Coordinating Rehearsal and Tech Time During International Festival Touring

What coordinated rehearsal and tech time means

Coordinating rehearsal and technical (tech) time during international festival touring means treating the festival’s booked slot, the venue’s technical rehearsal, the company’s get-in and the performance changeover as parts of one shared schedule. The aim is not to reproduce a full production week in a festival venue. It is to give the visiting company enough structured time to confirm safety, fit the set, integrate sound and lighting cues, test scene changes, and agree who calls what before an audience arrives.

Festival practice varies. The Space UK, a festival venue operator, describes the technical rehearsal as the point when a company first sees the space, meets the crew, learns where set and props will be stored, and tests whether its blocking fits the stage (Moss, The Space UK). It also gives a concrete scheduling example: companies receive a rehearsal of roughly one-and-a-half times their booked slot length, plus ten minutes for a safety and introductory briefing; a one-hour slot therefore produces a 1h40 rehearsal (The Space UK). That formula is venue-specific, not a universal standard, but it shows why the booked slot, rather than an abstract ideal rehearsal length, is the basic unit of planning.

Distinguish the parts of the schedule

Festival schedules often use overlapping terms. Agree on definitions in writing. Get-in or load-in is the movement of equipment into the venue. Stage build or set-up covers assembling the set and positioning props. Technical rehearsal integrates staging with lighting, sound, projection and scene changes; it may include a cue-to-cue pass that jumps between cues rather than running the whole play. A soundcheck or line check tests audio equipment and levels. A dress rehearsal is a full run with performance conditions. Changeover is the period between one company’s departure and the next company’s use of the space. Not every festival can offer all of these, so mark which are confirmed, optional or impossible.

Build the schedule from the venue’s constraints

Start by obtaining the venue’s technical schedule and confirmation of the exact rehearsal duration, crew call, access times, power and rigging limits, and the point at which the company must vacate. The Space UK’s example includes a ten-minute safety and introductory briefing within the allocated rehearsal, and advises companies to arrive a little before the start to meet the venue manager (The Space UK). Those details should appear in the company’s own schedule, not just the venue’s.

Then map the company’s priorities onto the available minutes. A useful order is: safety and access; set and props storage; floor and spacing; sound and projection checks; lighting focus and cue states; scene and costume changes; cue-to-cue or selected transitions; then a full run if time allows. If the full run is impossible, rehearse the highest-risk transitions. Do not assume that a technical rehearsal includes a complete performance. The Space UK notes that the rehearsal follows the booked slot closely and can produce unusual durations; companies should plan for the allocated time rather than the advertised performance length (The Space UK).

Assign roles and decision rights

International touring benefits from one clearly identified technical lead who can consolidate information and make decisions on the ground. Battery Dance Company’s touring guidance argues that it is critically important to have one person responsible for planning and executing all technical elements, and suggests that a company may ideally have two people covering the area, a production designer and a stage manager, while acknowledging that tight budgets often require one person to handle a wide range of responsibilities (Battery Dance Company). That lead needs not only design knowledge but patience, persuasion, repair skills, improvisation, calm under pressure and leadership (Battery Dance Company).

At the venue, the visiting technical lead should work with the venue manager or duty technician, the stage manager, lighting and sound operators, and the festival producer. Clarify who calls cues, who authorises changes to the plot, who holds keys and access, who manages radio channels, and who can stop the rehearsal for safety. Where several languages are in use, name an interpreter or bilingual crew member and confirm that safety instructions are understood. Do not leave authority ambiguous: a polite misunderstanding about who was responsible for a task is a common cause of lost time.

Send a usable information pack before arrival

The technical rider is the traditional document for stating requirements and contacts. A published international touring rider for Jasmin Vardimon’s NOW, for example, includes production contacts, general front-of-house information, an 85-minute running time, latecomer arrangements, merchandise coordination and technical sections (Jasmin Vardimon Company). Not every festival needs a full rider, but the visiting company should send the venue a concise pack: a technical rider; a ground plan or floor plan; a lighting and sound plot where relevant; a cue list or running order; a contact sheet; and a risk or access note. The rider should identify the person authorised to approve changes.

Internally, use a rehearsal and soundcheck planner to record inputs, check results and hand-offs. EventSuite’s template is explicitly a rehearsal and soundcheck workbook and printable desk sheet, not a full production schedule, technical rider, load-in planner or speaker-management workbook (EventSuite). That limitation is useful: the planner supports the rehearsal process, but it does not replace the rider or the venue’s schedule. Keep one master schedule and one master set of documents, with version numbers and a named owner. Print the desk sheet for the floor and keep an offline copy.

Coordinate sound, lighting and multilingual cues

Sound and lighting need their own sub-schedule inside the technical rehearsal. A line check confirms that every input reaches the console; a soundcheck sets levels for the performance; a lighting focus or cue-to-cue confirms states and transitions. For spoken theatre, reserve time for radio microphones, scene-change music, effects and any live feed. For dance or physical performance, confirm the sequence of cues and the operator’s calls. If surtitles, captions or projected translation are used, test the cueing method, the operator position, the readable font size and the timing of text against the performance. Translation adds a second cue stream: someone must decide whether the operator follows the stage manager, a timecode or a script, and that decision should be written down.

Language access affects the technical rehearsal as much as the performance. Terms such as standby, go, blackout, top, Q and changeover may not translate directly. Use a bilingual cue sheet, label consoles and flight cases in the working language, and avoid relying on rapid verbal instructions in a noisy venue. If the company and crew do not share a language, a short pre-rehearsal briefing with an interpreter can save more time than adding minutes to a cue-to-cue.

Plan changeovers and contingencies

Festival touring compresses time because the venue may host several companies in one day. Build contingency into the company’s own plan for delayed transport, missing equipment, customs inspection, power differences and illness. Confirm equipment compatibility and local supply routes rather than assuming that a listed item will be available. For legal or regulatory matters such as work permits, visas, customs relief, electrical safety or insurance, identify the jurisdiction and verify current requirements with the relevant official authority or an experienced producer; a festival’s general advice is not a substitute for a formal check.

Contingency should be written into the schedule as decision points. For example: if the get-in finishes late, which cues are essential? If a projector fails, is there an audio-only or adapted plan? If an interpreter is unavailable, who delivers the safety briefing? These are hypothetical prompts, not predictions. The point is to make priorities explicit before the company is tired and the venue is waiting.

A practical pre-rehearsal checklist

• Confirm the booked slot, rehearsal duration, crew call, access and vacate times in writing.
• Ask whether the venue’s rehearsal allowance includes safety briefing, set-up, soundcheck or changeover.
• Send rider, floor plan, plots, cue list, running order and contacts at least the agreed lead time.
• Name one company technical lead and one stage manager; confirm who calls cues and authorises changes.
• Agree the working language, interpreter provision and bilingual safety terms.
• Set a priority list for the rehearsal: safety, fit-up, high-risk transitions, sound and projection, then full run if possible.
• Record check results and changes on a desk sheet; update the master documents after the rehearsal.
• Confirm the changeover plan, storage, waste removal and who returns the space to the venue.

Good coordination does not eliminate the pressure of festival touring. It makes the pressure legible. When the slot length, briefing time, crew roles, documents and priorities are agreed in advance, the technical rehearsal can do its proper job: let the company and venue discover the real show in the real space, with enough time left to make it safe and repeatable.