Some friends have asked me to run sound for them on Jan 11. This group: http://stabilitynetwork.b....net/g-tunes/base8.htm When we made this recording, the vocalist caused feedback way before she was at the right level, so I put a pair of off ear headphones on her. This helped. For the live performance, I was going to run her though my compressor and compress her signal pretty hard. I was thinking of using an SM57 on her to reduce feedback. But short of running on stage and turning down the amps for the bassist and guitarist, I have no idea how I'm going to get her level right without feedback.

That is a very tough situation.

With live sound the practical goal is that you may make a good sounding band sound it's best.


Since you mention compression on the vocals I wonder how comfortable you are ringing out a room and the monitors with an EQ. If you are having feedback issues I'd reserve the compression until you don't have the feedback. If you ring out the room ands stage with EQ you should be able to minimize feedback and then add compression to the mains while using as little as possible in the wedges. (in ears; you can use all you want).

If you are using wedges you want to keep the vocals as clear as possible rather than thick and meaty because it hurts the FOH mix.


I like to ring out the system and the wedges and make the sound level that comes out of the floor monitors capable of being  painfully loud... that way when someone says the monitors aren't loud enough I can make it really clear that no one really want's the monitors to be louder... they just think they do... So I let them  hear them that loud... and then we can introduce seemingly reasonable ideas like turning down some guitar amps etc.


If the band hasn't worked out how to manage their stage levels a live sound mixer can't help them very much.

A lot of not in-it-for-the-money bands are lacking a leader and when it's like that it just is what it is... no one is really authorized to tell another to turn it down without creating resentment. I totally get how much fun it is to play with friends and avoid disagreement... but if that's what it is... that's what it is.

Great bands just mix them selves on stage. They play with each other. They don't need a leader... the music is the leader.

If a singer wants to share a stage with loud rockers then she has got to blast it into the mic... that's the only way to make feed back and bleed a non issue.

If that's not a natural thing that she enjoys then there is a mis match with her and the band and the best you can do is try to keep it fun and wonder how long it will last.


Stuff like that.


best regards,
mike

Yikes. I know I'm totally out of my league. Wedges are the speakers on the stage right? haha. ok and ringing out the venue means reducing q and boosting a level and sweeping to find where it feeds back, then cutting the dB at that freq, right? The band has an inexpensive sound board and I'm not even sure I get a different eq for the monitors than I do for the mains. I'm half thinking of bringing my fireface ucx and doing the mixing on the pc with a left and right send to the mains, a left right send to the monitors, and my headphones for soloing. I can put my 2 channel compressor between the ucx and the inputs for the mains into the board. .... The biggest problem here is that I only have a mouse for moving faders.