Define "Practice" v.s. "Rehearsal"...

[Vitrius Humor]

Semantics; kinda like Soda and Pop. At least to me it is.

 

[BobDeRosa]

You're not an a**, but it sounds as if some of your bandmates might be. Who brings family to rehearsal? That's crazy.

 

[pbass74]

Practice is what you do when half the band shows up and says that they haven't even listened to the new songs yet.

 

[lunarpollen]

Practice is anything you do to improve, refine, etc. your playing, your song material, your performance, etc. by yourself or with others. Rehearsal is a kind of practice, where the band runs through portions or the entirety of an upcoming set/show.

 

[dalkowski]

My rehearsal tonight got cancelled. I'll use at least some of the time to practice. True story.

 

[lowfreqgeek]

I'm not into the sportz-ballz, but what do the sportz-ballz teams do in preparation for sportz-ballz events? Do they practice, do they rehearse? What about other sportz teams like cycling, cross-country running, swimming, curling, etc? What do they do to get good at their thing?

Is the terminology relevant? Same concepts, same words, different meanings? Or are we just being precious?

 

[micahwc]

Practice = by myself at home to be prepared for
rehearsal = working with the rest of the band to ensure the performance goes well.

 

[MultiScaleMale]

Load-in, load-out like it's a gig? Running the setlist like it's a gig? Nah, that's too much for me. Practice is when you learn the songs on your own, rehearsal is when you bring the songs together as an ensemble. But the term "practice" is often used for both situations. "Dress rehearsal" sounds more like what you're doing for rehearsals. I wouldn't be upset if someone brought their family or friends to a rehearsal, assuming there is space. It's like an audience and they can lie to you and say, "It sounds great" when you ask them.

 

[KenD]

Rehearsal is the entire ensemble. Practice is the individual or sections.

 

[Hurricane Jimmie]

Or am i just an a**? Comments please!

So Anyway, yeah, just a little bit.
We should be prepared to rehearse, but most bandmates work at their day jobs.
There should be some fun that goes with being in a band.

Lighten up, my friend.

 

[waynobass]

Practice is playing songs randomly, replaying songs, working on parts, etc.

Rehearsal is pretending you're on stage and playing the set in order.

 

[fishdreams]

Yes you may need a run through every once in a while.

But a (presumably regular) rehearsal the way OP describes sounds like a tightly controlled zero fun sourpuss experience for the performers involved.

Fine, as long as it's understood that that vibe will shine through in the show.

 

[fhm555]

practice = alone with my bass
rehearsal = with a band and my bass

 

[BlueTalon]

For myself its always been... "Practice: what i do on my own time to make sure i know my bass parts within the songs. Or working with the band on newer material to make sure everyone knows their parts correctly. "Rehearsal": Everyone at the band pad on time, loading-in, soundchecking, running through the set-list in the correct amount of time, and loading-out just as if it was a live gig. I just get annoyed when i think its a "rehearsal" for an upcoming gig and along comes girlfriends, kids, dogs, and 12 packs. Or am i just an a**? Comments please!

You rehearse loading in and loading out? That's dedication!

So I guess I never ever rehearse, if that's the definition.

 

[J Wilson]

Practice: I only get mad at myself at flubbing that one part AGAIN in my music room.

Rehearsal: This one's late, that one won't stay out of the beer, the drummer will not use the metronome to set his starting speed, the whole thing sounds like a train wreck and nobody hears it . . . . but me.

See the difference ?

 

[retslock]

I think your definition of rehearsal is little too rigid. We practice at home to get our parts right. Rehearsal is what happens when the band comes together to polish the performance. There may be changes to song arrangements at that point and sometimes parts can be discussed. Ideas get thrown around and at times a song key might be changed.
Load-in/load-out is never a part of rehearsal in my world. Venues are all different and we take them as they come. We're all very experienced and it just gets done on time. Running to time is also never considered as a part of rehearsal either. Experience tells us how many songs and which ones go in to make up the sets.

 

[Pdaddy1978]

Practice is what I do on the couch to get better.
Rehearsal is what I do to sharpen songs for a performance.

 

[Core Creek]

Rehearsals???

Practice is what you do at home to learn the parts. In a cover band, rehearsals aren’t necessarily if everyone is able to work stuff out at home. Unfortunately most people fail to do their homework and take up other people’s time to learn what they should have learned at home.

So I avoid rehearsals…

 

[Zbysek]

Or am i just an a**? Comments please!

Obviously, some members of your band consider the "rehearsal" as "fun" and you consider it as "work". Neither approach is wrong. The issue is that you don't share the same approach. You should talk about it so no side gets frustrated.

My approach depends on what kind of band it is. With some bands I like to spend time together, discuss life etc. With some bands, I just like to get the work done and leave. I prefer the former as I am getting older...

running through the set-list in the correct amount of time

I don't like doing this, personally. I don't find it as useful. I prefer to come back to parts of songs which did not work and try to polish them...

 

[turf3]

The older I get, the less I am concerned about exactly which vocabulary word is used to describe this or that. The truth is that as musicians we all have a range of activity pre-performance, from the completely alone repetition of a tiny technical element over and over to clean up its execution, through a range of things we do alone, or maybe with one other musician, then a range of ways a band (or a subset of a band) can work together, clear up to a full-scale "dress rehearsal" including (if so inclined) actually working out details of load-in and load-out, setup, etc. What you call it really isn't important; what's important is that people either share expectations or are flexible enough to roll with the situation.

At my age, I've been in groups of all types from the completely business-oriented situation where you come in sit down have five minutes to tune and warm up and then it's one work item after another till done, five minutes to pack up, the leader turns out the lights, maybe you've exchanged ten words with the other people there - to the situation where you spend an hour catching up, having drinks, snarfing down ribs, and finally someone says "gee, I guess we ought to play some music, shouldn't we?" I wouldn't swear that the first type of bands always turned out better performances than the second type. I also wouldn't swear that the second type was necessarily more fun than the first type, either.

Frankly I think there are an awful lot of people who let themselves just get wound too tight over stuff like this. Try to go with the flow, and if the situation and vibe are not happy for you, move on quietly without making a big stink about it.