While the use of dialogue practices as an educational vehicle for critical learning and bridging differences has a robust history (Bartlett, 2005; Cooper, 2002; Hansen, 2010; Hendry, 2011), music education discourse about its uses and implementation is rather nascent. And though recent music education discourse reasons that adding unstructured “dialogue” or “student voice” to the curriculum does not necessarily spark transformative learning on its own, philosophical and pedagogical perspectives about the importance of dialogue within multiple musical contexts can be found across music education discourse (Abrahams, 2005; Allsup, 2016; Benedict et al., 2019; Elliot, 2009; Hess, 2019). In this paper, we investigate the generative possibilities and challenges of designing into the curriculum distinct dialogue practices as structural elements of the ensemble. We argue for the necessity of these practices as pedagogy and supportive container during this time of social and political upheaval and conflict across the globe. This examination offers a practitioner-focused orientation to three dialogue practices: Community agreements, feedback loops, and micro-practices of openings and closings. Dialogue practices can enrich the learning experiences of students and teachers alike by engaging differences and disagreements, but also by serving as an investigative mechanism of group dynamics through which to foster belonging within ensembles. As belonging is always being woven and unwoven within communities, including music ensembles, there is a dialogic need for music educators to keep a pulse on what is unfolding interpersonally amongst students along the axis between the individual and affinity groupings (Kahanoff, 2016). In addition, dialogue practices have also served as an integral aspect to activism and social justice work, centering non-majoritarian narratives, histories, stories, and lived realities (Hess, 2018). By engaging music students in dialogue, they can be invited to “name the world” of their lived experiences within their music making, offering opportunities for majoritarian and non-majoritarian students to make and take space (Bradley, 2009; Hess 2019a, 2021b; Spruce, 2015; Vaugeois, 2009). Within this inquiry, we attend to the following questions: What are the challenges of establishing community norms while seeking to build trust within the ensemble? How can student voices be built into dialogical structures to alter the design of music education spaces? And finally, what do opening and closing rituals as micro-practices offer as supportive structures to attune to students’ needs? By rethinking dialogue practices, we may get closer to the dialogue we seek in music education by offering more equitable spaces of belonging.