A short video to address some mistakes that I see some bands making with their IEM rigs. Fortunately, very easily corrected. When it comes to touring gigs, multiband events, festivals, etc... the key is to efficiently get on and off the stage as quickly as possible... leaving plenty of time for a smooth running and entertaining show for fans in between the setup and strike. You don't want to slow the sound system provider down, nor do you want what are essentially avoidable delays caused by mispatches, or other similar issues marring your show. Hopefully these addresses that and will help with these issues. Leave any comments or questions below. Feel free to share the video link. Likes and subscribes to appease the YT algorithm are always appreciated. Plus I'm pushing to get to that 50,000 subscriber mark :)
This is solid gold. What is the ultimate objective of efficiency? A show with minimum set changes, maximum time for performances, zero stress on musicians, and maximum audience engagement and satisfaction! Apply these simple principles and techniques to everything you do!
I've talked about this subject in longer videos, like: th-cam.com/video/XLCqQ3rF5Sg/w-d-xo.html ...but I realized the other day as I was dealing with multiple bands and these type of mistakes were creeping up, that I hadn't been specific enough. I'd talked about labeling the tails on the splitter snake, and why, but it never occurred to me to drill down into how to label a lot of this stuff. You can even see in the video I just linked, that I labeled things in my example scene in the proper way. But I didn't point it out and explain why I labeled some things like I did. Like the vocals for example. So when a band labels their vocals "John, Becky, and Bob" on their 3 splitter tail channels, they're probably thinking they're even being more specific than the examples I'd show with SR Vox, C Vox, SL Vox. But in reality, the actual names aren't really info that tells an A1 or A2 anything as they are trying to patch the band in. So that's why I created this video. It might yet be a topic I come back to and maybe spend more time on it next time.
You mean you liked to connect stage left first? I'm not sure what you mean. Stage right is always stage right and stage left is always stage left as far as descriptive terms go. A stagehand or tech should always know where stage right or stage left is. It never changes under any circumstances. The only caveat is there is house left and house right... which are the terms when talking about something from the perspective of the FOH engineer. But nothing is 'flipped' in that scenario.. House left = Stage right. Assuming you mean you like to connect SL as your first vocal... So, even if you as FOH tech like to have SL be your first vocal, it's still back to what the video is talking about- If the vocals (and other things) are labeled by position (SR Voc, Vox DSR, USL V, USC Vox, C vox...) on the splitter tails of the band, then you can connect them in the order you prefer if you're mixing the show. So you take their SL vocal tail and connect it as your FOH first vocal in your snake. Never even knowing what channel that actually is for the band. No need to cross-reference numbers and an input list. You just know the source and where you want it. If that's what you meant.
Quick question for you! What if the position (SR/SL) changes depending on the location of the stage box that night? I'd love to stay consistent with that each night, but it's just not going to happen across 20 different venues.
I'm not sure I follow... The musicians change positions depending on where the stage box is located? Normally, regardless of where the stage box/ear rig is, the musicians still claim their same spots on stage. And it's the stage positions we're labeling by. The position of the ear rig won't matter to that. But I suppose you could have someone that is the main one in the band in charge of the ear rig and they might change their spot on stage to be closest to the ear rig... or something like that. But still, I'd think more times than not it's going to be in the preferred spot. For the outlier times you'd just need to flip a couple of lines and let the FOH know. "For this show, what's marked as SR vocal is really SL and SL vox is really stage right". Then as the event provider, I'd either swap those two channels via soft-patch on my FOH console, flip them at the house snake (and knowing you've marked SR and SL it would be easy to flip them for an outlier situation), or just deal with it as a one-off thing and have the vocals not be grouped in visual order on the console for a set.
Stage right or left is based on the performers POV onstage (facing the audience). So that stays consistent when referring to the stage. Technically, terms like house left or house right refer to the POV of the tech at FOH as he or she is facing the stage. So when the FOH engineer is facing the stage, and looking at (let's say) 3 vocals across the downstage. The vocalist on the tech's left, (stage right) would correspond to the first vocal channel on the console. Then center vocalist would be 2nd. And finally the SL vocalist would be 3rd. So those 3 vocal faders would easily correspond to exactly the order the tech sees when they look at the stage. Almost no thinking or reading necessary. They simple match in physical position onstage with the order at the faders on the vocal channels. If you have two keyboardists, one on each side of the stage, then you'd group those the same way. The first keyboard channels being SR and the second keyboard channels being the SL keyboardist. The same for guitars. Even if both guitars were on SR, the first one would be the one most SR and the second gtr fader would be the one more onstage right. And if there was another guitarist SL then it would continue on. All the electric guitars grouped together on the console, and in the same fader order as the FOH tech sees them from FOH. Now... that all said... this is based on FOH being at FOH. You wouldn't change this pattern just because you got to a gig and the mixer has to be placed at the side of the stage. It's simply based on a typical FOH setup and stays that way even if FOH gets put in a non-typical position. You wouldn't redo the patch. And these days, with digital consoles and remote mixing, more times than not, the engineer is going to roughly end up out front and somewhere near center anyway.
That is some solid advice, tho i do bundle my cables by 4 I am going to change the labeling from Ken, Eric, Roger & Mark, & tho im not in no big time band playing big concerts, i do like be as professional as possible Your videos are spectacular, keep them coming 😊
Hey Allan trust everything is going well at your side. Im in need of your help. Ive been using an XR18 for my church. A few weeks ago before service started it made a loud pop sound and I knew it has lost wifi connection Don't matter what I tried it wouldn't reconnect The very next day it did ran it for a few hours and it worked as it should. Took it to church and the same thing happened again. Any suggestions?
@@AlanHamiltonAudio thank you for the help but power is still on after it poped. I shut everything down and turned everything on, everything turn on but it wont connect to the laptop.
A short video to address some mistakes that I see some bands making with their IEM rigs. Fortunately, very easily corrected. When it comes to touring gigs, multiband events, festivals, etc... the key is to efficiently get on and off the stage as quickly as possible... leaving plenty of time for a smooth running and entertaining show for fans in between the setup and strike. You don't want to slow the sound system provider down, nor do you want what are essentially avoidable delays caused by mispatches, or other similar issues marring your show.
Hopefully these addresses that and will help with these issues.
Leave any comments or questions below. Feel free to share the video link.
Likes and subscribes to appease the YT algorithm are always appreciated.
Plus I'm pushing to get to that 50,000 subscriber mark :)
This is solid gold. What is the ultimate objective of efficiency? A show with minimum set changes, maximum time for performances, zero stress on musicians, and maximum audience engagement and satisfaction! Apply these simple principles and techniques to everything you do!
Timing couldn't be better on this one. It's too informative to be encapsulated in less than 3½ minutes. Thanks.
I've talked about this subject in longer videos, like: th-cam.com/video/XLCqQ3rF5Sg/w-d-xo.html ...but I realized the other day as I was dealing with multiple bands and these type of mistakes were creeping up, that I hadn't been specific enough.
I'd talked about labeling the tails on the splitter snake, and why, but it never occurred to me to drill down into how to label a lot of this stuff. You can even see in the video I just linked, that I labeled things in my example scene in the proper way. But I didn't point it out and explain why I labeled some things like I did. Like the vocals for example.
So when a band labels their vocals "John, Becky, and Bob" on their 3 splitter tail channels, they're probably thinking they're even being more specific than the examples I'd show with SR Vox, C Vox, SL Vox. But in reality, the actual names aren't really info that tells an A1 or A2 anything as they are trying to patch the band in. So that's why I created this video.
It might yet be a topic I come back to and maybe spend more time on it next time.
Excellent info!
Thanks!
Thanks for sharing Alan.🐨
Good info - totally agree.
Hi Al!
Howdy Hunter! :)
Ive always had my stage Left from audience view. Not the other way round. It works best for me.
You mean you liked to connect stage left first? I'm not sure what you mean.
Stage right is always stage right and stage left is always stage left as far as descriptive terms go.
A stagehand or tech should always know where stage right or stage left is. It never changes under any circumstances.
The only caveat is there is house left and house right... which are the terms when talking about something from the perspective of the FOH engineer. But nothing is 'flipped' in that scenario.. House left = Stage right.
Assuming you mean you like to connect SL as your first vocal...
So, even if you as FOH tech like to have SL be your first vocal, it's still back to what the video is talking about- If the vocals (and other things) are labeled by position (SR Voc, Vox DSR, USL V, USC Vox, C vox...) on the splitter tails of the band, then you can connect them in the order you prefer if you're mixing the show. So you take their SL vocal tail and connect it as your FOH first vocal in your snake. Never even knowing what channel that actually is for the band. No need to cross-reference numbers and an input list. You just know the source and where you want it. If that's what you meant.
Quick question for you! What if the position (SR/SL) changes depending on the location of the stage box that night? I'd love to stay consistent with that each night, but it's just not going to happen across 20 different venues.
I'm not sure I follow... The musicians change positions depending on where the stage box is located?
Normally, regardless of where the stage box/ear rig is, the musicians still claim their same spots on stage. And it's the stage positions we're labeling by. The position of the ear rig won't matter to that.
But I suppose you could have someone that is the main one in the band in charge of the ear rig and they might change their spot on stage to be closest to the ear rig... or something like that. But still, I'd think more times than not it's going to be in the preferred spot. For the outlier times you'd just need to flip a couple of lines and let the FOH know. "For this show, what's marked as SR vocal is really SL and SL vox is really stage right". Then as the event provider, I'd either swap those two channels via soft-patch on my FOH console, flip them at the house snake (and knowing you've marked SR and SL it would be easy to flip them for an outlier situation), or just deal with it as a one-off thing and have the vocals not be grouped in visual order on the console for a set.
Hello 👋🏼 Mr. Al 😊
Hello Cindy!! :)
Rings, tips but no sleeves? 😉
why is left right and right left
pov from stage or from foh
?
Stage right or left is based on the performers POV onstage (facing the audience). So that stays consistent when referring to the stage.
Technically, terms like house left or house right refer to the POV of the tech at FOH as he or she is facing the stage.
So when the FOH engineer is facing the stage, and looking at (let's say) 3 vocals across the downstage. The vocalist on the tech's left, (stage right) would correspond to the first vocal channel on the console. Then center vocalist would be 2nd. And finally the SL vocalist would be 3rd. So those 3 vocal faders would easily correspond to exactly the order the tech sees when they look at the stage. Almost no thinking or reading necessary. They simple match in physical position onstage with the order at the faders on the vocal channels.
If you have two keyboardists, one on each side of the stage, then you'd group those the same way. The first keyboard channels being SR and the second keyboard channels being the SL keyboardist.
The same for guitars. Even if both guitars were on SR, the first one would be the one most SR and the second gtr fader would be the one more onstage right. And if there was another guitarist SL then it would continue on. All the electric guitars grouped together on the console, and in the same fader order as the FOH tech sees them from FOH.
Now... that all said... this is based on FOH being at FOH. You wouldn't change this pattern just because you got to a gig and the mixer has to be placed at the side of the stage. It's simply based on a typical FOH setup and stays that way even if FOH gets put in a non-typical position. You wouldn't redo the patch.
And these days, with digital consoles and remote mixing, more times than not, the engineer is going to roughly end up out front and somewhere near center anyway.
@@AlanHamiltonAudio thannk you so much sir. another lesson learned 😁
That is some solid advice, tho i do bundle my cables by 4
I am going to change the labeling from Ken, Eric, Roger & Mark, & tho im not in no big time band playing big concerts, i do like be as professional as possible
Your videos are spectacular, keep them coming 😊
Hey Allan trust everything is going well at your side. Im in need of your help. Ive been using an XR18 for my church. A few weeks ago before service started it made a loud pop sound and I knew it has lost wifi connection
Don't matter what I tried it wouldn't reconnect
The very next day it did ran it for a few hours and it worked as it should. Took it to church and the same thing happened again.
Any suggestions?
Get a pure sinewave UPS with AVR, plug your mixer into that. Will give you nice clean reliable power.
@@davebrownentertainment7191 is it power or wifi connection that's doing it?
I think power is the answer. Don't think it would be the wifi itself. Although it could be something in the console's power supply that is failing.
Use an external 5GHz router/access point dedicated to the mixer. There's too much traffic in the 2.4GHz band. IME a power issue is highly unlikely.
@@AlanHamiltonAudio thank you for the help but power is still on after it poped. I shut everything down and turned everything on, everything turn on but it wont connect to the laptop.
Very resourceful.
I would like to ask some questions, can I have your email or contact
akh a t hamiltonsystems . us