OTROS AIRES " Chicago Summer Dance Fest"

I am somewhere under that white EZ-UP. So this is what it sounds like from the Javier the drummer's perspective! Thanks for sending this to me Javier, you guys were great!

Reinforcing Folk Instruments - Is it a fiddle or a violin? Mics for strings.

This is a continuation of a series of articles concerning my preferred methods for reinforcing, various common folk instruments. Today I'd like to discuss the fiddle or violin. I have previously covered the double bass here.

Those of you who are familiar with my blog, know that I have a preference for using mics rather than pick-ups in most folk music situations. If you haven't read this post concerning this subject in general, check it out.

So, the fiddle:

First off, what is the difference between a violin and a fiddle? In general I think those terms describe not the instrument itself, but the style of play. A violin is a classical instrument, while a fiddle is used in traditional music (or the musics that have "evolved" from folk music.)

When someone describes their instrument as a fiddle how does one reinforce it. Hopefully the musician has a nice mic installed on their instrument, such as a DPA system.



If this is not the case a decent small diaphragm condenser can be used quite effectively, if the stage volume is low enough to allow it. The microphone needs to be quite close to the bridge of the instrument, hopefully ending up between the f-holes and the bridge on the low frequency side. For folk music I want the microphone in front of the musician. The player can then "work" the mic, moving in a bit for solos, backing off for rhythm playing. The back of the mic should be pointed toward the monitor as much as possible. As Art Welter points out here, "pointing the back portion of the mic away from the monitors as much as possible will help get a cleaner instrument sound. Many players tend to point the mic down at such a steep angle that they end up picking up a lot of whatever is going through the wedges."

One issue that can arise is with singing fiddle players. A phasing problem can arrise from having a vocal mic near an instrument mic, both mics picking up the same source at the same time. Putting one of the mics out of polarity might help with this issue. Recently I worked with the Claire Lynch Band at the Old Town School of Folk Music. Her fiddle player, Jason Thomas, has come up with a fairly ingenious way to deal with this issue. He clamps a Neumann KM 184 to his mic stand, just below the vocal mic.


One other option for the singing fiddle player is to use a condenser vocal mic for both instrument and vocal.

So what if the fiddler shows up with a pick-up, and insists on using it? Sometimes they are going for that plugged in sound. They are playing through an amp, using effects, etc. This is common with louder music such as modern country, world music, Americana or Alternative rock. My favorite plugged in sound come from Andrew Bird, who I have unfortunately never worked with. He uses multiple effects, looping and plays through some beautiful rotating speakers. See the image I took at Andrews last concert at Millenium Park. In the case that the musician is playing through an amp, mic the amp like an electric guitar and move on.



If they are looking for a realistic sound, and they are plugged into a DI, you might be in for some work. IF they have a nice pick-up, and quality instrument and a decent DI or pre-amp, it shouldn't be that hard to get it to sound real. You might need to roll off some high end and or some high mids. Scott Helmke suggested to me on Facebook that I add this:

"One thing I'd mention about pickups is that oftentimes they need a very high impedance DI to sound good - a Baggs or Fishman DI will have this, or a Countryman 85. A piezo pickup that's not happy with the impedance it's feeding will have weak bottom and weird mids."



When micing a "violin" one needs to keep in mind the fact that they are looking for an EXACT representation of their sound. One of the DPA mics or a comparable system will work, but barring that they will want a high quality condenser mic. In general violin is miced from behind the seated player. They like to have some distance between the microphone and the instrument. Most classical musicians HATE microphones. The don't want to even know that the mic is even there. This image is from a concert I describe here, where I mixed both fiddles AND violins:


discussion at PSW

The history of Concert Sound

Posting a lot today! This page is an amazing look at the history of live sound. We have come so far, yet somehow physics has not changed.

Acoustic Radar

This page is where I got my profile picture that have been using for most of my social networking sites. Fascinating stuff.

Art Vs. Science II

This post comes from this discussion on Pro Sound Web.

It starts with this question:
How much of what you/we do is determined by science as opposed to art? At what point do you stop being a mechanic/technician and become a performer making decisions based on subjective aspects of the gig?

I sometimes feel that we spend so much time thinking about the nuts and bolts of our business (specs, meters, technical widgets) that we lose sight of the true goal, which is to make it sound "good", which is purely subjective.

Maybe it's just me getting old...

---

Duane Massey
Houston, Texas, USA



Every decision that you make after the system is set up properly is an aesthetic decision. This means that you are at LEAST a designer, a craftsmen. The best of us ARE artists. The decision to mix in such a way as to please the band, and sound as much like themselves as possible is an aesthetic or artistic decision. Hooking up a mic might not make you a scientist, but picking out the right mic and positioning it is a mixture between craft and technical knowledge. Choosing and placement of microphones is the first and maybe the most important artistic decision an sound engineer makes. Every other aspect of your sound is based on these things. Putting a 57 on an acoustic guitar vs. putting a high quality condenser on it is as much an aesthetic choice as it is one based on physics and your on personal experience.

Any EQ applied that isn't for feedback reduction is an aesthetic decision. It could be compared to an artist shading an image, polishing a statue.

Last night I mixed an old timey honkytonk country band. There was really only time for a line check. I'd never heard this band before. I made sure the vocals were on top, that there wasn't too much sizzle on anything and dialed in a nice "sun Records" slapback delay for the faster numbers and a spring reverb for the slower numbers. No one from the band told me to do this, they trusted me to mix them appropriately.

By stating that I am both an artist as well as a scientist, I'm not implying that I do anything that is inappropriate. To do this job successfully you need a sense of aesthetics as keen as any designer or artist.

OK, how is a sound engineer like an artist, where the other tradespeople are not? We work with a subjective creative medium. There is no aesthetic quality to what an electrician or a plumber does. There is nothing subjective about electricity. A mason or a carpenter however creates something that can be observed as beautiful, can be perceived on a subjective level. They also create things that last. Our art is more like a Buddhist sand painting. It is impermanent. If there was no subjective aesthetic quality to what we do, one that has a visceral effect on the audience, then every concert would sound perfect to everyone.

Is a graphic designer an an artist? A lot of people sure think they are. They take clip art, other people's content, fonts they didn't design, and place them together into a pleasing package. Sure they are trying to please the client, but often times they are completely independent. We are much like them. Is someone how makes collages not an artist? We make collages out of sound. How about a film editor?

James Drake posted another example in the discussion on PSW: "if a painter is commissioned to make a painting which includes "something blue", does that make him less of an artist because that decision was not made by him but by his client?" Is the Sistine Chapel a lesser artwork because it was a commissioned piece.

In Jamaica both recording and live engineers are considered to be musicians in their own right. Is this wrong? The bands I work with consider me to be part of the band, even if just for the night. We don't have a pre-show conference where they tell me how to mix them.


As far as science goes, we use science all the time. We must understand at least the basics of Physics. How sound travels, acoustics, how an opamp effects the signal, the effect of humidity on sound waves, how to set delay times etc. We use the scientific method every time we troubleshoot, every time we hunt down hums, buzzes, and any other technical issue we run into. Those of us that are better at these things become systems techs.

It is absolutely essential that an engineer understand signal flow, gain structure, feedback reduction, acoustics, electricity, Ohm's law, and the scientific method (troubleshooting.) Does this make us scientists? I guess it depends on your definition of "scientist."

Does anyone think that a recording producer is not an artist/ craftsmen/ scientist?

The only difference between a record producer and a live FOH engineer is they they have days or weeks to do their job, a sterile environment (anechoic or nearly so), more toys, mixing engineers at their call, and they don't need to worry about feedback. We have to work on the fly, have to work with whatever soundcheck we can negotiate, have to deal with being in a reverberant space and the possibility of feedback. We are expected to create something that is just as perfect as a record and we only get one shot at it.

I don't understand how Eno and Lanois can be artists, yet when U2's engineer replicates that mix on the fly in a different city every day, he is not equal to them. I would guess he also gets a decent paycheck. Quincy Jones gets more money because of his name, which carries with a perceived level of quality and experience. I'll bet Big Mick, Dave Rat and other well known band engineers get a decent day rate comparable to many record producers.

I am not a studio guy. I like the fact I only have to hear any song once a night, rather than listening to it over and over. Although we don't pick the songs, or arrange the tunes, we do take what the musicians give us and create a mix. To me a mix is more than a sum of it's parts. It is something above and beyond the individual parts. This is really where we are similar to a record producer. We work to create that greater big picture mix out of the disparate parts that are the individual inputs.

We are very much like an arranger or conductor, taking the source material through the filter that is our aesthetic sense, and presenting it in such a way as to keep everyone happy. We arrange the sound all the time. It is called mixing. We decide to mix the vocals higher or to boost that guitar solo. No one is whispering in my ear that they really want that gated tom sound, or that the predelay on the verb needs to be tweeked a bit. Just by emphasizing a specific instrument we are "arranging." I have heard sound guys who are musos as well subconsciously mixing their own instrument louder than it "should be."




I mostly work one-offs. I don't have a band member standing over me while I mix (other than a few Indian Classical acts that work without monitors and call out every level and EQ change.) I am essentially producing a record every night. Then it disappears the second I zero the console. All that is left is a board dub which is just a shadow of the work that is my mix.

If we are doing our job no one knows that we are there. Except other engineers, musicians and industry types. I am not a Red Hot Chili Peppers fan, but I would attend one of their shows just to hear what Dave Rat does with their sound. When I am at a show I might as well be working because, unless the sound is perfect to my ears (one show in ten, at best) I am constantly analyzing it. I might be there to hear the band, but I am hyper aware of the mix.

If you haven't read it this is Art Vs. Science I.

Robbie Fulks' keen observations

I've been lucky to work a few times with Robbie Fulks. He is one funny, smart and quality musician. I just read this list and felt the need to post a link.

how to be miserable as a professional musician: a ten-step guide

Free Music Archive

This site is really cool. It is a curated collection of free music.

This is my favorite collection on the site. It includes a bunch of old 78s of old time music, from all over the world. Very cool!

5 Ideas for Saving The Music Industry from Gibson

In this day and age of whining about the music industry, here are some great ideas for fixing it from the Gibson Guitar company.

Del Fest Weather this year - Glad I wasn't Working This One

Blog With More Videos

Summer season ahead

Summer is right around the corner. I will once again be working the Chicago Summerdance program. I am hoping to post here soon some of my strategies for mixing big band and Latin orchestras. Stay tuned!