Vital…Propel…Next Level…Can four production tips make THAT MUCH of a difference? Yes, they can! The sad part is a good number of people aren’t using these tips and their sound is suffering.
Answer this question; when does the mixing work begin?
- Once you enter the sound booth.
- Once you enter the sanctuary.
- Once you get the song list.
Too many techs answer this incorrectly. That’s where this list of 4 vital tips comes into play. These are the simple things that should be done, could easily be done, but many times aren’t being done. Let’s change that.
The 4 Vital Production Tips
1. MIC INSTRUMENTS THE RIGHT WAY!
I’m occasionally pulled into a church to listen to their music mix and make recommendations. Before the event starts, I check out how the instruments are mic’d. The wrong mic setup will have a hugely negative impact on their mix. In many cases, mixing tweaks can’t compensate for the poor mic setup.
Poor mic setups can be categorized in two forms; too far and too close. Mic’s that are located too far from the instrument will pick up a lot of stage noise and won’t pick up enough of the instrument. For example, a kick drum mic located too far away from the drum head would give you a dull kick drum sound and a bunch of stage noise.
Mic’s that are too close to the instrument can produce a distorted signal or a poor sound. For example, if an instrument microphone was set up with an acoustic piano and the microphone is placed too close to the piano strings. In this case, instead of capturing the full sound of the piano, the resulting sound is dominated by the frequencies produced by a handful of strings.
Instruments should be mic’d so you hear the best representative sound of the instrument and the least amount of stage noise. It is the live environment so sound isolation isn’t possible but you do have the ability to get really close.
Oh, and make sure you are using the right microphone.
2. LEARN TO SET THE CHANNEL GAIN!
Second to microphone location is gain setting. And gain setting is the second place where I see people make mistakes. The problem is it’s assumed the GAIN (a.k.a. TRIM) knob is a volume control and from there, it’s easy to mess things up. Hey, I’m not judging…I used to think the same thing myself.
How do you know if your gain settings are whacked? Do you hear a lot of hiss in a channel even when the musician is playing? Do you have feedback issues all the time? Are your fader controls normally down near the bottom of the fader slot? If you answered yes to any of these, chances are you have gain issues.
The GAIN controls the level of audio signal coming into the mixing board. Along with the audio signal, there is the presence of electrical line noise that’s part of any audio system. When the GAIN control is set too low, you hear this noise in the channel. When the GAIN level is set too high, you experience problems like audio feedback.
Each channel’s gain should be set so you have the best audio signal-to-noise ratio (S/N ratio). This means you hear a strong signal and little-to-no electrical noise.
3. DON’T TREAT MUSICIANS EQUALLY!
There is a time and a place for bias and this is one of them.
I remember it like it happened yesterday. I watched the sound guy during the sound check and I couldn’t believe my eyes. The band took the stage, he set all of the channel volumes at the same audible volume level and then he stopped. There was no mixing or volume balancing. It was all singers and instruments coming out of the main speakers at the same volume.
In my complete guide to church audio production, I go into detail on volume balancing and there is even an audio file where I mix instruments all at the same level and then compare it to a properly volume balanced mix. The difference is dramatic. Don’t treat musicians equally!
The problem is what you hear and what you think you hear are two different things. For example, if the band is doing a final song that should sound big with full-on instruments and everyone singing, then you might think you should bump up all of the channel volumes. But as soon as you do that, your whole mix falls apart because the bass is stepping on the electric guitar that’s stepping on the acoustic guitar and all the instruments are stepping on the vocals. Taking this scenario as an example, it would be better to boost of house volume so the overall balance of instruments and vocals stays the same. I digress.
How do you learn where musicians should “sit in the mix?” I’ve said this before but I can’t stress it enough; analyze professional recordings of the song. So whatever Chris Tomlin song your worship band is playing next week, get a copy of the original and listen to it over and over. Listen to one instrument through the whole song. Is it “upfront” in the mix? Is it more of a supporting instrument in the background? Imagine all of the musicians on the stage and their location on the stage is based on where you hear them in the mix. That’s the best way to learn where musicians should “sit in the mix.”
A quick tip on evaluating your volume balance:
4. PUSH YOUR PRIDE ASIDE!
Whenever I find significant problems with someone’s music mix, it’s because they messed up in one or more of the above areas. And that’s where this last point comes in.
Maybe it’s a guy thing. Maybe it’s a geek thing. Maybe it’s just me, but I doubt it. If something is wrong, I want to figure out why. I want to figure out the how’s and why’s and where’s and all of that stuff. While I applaud anyone who desires to learn, I will applaud even more for the person who asks for help. For more on that, check out:
The last point comes down to this; no matter how long you’ve been mixing, no matter how young or old you are, there will always be something to learn from another audio tech. One of the best ways I’ve found of learning is by creating my mix, during band practice, and then asking another tech to show me how they would change it to make it better.
The Take Away
These 4 tips are VITAL because they involve the foundation for all mixing work. Get the first three right before starting hands-on mixing. As for the 4th on being foundational, one must have the right mindset on mixing, learning, and desiring to create the best sound for the congregation. I’ve seen what happens when pride gets in the way. It’s not pretty.
Scott says
January 3, 2014 at 12:13 pmAmen to tip #3. As a bass, electric guitar and keyboard player that also has live sound mixing responsibilities, and some past worship leading experience – tip #3 applies not only to the sound techs, but to the entire band. Critical listening and understanding song composition and orchestration go miles to perfect a mix. Many times this often translates to telling the keyboard player to put their left hand in their pocket, if a song is being led with an acoustic or electric guitar rhythm parts(a whole bunch of modern worship music), and there’s a bumping bass line going on – the left hand of the keyboard piano, organ, pad, etc. is often not present in the recording either by arrangement (typical), or by mix EQ on the keyboard tracks. This is where the worship leader/music director can help out the sound tech immensely. The sound tech needs to be as aware of the arrangement as the band and have notes as to when to pull down or feature different parts – it’s a live arrangement task if the band is not taking care of this themselves. Ultimately, this should be a partnership between the tech and the worship leader/music director. For the band, simply learning the rhythm/melodies/chords is not the final destination. Unless you have very specific charts (rare), the task of arranging for the worship service is down to the individuals and worship leader. YouTube also is very helpful here to guitar players in particular, as there are lots of folks giving ‘lessons’ for nearly any popular modern worship song on how to play different parts, set up effects, etc. For the tech, it’s not just putting up mics and setting channel gains and EQ and providing an IEM mix – learn the arrangement. I write out mixing arrangement notes in a spreadsheet where the rows are the song sections, and the columns are individual instrument/vocal parts. Most modern rock worship songs have about 10 distinct tracks these days: Drums, Bass, Acoustic Guitar, Rhythm Electric, Lead Electric, Keyboard 1, Keyboard 2, Lead Vocal, BGVs, and often another ‘effect’ guitar or keyboard track or two. For the band leader and sound tech, to make notes for each of these as to levels and presence in the mix, this is a good 5-7 full listens through the song. Lead Vox levels usually don’t change, and often the lead rhythm instrument, whether it’s a guitar or a keyboard, doesn’t vary significantly throughout the song – but everything else usually does if there are any Bethel/Gateway/Hillsong type dynamic build/releases going on.
Chris says
January 6, 2014 at 10:24 am“telling the keyboard player to put their left hand in their pocket.” I know what you mean. As a tech, I will pull back an instrument if the sound they are playing doesn’t compliment the arrangement.