Comments on: Why Do Sound Engineers Insist On Actively Mixing Vocals?

By: John Lords

John Lords — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 11:49:08 +0000

I am a sound engineer on a small club and bar level and have watched other pro engineers run sound. I always wondered why they were cranking faders up and down during and in between songs. Seems kinda silly but i guess if your riding the gains to maximize presence and volume you can get some feedback throught the monitors. Generaly i have this problem with the drummers because their kits are miced but there still bleeding through the vocal mic. I just give them an on/off switch so they can use their own discretion.

By: Stan

Stan — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 18:47:49 +0000

I am another who doesn’t get into blogs but found this interesting and wanted to pipe in. I think there is a lot of agreement in these blogs even though it appears that there is some disagreement. The easy answer was the last who said “Band and Sound guy should talk and agree prior to the gig”. I am a musician and Sound guy enjoying 20+ years of working musically in 20 European countries, 3 African countries and 28 U.S. states. Sound guys work on such diverse levels with bands who are Novas all the way up to Pro which makes all the difference in the world. Real World is that most bands that sound guys work with are Novas and know very little about sound and do not know how to back off when they are singing backgrounds. Most Novas vocalists never check there mic professionally like they are going to scream during the real gig. Leaving mics on become a real challenge especially in a situation where a drummer has no real voice and the gain on his mic destroys the overall sound when left on. I do agree with trying to leave the mics set and forget them when working with a professional band. Professional bands are few and far between. The most recent laugh I want to share is a funny situation where the band leader claims that he runs sound on a regular basis and knows everything about sound and doesn’t realize that he is a horrible drummer to boot. The guy had some decent gear like Dual 18 Yorkville subwoofers Large series three QSC amps and wants to make sure that the sound guy mixes his kick drum correctly only to find that he has 22 gauge car stereo speaker wire operating the QSC amps supplying power to the subs and has a kick drum with a ripped head??????? So much for dampening factor. Sound guys that have proper training do understand more than band members. There’s a lot more than knobs and cables. Sound guys who were musicians first then received pro sound training found their selves realizing how much more there really is that they and band guys are clueless about. I would say that if the Macworld All-Star Band is a pro band and you guys have the training and the sound guy won’t listen, FIRE him. I wouldn’t assume that every band has your skill level. The percentage of Novas bands trying to get attention and trying to prove how cool they are has to be 80% while the percentage of Pro bands out there gigging is probably 20%. Most bands know nothing about real sound! The two last things that I would say that I hope would shed some light is this, if a sound guy walked into a gig trying to tell the guitar pro how he or she should voice his cords or what amps to buy or what strings to play on, would you assume that he has more knowledge than your guitar player? Also, you said in your original blog that the band should take the heat if they don’t balance correctly. I wish that were the case because I agree with you however, the real case is that 5 people from the audience would be correcting the sound guy calling him every name in the book professing to know how to mix better than the sound guy. Unfortunately, the sound is a reflection of the sound guy’s abilities and there is no way to correctly point the finger at the band. Most sound guys really do want to mix well and make your band sound like a perfect CD recording.

By: Dave

Dave — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 17:47:57 +0000

Good points, Chris — And I agree that subtle changes throughout the night are the job of the soundman. My beef comes with a majority of soundmen I’ve encountered who seem to want to actively (spastically?) mix vocals, pulling the faders for everything but the lead way down, pushing the lead up, then missing harmonies, etc. That’s the big concern.

Oh, and for the love of all that’s good and pure, please put a little slapback delay in the vocal monitors. Every singer I’ve ever worked with *loves* it, and it allows you to keep the monitor volume LOWER resulting in less opportunity for feedback. Just sayin’

By: Chris Church

Chris Church — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 17:07:05 +0000

As a live sound engineer who has worked with lots of bands from Aretha Franklin to April Wine. I think in a perfect world the band would know how to perfectly blend the vocals. But that simply is not the case in most situations only because the monitoring system in most gigs SUCKS…. and getting good levels and clarity is almost impossible on stage. Therefor a good sound engineer will make subtle adjustments to the levels to keep the harmony’s correct. That’s our job as engineers I am also a musician for over 30 years. So I do understand whats going on better then someone who is not. I understand what your saying but with all due respect sound engineers are like bands. Some are good and some are bad. When I mix a blues band I rarely have to touch a fader but when I am mixing a musical or a pop band things are so dynamic that you must be “on top of it” that does not mean making “spastic” changes to levels Its all about being subtle. I think you have run into a bunch of shit sound man. That’s the real issue.

By: Dave

Dave — Mon, 11 May 2009 12:24:56 +0000

Thanks for the comments, Kevin. Your thoughts do, indeed, illustrate the problem pretty clearly. That is, engineers walking into a gig assuming and/or generalizing things about the band they’re there to mix. As has been clearly indicated in the comments before yours, the key to all of this is the band and the engineer dispensing with assumptions and having a clear, open, honest, and candid conversation with each other before the gig starts. Then and only then will this problem be solved.

By: kevin

kevin — Mon, 11 May 2009 09:26:08 +0000

Ok….. So I was surfing a ended up on this blog. Very strange/funny to hear what everyone has to say about Engineers, I am an Engineer. I own a recording studio in Branson Missouri, A mastering Studio in Phoenix, Arizonia, went to Full Sail and Sae institute. I NEVER post to blogs but felt the need. I can only try and explain why Engineers do what they do in such a short time and space. You made the comment “why do engineers insist they know how to mix the vocals better than the band”. You also said that Your band is talented enough to know mic dynamics and that the engineer should just leave the mic levels alone and get out of the bands dam way. This is the primary problem ALL engineers run into – Musicians who think they know sound science. Its the other way around you see. Engineers dam well know how cocky and arrogant musicians can get. Knowing this we ride the faders for fear that one of you will feel like you need attention and start singing louder than you should be. It happens non stop with musicians on ALL levels. You tell them its time for level check – theres no-one to show off to so they sing quit so you think you have your levels. THEN the audience shows up and everyones head starts to swell and then the musicians could give a shit about the engineers problems and do whatever they want and just think screw it he will fix it and then they bitch when things go wrong and blame it on the soundman. And your comment that vocalists just learn mic dynamics on the way is completely untrue. I record around four bands a week and deal with “PROS” all the time and let me tell you as an engineer you NEVER trust the musicians when it comes to ANYTHING that pertains to engineering unless it has to do with the direct way their instrument sounds. I should also tell you that whatever it is you are doing on stage that seems so hard (dancing,singing,playing) the engineers about the only person in the room using intelligence on a deep level at all. They are responsible for the way the room colors their sound, the front of house monitoring, the stage monitoring, the routing, the mic placement, the levels, the eqs, compressors, noise suppressors, gates, power conditioners, fader riding, panning or speaker assignment, effects units, and worst of all unappreciative musicians.

By: Mark Lint

Mark Lint — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 18:51:27 +0000

Gotcha. Hey, send your current mailing address to me at mark@marklint.com, and I’ll send you something. -Mark

By: Dave

Dave — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 18:45:13 +0000

Hi Mark — great to hear from you, and love the new band and video! Priceless!

As for singers, the Macworld All-Star band has 5 vocal mics live on stage, but other than those “gang vocal” type tunes where everyone’s singing unisons together, there are rarely more than 3 people singing harmonies at any point in time. The problem, of course, is that this makes it impossible for the sound engineer to *know* who’s going to be singing (often until it’s too late), hence my rant above.

By: Mark Lint

Mark Lint — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 15:20:29 +0000

Oh, and good to see that you’re out and playing… and singing lead no less! Fantastic! Of course, your life would have maximum meaning were you to move to Madison, of course… My new album is arriving in days: http://www.newpeopleband.com . Best, -Mark

By: Mark Lint

Mark Lint — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 15:18:22 +0000

Hi, Dave!

Wow, five singers (or is that three singers and two mostly sax players?). That’s ambitious! I thought having the four of us miced in the days of the Fake was probably overly ambitious for club gigs as it was!

My current band has two alternating lead vocalists (with no 3rd vocal mic, much as I’d like one if the drummer could sing), and since I sing some things very low and quiet and some things much more forcefully, I like an active soundman trying to keep the two of us straight and adding delay at choice moments and all. Still, if it’s a big concern, maybe buying a multi-channel noise gate unit might satisfy them so they don’t feel they have to pull down the mics that aren’t actively being used.