Small festival sound

[TonyMitchell]

we didn't take our sound guy because this was one of those no outside engineers on the desk jobs.

 

I can't understand why any event would allow this policy!

Not allowing the band to bring their mix engineer to me is no different than not allowing them to bring their own drummer!

No house tech, or tech that has never mixed that band previously is going to come close to the guy that knows the band and their repertoire intimately.

Crazy.

[Tim McCulloch]

Greetings from The Colonies! It's been several years since I've posted here at BR and was glad to see my login still worked. :)

 

It there is any solace it's like that in the USA as well. Taking the lowest bid regardless of previous negative experiences, shady bidding practices on both sides, etc is probably a major component of these festivals. The earlier comment about lacking a bodily injury or death, it's "all good" is spot on.

 

My background - I'm a union (IATSE) stage hand in my spare time but my real job is managing a regional sound/lighting/vdo company and senior audio systems engineer. We service events ranging from small business meetings for 75 people to indoor arena concerts and corporate events. As a stage hand, I am exposed to a variety of other providers, their gear and their personnel. At the "A" level of national and international touring performers, most of the Band Engineers are appropriately competent and a few are downright exceptional BUT generally these BEs are not employees of the audio system provider, they are employed by the artist's technical representative; at lower levels one still finds some really good mixerpersons but often they have additional duties - production or tour management, merchandise accounting/supervision, back line assembly - that distract them from the focus needed to be a good mixerperson. Again, these BEs are engaged by the artist, not the audio provider. As the audio system provider we supply system technicians that have some clue as to how a variety of music sounds and they'll try to make your presentation a good one. A great deal of having a successful company lies with the mixerpersons having exposure to musical and cultural variety, a positive service attitude and people skills to deal with situations as they arise.

 

As to the "no guest engineers".... uh, I've been on the receiving end of it a few decades ago (and didn't like it, neither did my artist) and unless the event organizers put such a policy into the contract between the event and our firm, our system tech will have a little chat with the "guest" and absent any red flag issues or comments, will assist the BE in getting the results he seeks for his artist. If it turns out the BE is more of "Sound Doood" our tech might take over if the work results are embarrassing or threaten the integrity of the system in any way; or if the event organizer asks us to step in.

 

Mixing music is a skill that requires rehearsal and practice, just like playing an instrument or singing. Too many "Sound Dooods" like to play with the knobs, buttons, sliders and software... but don't have a clue as to what the final result should sound like. Without some kind of target (subject moving target status) it's only random chance if playing with those controls will result in *music* coming from the PA system. The other type of Sound Doood spends more time on social media, talking about his gig than actually paying attention to the mix... but if this tech doesn't know what it's supposed to sound like, almost anything is good enough so why not be on FaceSpace? /sarc But without practice even more motivated techs are unlikely to reach their potential. I started in audio nearly 40 years ago as a mixerperson - the systems engineer thing came later and not by design - and to this day I enjoy mixing the support acts and bands that for whatever reason do not bring a BE. I've trained our crew to *ask* the performers about their music and how they want to be heard/seen. After they get over the shock we get some direction or at least a feel for what they're hoping for and then we try to do no harm. ;)

 

If any of you here find yourself in my part of the USA, I hope we do a show together!

 

Have fun, good luck.

 

Tim Mc

[Jivemaster]

From several years doing the event circuit in lots of London hotels, and a while on here, it's my opinion that a band has finally "gone professional" when they take their own sound operator. This is mostly to ensure that the band sounds the same each time so actually can perform the show as known.

[Junior8]

Truly I simply can't recall when I heard good sound last in a theatre or concert setting. Trouble is I think it has all got too complex and equipment heavy and somewhere along the line the notion of simply reinforcing the original sound seems to have been lost. I'm old enough to recall when it wasn't like this, when even quite big names would turn up with a backline and a PA and give a much better result than the over-tinkered with present day live mixes. But you see it was their music and no one else was going to get in the way. That's what Paul is moaning about when it comes to basics - someone with a tin ear or no blasted ear at all has been interposed between them and their audience. It's all too common I'm afraid.

[paulears]

I wonder if with sound becoming clever, operators get more pleasure and job satisfaction in the prep and setup rather than operating. A bit like lighting designers now use a programmer who does the clever stuff. In sound though, there is often not a sound designer - so the operator needs to be 'wider', and I think that could be the problem. The actual gig is not the important stimulating thing it should be. I see sound ops joining in comms chat, using their phone and doing other stuff during the show. I hear feedback that gets ignored or worse, repeatedly allowed to ring. I see a rise in automatic tools - the easily applied compressor button so to a degree, the thing mixes itself, and now on X32s, people using the auto mix (or at least, trying to) in music shows - when, if I understand it, it is really for conferences and the like not music. Compression and limiting meaning less real balancing of the sources. Before the troublesome gig - I specifically mentioned that compression was not required, and I pointed out why with the keyboard expression pedal example, yet that's exactly what happened. I just don't see why a company who have invested serious money in a decent line array system then make it sound less good than it can be. Do they assume that the punters don't notice? I just can't believe they it's because they are poor at their job, they just seem bored and/or lazy. It does work the other way too - one of the forthcoming shows at my venue wanted us to do their sound, and provided 28 inputs on their list - including brass and 7 vocalists. I found it surprising a show that complex would not be touring their own engineer who knew the show. I'd have been happy to mix it, but it would have been a tough one. I do know that if I had mixed it, then it would have had my 100% attention - the idea that I'd try automixing or slapping compressors everywhere so I could play win my phone is just not on!

[timsabre]

I find mixing sound more enjoyable with the latest tech to help. Means you can concentrate on getting the right sound rather than fighting with not enough compressors or eqs or whatever. I think the answer is as above, PA is now cheaper and there are lots of people who enjoy buying and playing with the gadgets but don't know how to mix.

[Stuart91]

I agree with Tim, but I still can't help but suspect that the problems Paul suffered were due to lack of interest as much as lack of skill. And that's the bit I struggle to understand. Had it been a blundering idiot continually tinkering with the mix but making the wrong decisions, that'd be almost more forgivable than slapping on the compressors and sitting back. For me, mixing the band is the "fun part" of the day, and even if we've had hours of slog beforehand, I still find it lifts my spirits when the music kicks off. To be sitting at that point thinking "meh" and reaching for your phone seems like a really sad place to be.

[electronicsuk]

Personally, I like to get in touch with any acts that I know I'm going to be mixing well in advance of the event. I'll get a basic channel plan and monitor mix set up based on their response, deal with any specific requests and, most importantly, I'll see if they have any studio-produced tracks that I can listen to and get a feel for their sound. For me, this has produced a lot of positive feedback. That's fine for me as I'm a very small operation. However, I can see how an engineer working a small stage but as part of a larger company would have a hard time of it, as they may have little to no involvement with the planning side of things. They probably don't have the luxury of getting to know their acts ahead of time and may well be mixing a genre that they've never listened to before, let alone one that they enjoy! Even so, that's no defense for a set-and-forget attitude on the desk once sound check is done.

[sunray]

I've never understood why there are so many people working in sound who are so useless at it It winds me up on many levels

If you don't want to mix the bands, go and work conferences or something!

I don't understand this either, except it's too easy to end up in a division one is not accustomed to. My own origin started by sharing my pushchair with a 10W amplifier and the matching 10" 5W speakers as Dad didn't have a car, our 'niche' was basically the average village fete but over the years have found myself in areas I'm not particularly experienced in. Gradually my kit expanded over the years as my regular customers have asked for different systems and yes did start doing 'band' systems up to 5K but didn't offer the operator. Yes I've ended up mixing bands where the operator has not turned up/gone sick (drunk) etc. and I think I've got away with it so far. I've pulled out of this side as fitness has decreased with increasing years and arthritis.

As to doing conferences as a lower option, oops! I think the mistakes are impossible to hide there whereas most of the public couldn't care less about the sound of a band as long as it's too loud.

 

Hiding my head below the parapet now.

[S&L]

Personally, I like to get in touch with any acts that I know I'm going to be mixing well in advance of the event. I'll get a basic channel plan and monitor mix set up based on their response, deal with any specific requests and, most importantly, I'll see if they have any studio-produced tracks that I can listen to and get a feel for their sound. For me, this has produced a lot of positive feedback. That's fine for me as I'm a very small operation. However, I can see how an engineer working a small stage but as part of a larger company would have a hard time of it, as they may have little to no involvement with the planning side of things. They probably don't have the luxury of getting to know their acts ahead of time and may well be mixing a genre that they've never listened to before, let alone one that they enjoy! Even so, that's no defense for a set-and-forget attitude on the desk once sound check is done.

 

I was feeling a little depressed by some of the comments here and particularly the crack made at weekenders which was bordering on offensive in this day and age - but electronicsuk reply gives me encouragements - very similar to the way I work on 300 - 700 cap festivals indoors and outdoors. I would make the following observations that are slightly more practical than the crack at part timers:

1. information is a two way street - it can be like pulling teeth trying to get information out of artists and to get them to have some sense of what is realistic within timescales and budgets.

 

2. almost invariably I'm mixing monitors from foh - artists sometimes have very little appreciation of how limiting that can be. keep it simple, keep expectation modest.

 

3. a festival is not the place to get flash - don't bring 4 guitars and 3 keyboards when one of each will do. don't try and complicate your monitors or monitor mixes -- simple wins the day

 

4. I always push for soundchecks and breaks with clients, even if that means doing it in front of the public (making it clear that they are checking) - the public gets it - often engineers promote a climate of bravado - no sound checks, precious little line check time, it's illogical. however good you are, do the prep and it will be better.

 

5. checks goes both ways - I had a big name 60s artist who never checks (walks in after doors open) and within 30 seconds of starting was at my throat over the mic, in front of the audience, for his bad monitor mix. thankfully it was 2nd day of the festival and the audience were all resident within the hotel hosting so they knew every other artist had sounded decent and therefore who was really to blame.

 

 

6, festivals or otherwise, amateur or pro, roughly 50% of artists I work with cannot keep a reasonably consistent signal level singing or playing their instrument. if the gain is all over the place it's often bad setups or poor mic technique. so what does the engineer do? let the signal on a digital desk start to clip or adjust? and then when the keyboard player switches patch again, is it the keys fault or the engineers fault that the gain doesn't get adjusted to the target level in the first 60 seconds or so.?

 

 

7 even the pros have bad technique - this gets more wearing on a festival when you are working on the 11th guy that can't sing into a hypercardioid and the 7th guitarist that has a tone so indistinct it takes you all your time to get anything resembling acceptable. I have sat with others who have said "not my problem if they didn't get in touch with channel list / if they cant play /if they have no mic technique or appreciation" and they turn off that much quicker - I never stop mixing but I have worked with others that think that the artists lack of preparation/ability/unreasonable expectation is a sign for them to stop caring - this ramps up more quickly when fatigue is a factor.

 

 

8...fatigue is a huge factor on festivals. I did a small local festival last month (700 cap marque) and as per usual, I mixed everything, I managed everything from stage and lights going in, through channel lists, monitor mixing etc - with an a2 at the stage end and a 3rd hand for 6 hours at the end to load out - we did a 10 hour prep day on the Thursday and then a 14 hour day followed by two 16 hour days. at some point you wouldn't be human if you weren't distracted for a minute or stifled a yawn at some point. doing those shows is an endurance event.

 

 

some guys do just turn up and mix and maybe they don't give a damn, (that's not much different to any other environment) but don't assume that's all that the guy on the desk does on every small festival or that there aren't other demands on him/her while mixing or that the artists are blame free. coming at it as a customer or engineer or artist you need to understand that ANY festival is always going to be a compromise compared with a one artist theatre show. if you are the artist, all you can do is make it as simple as possible for the engineer and hope. ...and then avoid if you feel its hopeless - no one forces you to take the show.

[paulears]

I really have to smile when you go to any of the shows we visit ourselves - the PLASAs and the video shows where they do Q&As or training sessions - and every single time the sound is awful, and sitting there in full view of perhaps hundreds of audio people is a guy at the back paying no attention, often on their phones. If it was me I would at least attempt to show people in the same game I was trying!

 

One of the things that we've all had is when you are at an event and you can hear something about to take off, or you know that while you can see something happening on stage you can't hear it, or at the one I was at last week as an audience member, you can hear something that is completely wrong - a snare drum so loud compared to the rest of the kit it must be noticed by the FOH guy - or the slap double bass in a rockabilly band that is just going duh - duh because there's no treble. Or the reverb left on after every single button on the end so the first words are all effect when they chat and say thank you. Once maybe a slap head moment, but every single song? Almost as if the engineer suddenly noticed it had gone quiet.

 

I think we're just talking about lazy people, fed up with act after act. I agree with most of S&Ls post but the 11th guy having trouble singing into a hyper suggests that maybe hypers were poor choices. After all, they don't have a big label on them saying these work differently. Often when you do a show where people share kit - like the drum essentials and maybe bass amps/cabs the crew don't spot the drummer replacing heavy deep shell snare with a light one with a brush head, and they again might not notice the thinness of the cymbals - yet the two overheads would let a 6 ft person stand under them - and that metal eq is still on the desk.

 

Levels seem to be set with no headroom - digital desks really don't need to get near a red light on sound check, because you know its going to rise, and at these small festivals levels are set individually - never are the band asked to all play at the same time. The first time they do it's a surprise the red lights all come on? This then wrecks the minimal soundcheck balance. If you can afford a line array for your hire stock, why not give everyone a personal mixer? They're less than a frame to stack the damn speakers together! So many bands who have their own PAs have personal mixers and you have to downgrade to remote control monitors for a festival gig? Surely getting rid of monitors would make the engineers so much happier because they could (if they feel inclined) mix.

 

When I first started company managing panto - I used to feel guilty when I was packed by 11pm on the out, and the crew were looking at all night. Now I don't because I realise that this is what they sign up to do. So sure - the festival crew have long days and then a miserable time when it finishes - but if you don't like it, don't do the job. Sound used to be the job where the op could not be 100% with the team during the show, because their 100% attention was on what was happening onstage. The good ones are tunnel visioned - their entire concentration is on the show. The ones that need to complete the next level on their phone cannot be in the same league. Many are also musically inept. Unable to understand the common features of any genre other than the one they like (or play in). Like those who do show an interest and say "I tried to get some cut into your bass sound, man - but your amp settings are all wrong." Odd that, the tone turned down on my guitar and the HF rolled off is 'wrong' is it? A few years back, PA supplied was nice to read on a contract, but now it introduces an element of concern. Especially when there's no monitor desk on stage, and you n' even see the tent out front!

 

It's just very sad when somebody puts on Facebook that they couldn't hear the drummer - when he is the lead on at least 30% of the songs, and does all the squeaky high stuff. Most of my stuff is the 3rds - the Majors and minors, and hearing this coming back from the reflections as high in the mix just confirms what I was maybe thinking. The person who did the sing intro is NOT the person they should be listening to - the set list gives those details, but all they want to know is what the last song is.

 

Turned into a bit of a rant - sorry about that, but I used to enjoy playing at festivals and now they are the worst kind of gigs. Theatres being probably the best now, and corporates randomly swinging from good to band. Without doubt the gigs we do with our own kit and own PA guy are the best in terms of stress level.

[timsabre]

I was feeling a little depressed by some of the comments here and particularly the crack made at weekenders which was bordering on offensive in this day and age

 

I'm not sure which comment you're referring to but if it was me, I wasn't making a crack at weekenders/part timers, I am one myself. A lot of "part timers" actually do a better job as they're turning up fresh to an event with some enthusiasm for it. My target was what Tim McCulloch above called "sound doods" who know how to operate the gear but have no experience mixing - this was me once as well, and everyone has to learn, but being left alone to mix a band at a festival is not a great way to do it.

 

[TonyMitchell]

I read S&L's comment as referring to post #11, the one suggesting moonlighting 9-5-ers buy X32s to use with disco rigs, citing the affordability of the desk as the problem.

I disagree, as in pre-X32 days, these would be the guys that would turn up with a battered Mackie desk or similar, complete with dead channels, crackly faders and missing pots.

However if they are now buying X32s, then (a) they are investing more, not less, than back in the day and (b) they have the benefit of preset libraries, which are a much better starting point than nothing, when also considering their analogue outboard racks would typically be non existent or of low quality with settings being guesswork... not forgetting they would never carry enough insert cables to patch all those shiny silver gates & comps.

[Stuart91]

Of course, an X32 now means that you can have compression on ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING and you can strangle every last bit of dynamics out of the sound.

[Shez]

That's the one downside to digital desks - you can screw up the sound far more spectacularly than you ever could on an analogue desk!