[LAU] Live mic and monitoring (was rant.)

[Thomas Vecchione]

Nettings hit most of it on the head, but I will add a few comments...


On Sat, Dec 29, 2012 at 6:23 PM, Jörn Nettingsmeier <
nettings at stackingdwarves.net> wrote:

> On 12/29/2012 09:55 PM, Len Ovens wrote:
>
>>
>>   - lead vocal (also da boss), Male, uses stand. sets the eq on the PA for
>> bass and highend up and midrange down (U shaped yuck)
>>
> ...
>
> > but then the whole PA is set to his voice as he likes it.
>
> problem identified :) solving it is beyond the realm of the technical and
> may necessitate the use of blunt instruments.
>
>
Well partially beyond the range of the technical.  Blunt Instruments first,
then come back and redo it right.  The System EQ should be set so the sound
coming out of the speakers and being heard by the audience is as flat
response as possible.  Use channel EQ to shape the sound of the singer's
voice.  The system EQ should be used very minimally if at all to shape the
overall sound of the system other than to get it to a flat response.


   - vocal three, female, classic trained.. hardly needs a mic at all but
> has the Dixon I mentioned before... may as well be using a carbon pile
> telephone handset.. lucky she doesn't need much reinforcement.
>

still - it's nice to have a decent mike on a good voice, where it will make
> a difference.
>
>

Agreed.  Especially if your other vocals are amplified, this can sound
somewhat unnatural unless you have some going through the PA sadly.  It
really depends though.

>
> i honestly don't know why a 30-band eq lets you boost stuff. 99% of users
> would be much better off having an eq that only provides attenuation.
>
>
Used to agree with you, but honestly sometimes it is much easier to boost
one or two bands than to cut 28:)  But yes you should always be cutting
rather than boosting as it means you are adding headroom before feedback,
not taking away.


> honestly, an omni mike won't help you. fons does have a point in saying
> that omni mikes have some advantages and could be put to good use outside
> the realm of classical recording, but until someone sorts out your lead
> singer problem, that's academic :)
>

Yes, any use of an omni mic on stage really necessitates making sure that
your system is as flat response as possible, see my comments above.


> get a mixer with two semi-parametric mids, problem solved. very decent
> ones are available nowadays at very low cost. a year ago, i got the club i
> work for to invest in a new board (an a&h gl 2800 for about 3k euros plus
> taxes, which is really negligible for a professional venue), and the
> musicians have been more than happy with it. a board with that feature set
> and sound quality would have been high in the five digits 15 years ago.
> nowadays, there's really no need (and no excuse) to work with inadequate
> mixers if you're serious about your music.
>
>
For smaller format mixers, look at the MixWizard series, also from Allen
and Heath.


>
>
>  When I was in broadcast(80 to 85), the ENG guys had sennheiser shotguns.
>> They used them both camera mounted or hand held... the talking head could
>> hold the mic very low almost out of the picture.
>>
>
> shotguns are not useful for music stages. they do have better side
> rejection in theory, but at the cost of a very irregular off-axis response.
> the few times i used shotguns in the theatre, i found they would give me
> even less gain before feedback than a standard supercardioid, and required
> insane filtering.
>
>
Depends actually.  I can utilize shotguns when I need to in a theater, but
you are correct in that you have to be very careful.  I have used them on
stages for vocal pickup as well as tap pickups.  But unless you KNOW what
you are doing, these are the wrong mics to use, and are certainly the wrong
mic to use in this case absolutely.

          Seablade
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