Balancing sounds for live performances

[Scilla]

Hello everyone,

I recently bought a NS2. I'm very new at this and English is not my first language so I hope you guys will understand my questions.

I have played 3 gigs and so far, people always have the same complaint : they can barely hear me in the mix. I have a very hard time figuring out what to do about it, I don't know where to start to correct the situation. When we're practicing, it's not so bad because I'm the one adjusting the volume levels and the band can hear me.

All ideas will be very much appreciated (except the one telling me never to play live again! Haha !). I will seriously try everything you tell me. I've worked so hard and I spent hours tweaking my sounds, I'd like to be at least heard in the mix.

Thank you in advance.

[Mr_-G-]

Can you explain what kind of band/music and how do you amplify your gear?

[Falcon2e]

Yes, same question as Mr. G, does your band have a sound man? If you have a sound tech at the mixing board out front, he's the one that should fix your issue.

[Scilla]

Thank you Mr_-G- and falcon2e for trying to help me!

In the three shows I've played, we have been working with three different sound men. What I have tried to do to help the sound person balance my Nord in the mix BEFORE I started live playing was this: As I created and tweaked my sounds, I have set my main volume at 12 o'clock (halfway up) and then worked each sound with a dB meter to make sure that all of them would reach about the same levels of dB to ensure they would all have the same "loudness".

We're a cover rock band, we play Heart, Janis Joplin, Pat Benatar, Alanis Morrissette, Alannah Myles... all female singers.

What I usually do is plug in a Mogami 18 feet into the PA and that's pretty much all I know.

In rehearsal, we have a small mixing board that is hooked to a monitor. All I have to do is take my Mogami and hook it up to the mixing board. As you can tell, I'm not an expert on sound amplification. I wish someone could teach me about it. I'm sure it would help me understand a lot of things. Stage amplification is an art in itself.

Thank you both again.

[Mr_-G-]

I am no expert on this, but this are the things I can think of:
Maybe you are playing too low? Often the other musicians start cranking up their amps and guitars so you will be left at a relatively lower volume than the rest.
I presume that those that do not hear you in the mix are in the audience and not your fellow musicians?
If you plug a cable directly to the PA, how do you monitor yourself? Do you hear yourself and the others?
Do you play in large venues? Perhaps the room acoustics change between the empty room at rehearsal and when it is packed with people and the sound people do not compensate for that.
Have you spoken to the soundman and explain the concern? They might only care about the guitar solo
Maybe getting a 3rd party other than the soundman to give an opinion and help setting the level would make a difference.

I am sure that others more experienced will give you some more ideas.
Let us know how you resolve this.

[er1kk]

I think by balancing the volume of your patches you have already done more than most others would, and there is relatively little you can do. There are rumors that soundmen sometimes don't like keyboard players, especially in rock bands. I've personally never had a problem, though (in the admittedly very few shows that I have played).

I'm no expert either, but I have a few suggestions:

• If your master level is at 12 o'clock, you are probably sending a quieter signal to the sound person than he regularly expects. That is not a problem in principle, but maybe it's a problem in practice if (s)he doesn't notice it. I usually set it to 3 o'clock first, to have a little headroom left. Best practice would be to set it to max during soundcheck to make sure that doesn't cause any clipping, then dial it back a bit. But then you are in danger of being forgotten again.
• Make sure that your monitor mix is well-balanced (concerning not just you but all other instruments and vocals as well). Then, ideally, you can make good volume adjustment decisions yourself, and the sound person doesn't have to do much. Balancing all patches is a good start for this, but you might still be perceived as too loud compared to the others occasionally, and that can be a reason to leave your volume down entirely.
• Avoid sudden peaks in volume, for the same reason.
• Talk to your bandmates and tell them to indicate to the sound person when they can't hear you well. This can give the sound person a clue that you are too quiet in the main mix as well.
• Avoid clashing with the bassist or guitarist, both in terms of frequencies and in terms of groove and timing. This is a difficult topic, and I don't really know much about it. I think a large part of it is mentally taking a step back and listening to what the entire band sounds like, especially during rehearsal. It's easiest if you record your rehearsal sessions.
• Maybe play a song with a keyboard (or keyboard+vocal) intro sometime at the beginning of your show. Don't turn your volume up too much during the intro. If you are too quiet in general, the sound person will be forced to pull you up at that point, and hopefully leave you there for a while.
• I almost forgot: Record your show from the audience's perspective, to be able to hear whether the problem actually exists. (Or whether it's really something else that the sound person has no control over, like the guitar or bass amp or the drums being too loud.)

[er1kk]

1: Do a proper soundcheck. This is when sound engineers should make sure all instruments are correctly balanced.
2: During the soundcheck, use as many different sounds as possible, so the sound engineer knows what to expect. You have balanced the different patches, but still a sound engineer might get annoyed when he hears unexpected sounds during the show.
3: Have someone in the audience that knows your band, knows the songs and knows how the music should sound. Tell this person to step up to the sound engineer if you (or someone else in the band) is too loud, or not loud enough. Ask the sound engineers to do what this person suggests.
4: Make sure this person is next to the sound engineer during the soundcheck!
5: Use good quality cables. When a sound engineers hears crackling coming from faulty cables, he might shut you off completely. (happened to me once!)

[Berretje]

Hi!

I've encountered this issue myself and wrote something about it in this post:

Hi Soultrane,

Compressor is saved for each program.

I had the same issue about the levels with my band. What I did is, I show up earlier at a rehearsal and I've plugged in my Nord into our In-ear monitoring system.
I've put my channel in PFL (Pre-Fade Listen) and I can see at the volume indicator at what DB it is outputting.

So I've "nulled" all my sounds that way. So everything is about the same level.
Had to go through all my programs, but it is worth the effort.

Don't know if there is a easier way?

Gr
Bart

See for yourself

[AlQuinn]

Check that the individual patch volumes aren't low. These are the volumes saved for each sound engine being used within each patch. I run the piano and organ patch volumes as high as possible while keeping them balanced with each other then adjust other patch volumes accordingly. This seems to ensure that each patch is driven hard. I've still had soundmen comment that my signal is less than they expect. They then turn up my channel on the board and everything sounds great (and I rarely, if ever, have the master volume past 3:00). I've heard folks say that Nords generally output a lower signal than Yamaha, Roland, etc. I never checked this myself but it could be contributing to your struggle, but this is also solved by the soundman turning up your channel. During sound check I sometimes ask someone else to play my NS2 while I stand near the soundman so that I can really understand how it sounds out front and comment/influence accordingly. Hope some of this helps.

[cphollis]

I have a different theory on what is going on here. Congratulations, you have done your homework on balancing your sounds. Maybe a small mixer would help in boosting your signal levels.

But that's not where the problem is, in my estimation.

There are many sound guy(s) who believe that keyboards should be seen and not heard, especially in smaller venues. Their priority is (1) vocals, (2) all guitars, (3) drums, (4) bass and finally (5) keyboards. Unless your sound guy is willing to put you up in the mix, you're not going to be heard, period.

Unless you take matters into your own hands, which I learned to do a long time ago.

I bring my own amplification. Either a pair of QSC K series (1000w each), or a pair of Fulcrum Acoustic 12acs (2000w each). I have my wife or a friend check the balance out in the crowd, and I simply turn up until they can hear me. Very often, I've got more watts onstage than the sound guy, so I win.

At one festival gig, where we knew the sound guy wasn't that great, I brought both. Yes, 6000w of onstage keyboard amplification. I didn't have to use all of it, though

That being said, if we have a good sound guy, I don't need to do this. But that tends to be the exception vs. the rule.

Sorry to say, but it's happened to me consistently. So I've learned to bring my own weapons.