technical difficulties October 1, 2007
Posted by Phillip in Amps, Church, Effects, Guitar, Live Sound, Music, Worship.trackback
The second service yesterday was pretty rough.
I played the entire set without a monitor. The first service was fine, but when I played the first chord, I heard nothing. I checked my amp to make sure that no one had turned it off or accidentally unplugged the cord, but it was on. I have taken great pains to isolate the amp from the house so that there’s no bleed into the audience, and that really backfired yesterday.
I could sort of hear myself coming out of the mains as the sound waves bounced off of the back wall, but most of the time I felt like I was playing air guitar and stepping on pedals at seemingly random intervals. I would think “I stepped on this pedal in the first service and it sounded okay – hopefully it’ll work this time…”
I still don’t know what the problem is/was. Our (volunteer) sound guys couldn’t figure it out either. The weird thing about the whole thing is that I got more positive comments about my playing yesterday than I have in a long time. Go figure.
WorshipGuitarist 
You know… sometimes when you’re “flyin’ blind” you fly the best because it’s all by feel.
GoofyDawg
Hi,
I was doing some research about sound systems for our church when I came across your blog. We definitely have the same issues that you guys are having, but you seem to be a step ahead in a few cases. Maybe you could offer a bit of advice….First our speaker system was designed for choirs, and soloists….not praise bands, so the sound definitely suffers.
Here is our setup:
LIve drums (no shields)
Electric guitar mikes his amp and runs it through the house speakers
Acoustic guitar through direct box to sound board, back to wedge monitors and house speakers
Bass through 30w amp out to soundboard, back to house sub woofer.
Keyboard direct box to board, back to wedges and house speakers
3 vocalists through house and wedges.
Obviously, just like everyone else, the drums overwhelm, and everyone on stage wants more of themselves in the monitors until it’s just one big loud mess. Do you have any tips that have made a large difference to your band? The people who complain the most are the keyboard and acoustic saying they can’t hear themselves. I had a sound guy suggest having everyone with their own onstage amps set a fairly low level and miked to the house speakers. That would allow each person to use their amp as a monitor, and adjust it themselves. Couldn’t that just turn into another loud mess? What does your acoustic player run through?
Thanks!
Matt