and give them the hand signal.
3. Set the arrival time in the next rehearsal notice as 20 minutes before the start.

Where expert.band helps

Put the start time and the "arrive 20 minutes before" note in the rehearsal notes, and members get both in the email with the details and in the email and SMS reminder before the session. The agenda in the same notes tells everyone which songs to prepare, so "homework done before the room" is a specific list rather than a hope.