Worship Team Rehearsals

Worship teams don't get very far without spending regular time rehearsing together. It doesn't matter if you only have one musician and one vocalist, or a complete band, it's important that they rehearse. Here are some important things to remember.

Rehearse Regularly

It's best for a worship team to rehearse twice a week. Get together mid-week every week so that you can each get used to working together as a team. Learn your new songs and practise whatever is on your list for Sunday. This means that worship leaders need to be organised and get their lists together in time for everyone to know what's happening.

But that's not where it ends. To see real cohesion developing in the team, you need to get together for a team rehearsal before the Sunday service too. It may not need to be as long as your mid-week practice, but it makse sure that everything you rehearsed eearlier in the week is fresh in everyone's minds on Sunday too.

Listen Critically

This is not an encouragement to become a critical person. But you do need to listen carefully to the sound you are producing overall. Different churches have different levels of resourcing with the levels of talent and experience they have available as well as the quality of equipment they have. But do your best. Don't think that just anything will do. Remember you're serving the Lord first and He deserves the best.

Listening critically means to be doing an ongoing aural check that everyone in the band is actually playing the same chord at the same time, that vocalists are singing the correct tune, that the overall sound is musically balanced. You don't want one instrument way louder than the others or a backing vocalist taking over.

Fix Problems

If you hear something that doesn't sound right, don't just ignore it. Fix it. The whole point of rehearsals is to improve, and that'll never happen if no one takes the time to fix what isn't right. This could be as simple as stopping and saying, "Hey, hang on guys. I'm not sure we're all playing the same thing here. Can we sort this part of the song out?"

Practise Your Instrument At Home

For those who are less experienced instrumentalists, it can be tempting to ask more experienced musicians to teach them the "lead break" or some new chords. Resist the temptation to accommodate such requests. They can be shown at some other time. But the group rehearsal is not the time for one person to see it as an opportunity to have a lesson while everyone else stands around waiting to get on with the rehearsal.

As I said, they can be shown some other time. Then they should practise at home in their own time.

How To Set Up a Worship Team | Pursuit of Excellence | Worship Team Rehearsals | Why More is Less | Worship Teams & Keys | Worship Teams & Guitars | Worship Teams & Drums | The Power of Music