Behind The Mixer

Like I mentioned in the last blog post, running sound at church puts you in line to run sound for events other than church services.  Take my experience with a jazz band for example.

Imagine a huge place that sat thousands of people.  Imagine microphones on every instrument so you had control over the sound.  Imagine the perfect scenario.  This was not it.  read more »

If you've been running sound systems long enough, you get the occasional request to run sound for a wedding or other event.  I've run sound for home school graduations, jazz concerts, some weddings, and even a few plays.  I'm usually excited because I can use my talent for something new.  Some of the events can be a challenge and I always love a good challenge.  But there are always those times when I get caught off guard.  read more »

First off, a huge thanks to all the new newsletter subscribers.  I've got a lot of good stuff coming up for you.

WAIT!  Don't go!  That newsletter subscription requires that you verify your email address by clicking on a link in an email.  If you don't do this, you won't get the newsletter.  So, if you have haven't checked your email, please do that.  Click the verify link and put a smile on my face.  read more »

I was thinking about all the types of wall treatments for dealing with sound absorption.  In short (article coming soon), a room can have hot spots and cold spots where sound either appears super loud or very quiet if standing waves exist due to sound wave reflection.   read more »

Check out the post of Basic Mic'ing Techniques for Piano from ChurchAudio.

I'm finding some worship team pianist's like to play a regular piano instead of an electric such as the Clavinova.  While a baby grand does have a great sound, toss in a guitar, some drums, and a whole congregation singing, then you see why you need to mic the piano.  JB shows in his article that it usually takes more than one microphone.

When you hear a musical sound, let's say at 500 Hz, you are also hearing related sounds at 1 kHz, 1.5 kHz, 2.0 kHz and so on until the energy level of the frequency drops off.  Understanding harmonics will help you identify related frequencies and control your sound system's output accordingly.  Find out how...  read more »

I usually make the blog posting related to stuff that is related to church sound systems...but aren't quite enough for me to call an article.    In this case, I felt I should post a bit of information about the site.  read more »

Mix-minus is a particular setup for a mixing console, such that the output to a specific device contains everything except the input from that device.   The advantage of a mix-minus is the elimination of echoes and feedback.

A mix-minus signal is sometimes also known as a 'clean feed' or a 'Select Audio Return' (SAR).

How is it used?   read more »

A common approach to sound mixing is the four step approach; Set fader's at 0 point , set the gain, turn on the channels, and leave the board alone until the end of the service.  Looking at the fader's, they are all in a flat line. This is a good place to start but it's not the final answer.

Mixing the different sounds in a service is much more than that.  Read more to find out how you can bring your sounds to life.

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Sunday mornings start with me setting up the stage with all the microphone stands, cables, wires, music stands, microphones, and everything but the musical instruments that the worship team brings in.  But there is more to it than plug-and-play.

Here is my pre-team list:  read more »