Live sound refresher,,,

[mmistudent]

ok, I'm going to set up some guy's PA tomorrow. I'm hopeing/assuming he has a crossover. There's two types of xovers... active and passive. Active divides the signal before the amp, whereas passive divides the already amplified signal, correct? I just don't wanna end up frying out a xover. Another thing, use the pre fader aux sends as your monitor sends, right? And the monitors need their own amp if the main amp is only 2 channels, correct? Theres no weird way of getting everything to go through one amp, is there? I haven't had my classes on live sound yet, but I'd assume each of the aux send monitor outputs need their own amp.

 

[dirtythermos]

Yeah, send to the monitors pre-fader. FX go post-fader. Always mute the channel before you press the phantom power button.

You need one amp channel for each mix channel. For a stereo FOH, you need 2 channels. Another channel for each monitor mix.

If you get some deaf singer up there and his monitor is cranked and it's ruining your FOH mix, put a little verb in his monitor. It's what he really wants anyway, he just doesn't know it.

Always mute the channel before you press the phantom power button.

Make sure the monitors are pointed at the performers' heads. The sound should hit them right in the face. If it doesn't, then they're going to want their monitors hotter than necessary, and it will muddy your mix.

With good bands, not every musician is going to want to hear the FOH mix in their monitors. Good bass players want to hear mostly bass and drums, for instance. Maybe just a little bit of lead vox so they know where they are in the song. A good bass player is probably not going to want to hear the lead guitar very much, if at all. Ditto for drums. Bass and drums can share a monitor mix if need be. Lead vox should get his own mix if at all possible. He'll want to hear himself much louder than everyone else will.

Always mute the channel before you press the phantom power button.

Hope this helps. Have fun mixing!

 

[wilkee]

The main hassle I get is always with the lead singer and monitor levels.
They seem perfectly happy having it that loud that the FOH vocals can hardly be heard because of feedback problems.

Roll on cheap in-hear monitoring.
And I agree mute the outputs before switching on the phantom power.

 

[boingoman]

Also make sure the PA speakers are in front of the singer, not beside, or worse, behind(we've all seen it).
If you can, try to find a graphic EQ for the monitors. It'll help a lot. Plus what dirtythermos said. Give 'em some magic in their monitors and they will love you.

 

[TexRoadkill]

Bring extra cables, batteries (if anything is wireless) a flashlight, duct tape, electrical tape, needlenose plyers, screwdriver and a buttfor.