How to level program volumes

[ajstan]

You all are giving me an even greater appreciation for the sound techs my band works with. Whether it's the house sound or the companies we hire, they all seem to enjoy mixing a band with keys, being a partner to the band, and actively riding levels all night. Now, we have just one guitar, bass, drums and me with two primary and three secondary vocals and the lead singer with sax and percussion, so it's not the most elaborate setup. Still, it's easy enough for me to talk to any first-timers, let them know that I'm working on my levels, and ask to let me know if they have any recommendations for specific songs.

As far as recommendations to better manage sound levels, I use IEMs which makes it much easier standardize what I'm hearing from gig-to-gig and detect level differences between parts and programs. I also record every gig with a Zoom Q2n-4K. It's been quite helpful to hear how I sound in the mix and how to adjust, EQ and balance my programs to cut through or fill out the mix. It also lets me know where I need to lay back to declutter things, which can be as important as playing the right notes with the right sound at the right level.

[mon8169]

I level my songs (programs) using this technique:

https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques ... -reference

It uses a pink noise to have a reference level. It isn't perfect but is quite good and easy to set up.

Ramon

[BassJo]

A sound engineer moaning about doing more work is nothing new, but saddening, because it's a craft and that's what a sound engineer is there to do, mix, enhance and get a decent sound to the P.A and recording systems, otherwise, why bother.

The sound engineer’s job is to make the whole band sound great out front.

If the keyboard guy or a guitar guy with a pedal board doesn’t have his levels under control, then his job is going to be made that much harder/impossible, because he’s got two vocalists and a horn section to balance, and if a singer gets out front to work with the audience, then any blaring synth hit that’s 6 dB too loud is just going to get the keyboard turned down until it’s no longer annoying.

Either that, or the keyboard is just going to get slammed into a limiter, which means that rather than sounds being at the RIGHT level, they’re all going to be at the SAME level, which is absolutely not what you want.

In addition, if you’re working with layers or splits, and the piano is just right, but the horn part takes a quarter inch off everyone’s scalp, there is no way a sound engineer can fix it.

Getting your levels straight is part of the keyboard player's job. If he fails, the sound engineer can save him a bit some of the time — but only if he has the time.

(FWIW, first major cover band job I had, it took me about two weeks to get the sounds down. About six months to get the levels straight — constant working with the FoH guys, who’d often be nice enough to make a note when something stuck out or they had to fix the mix.)

You're right and the last thing i want is a sound engineer putting a limiter or compressor on my sound. That's the reason i open't this topic

[BassJo]

I am 100% agree with guys mentioned all methods.

( Some of soundengeneers recommended me to use Vst Effect Plugin "K -Meter " where enabling RMS meter gives you a chance to measure an “average” signal strength.
Using keyboard signal + backing track in your DAW will give you "average" picture what it should be on stage .
And of course final touches should be made only whilst performing which takes time to get it levelled in different clubs and PA.

Thanks!
I downloaded the demo and used it in my DAW, without the pink noise (demoversion) but i leveled my programs fairly good with eachother.

[alexmarinojR]

I have also for every song a specific program. (Nord Electro 5D)
I had the same problem. But with the "gain knob' you can give every program his own volume.
Further I use the expression pedal as a volume pedal. I am happy!

Hi , Wietze
I just got a stage 3, but was working with an electro 5 till now.
I also have this problem with balancing volume between my different programs.
On the electro 5 I always did my best to balance a program and its engines by itself , and then I used the gain knob on the electro to balance the whole program relative to all of my programs to an output level I desire accordingly.

How do you do that on a stage 3 ?

I only see db control over every different engine in a certain program, but that's gonna make a lot of work in the future if I want to tweak on the fly. Actually it seems if I want to lower a certain volume output of a program I need rebalancing every engine in it. This seems not well thought out. What am I missing ?
Thanks

Kind regards
Alex

[alexmarinojR]

Hello Alex, you can use the Prog Level setting in the Utility menu to set a Volume offset on each Program level.

[alexmarinojR]

Hello Alex, you can use the Prog Level setting in the Utility menu to set a Volume offset on each Program level.

Thanks , Max

I think that's exactly what I'm looking for , just didn't check the menus as I'm not used to find anything there on my electro.

I'm still finding my way around this monster of a keyboard and I can see sometimes they had to move some stuff in a not so obvious positions. The answer is almost always on the surface, the usability is amazing. I'll check it out tomorrow, but it looks like that's the thing.

Regards
Alex