A method and apparatus for conducting a sidebar, subconference call from a multiparty conference call is provided. Once a party has joined a multiparty conference call, the party is able to initiate the subconference call by transmitting a session initiation protocol (SIP) command to a target party. Two SIP commands that may be employed to initiate the subconference call are the REFER command and the INVITE command. To allow the target party to distinguish between incoming communication requests related to the multiparty conference call from extraneous ones, the REFER or INVITE command includes at least one data field containing an identifier of the conference call referred the REFER or INVITE command. Once received and verified, the target party may respond accordingly to establish the subconference call. The target party's handset may reference data fields in the SIP command to those locally stored and known to be associated with the multiparty conference call. Where recognized, the handset may present the communication request to the target party along with an option to accept the communication request.