Behind The Mixer

Learn Church Audio Artistry | Church Sound

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The Real Reason People Criticize Your Production Work

Don’t let one person’s opinion
define the quality of your work.
Photo provided by Daino_16

Breathe in. Breathe out. It’s ok. They simply don’t understand.  They think anyone can operate a mixing board.  They think all microphones work the same way.  They think…oh, you’ll find out soon enough.

Lately, I’ve been in a writing rut because I’ve been frustrated at things I have seen and experienced and I’ve let it get the best of me.  I tried writing a Top Ten FOH T-shirt Quotes and found myself writing #2 as “LEAVE ME ALONE, I KNOW WHAT I’M DOING!”  It wasn’t until my mother called me for help with a portable sound system that I had the “AH HA” moment that’s pulled me out of this rut.

Enter the Garden Club

My mother called me because her Garden Club was using a portable sound system for meetings and they were having problems.  The problems were focused around feedback and people having a hard time hearing the sound from the sound system.  She said “We aren’t sure what to do because every time the person turns their head away from the microphone, they can’t be heard in the sound system.” AH HA!  She thought audio work was easy.

I’ll say that again…she thought audio work was easy.

A New Perspective

This is when I started considering all the things I’ve heard people say (or have heard other tech’s experience) and I looked at them through the lens of someone who thought live audio production was easy.

Consider these comments coming from people after the service.

  1. “The electric guitar needed to be louder.”
  2. “The volume on the worship leader dropped out during the second song.”
  3. “Do you REALLY have to use all those knobs?”
  4. (During budget requests) “What’s wrong with the mixer we have now? We only need it for Sundays.”

How would you respond on hearing such comments?  Would you think any of these thoughts?

  1. “I know that’s how 99% of the congregation likes the mix.  Taking it a step further, I know that’s how the guitar is sitting in the mix in the radio version.”
  2. “They don’t realize a microphone can’t pick up a singer who has gone from 2-inches from the microphone to 4-feet away.  What are they thinking?”
  3. “Mixing is more than volume control.  The band sounds great because of their skills and my skills.”
  4. “What wrong with the mixer? This person has no idea the work involved and how we have outgrown the capabilities of our current equipment.”

This is hard work!  What do they know?

They think they know your job.  And, they think it’s easy.

My mother knows about my love for live audio production and the work I put into it.  She knows about this site.  She knows about my church audio training manual.  But for some reason, until she experienced problems with the portable sound system, she thought audio work was easy.

Back to the Garden Club

I gave my mom a few bits of advice for her Garden Club and using the portable sound system;

  • People must talk directly into the microphone.
  • Set the speakers on a table, not on the floor.
  • Always keep fresh batteries on hand.
  • And a brief primer on using the system’s only two EQ controls labeled “treble” and “bass,” regarding the spoken work.

For people like you and I, that advice seems so basic.  It’s stuff we know to do without even thinking about it.  But for the Garden Club, they used my advice and for the first time had a feedback-free, easy-to-hear sound system experience at their next monthly meeting.  They discovered that audio work isn’t as easy as you and I make it appear.

The Take Away

The next time a person comments to you on your mix, or the equipment, or in any way causes you to be frustrated at what they say, relax.  Consider the person who says it thinks they can do it themselves.  Then imagine what would happen if you put them behind the mixer for a full church service.  Relax.  Breathe in.  Breathe out.  Move on.*

*Yes, there are times when people complain for the right reasons. I’m all for taking corrective measures and owning up to mistakes.

**EDIT: My friend Brian made a great observation after reading this article – ‘it’s our job to make it look easy.’ In that regard, the easier we make it look, then the more likely others would be lead to think it is easy. Oh, if only it were so…

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Comments

  1. Just perusing through old-ish posts here…I agree that if we’re doing our job well it should look easy to outsiders. The whole goal of what we do as techs is to get out of the way of what the Spirit is going to do during a service. My church’s tech team has gotten fairly good at doing the best we can with the equipment we’ve been given that our pastors don’t always understand why it would be better to rent for some of our larger events which puts us in a difficult position at times. I mean, if 2 mackies at the front of a long cement and brick box w/ a capacity of 1,700 people worked the first time (not really) why wouldn’t it work every time? But when we’ve been given the go-ahead to rent and use better equipment we’re better able to produce an excellent sound quality which gives me some hope for the future of a permanent system :-)

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  3. The next time someone says they could do it better/with less equipment, make sure and tell them that volunteers are always required – see how quickly they retreat. Or just maybe that person can and wants to be a part of the audio team!

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  4. Simply forgive those who don’t understand, and thank those who do and freely offer valuable insight. We have plenty of both in our church. Don’t take personal offense to suggestions given sincerely. We have a handful of LA session musicians and mastering techs in the congregation with some pretty incredible ears (tough room!). If they hear something I don’t, I am wise to consider their input.

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  5. Sunday, our quartet went to sing at an outdoor event. I’m usually the soundman that sits out front, but I had to fill in singing bass, and run sound from stage.
    I got a comment about pushing too much bass through the system, from a fellow group member. Then yesterday at pratice, I got a comment about the same thing from another group member.

    I have to laugh, because…….. what they don’t know is, I low cut the monitors at, or near, 200 Hz., and the mains at 140, with Linkwitz-Riley, 24 dB per octave filters for both the mains and monitors. We didn’t use a sub that day, so what they were hearing WAS NOT bass!

    Insane, doing an outdoor event without a sub. But anyway, we made it.

    Of course, people critize when there REALLY is a problem. Mine that day was distortion in the mains. The channel, subgroup, and master faders were initally set around the 0 mark. The amps were set for appropriate gain sructure…… no clipping at all.
    Although I didn’t see the channel PFL levels go “into the red”, I’m pretty sure the problem was having the mic gains set too high.
    You see, we sing like whimps……… seriously, now….we’re soft singers. So when other, louder vocalists step up and use your system, when the gain structure is set for your group’s voices, you run into trouble.
    As the day went on, I backed the faders off. But I didn’t adjust the gains: shame on me!
    Worse yet, initally, I stayed onstage. I didn’t walk out front at all while we were “checking” .
    So, what did I glean from this? Having a more thorough sound check would help, specifically, letting the other groups “check” while I walked out front.

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    • Quaid, whenever I see people running back and forth from the stage where they are running sound AND playing/singing in the band, I want to step in and say “I’ll take care of the sound, don’t worry about it.”

      Too much bass…. Ha!

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      • Yep, allow them to focus on singing, playing, ect.
        And yes, that was alot of bass comming from our system. HaHa!
        The monitors weren’t the best, but there was no offical “bass” there.
        I must confess, and give some additional details: the 2 songs that caused problems were songs that the bass harmony part was recorded onto the soundtrack. I did this because I wasn’t fully confident that I could sing the part right on the 2 songs when we’d get on stage. So in theory, I’d hear the bass part on the track, and be able to follow it.
        Even at that, with the monitors cut off at 200-ish, and the mains at 140……. it’s not bass.
        “Rumble” was the word that was used when we were dicussing it at pratice yesterday. Granted, my voice isn’t the best. But still, How can you have rumble when there’s no real bass in the P.A.?? Well…… anyway.
        Thanks for the post, Chris. And thanks for giving Christian soundmen a “soundingboard” online, where we can talk to someone who knows what they’re talking about.

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  6. Brian makes a great point — there’s an inherent irony that you’ve touched on: if we do our work well, then it will *appear* easy. Of course, anyone who has actually stood behind a mixer knows differently. The challenge is how to respond to criticism with grace! Our work puts us right in the middle – sometimes the literal middle – of the people we serve. That makes it tough. I don’t have any great answers or insights, as this is something I also struggle with.

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