Yesterday I ran live sound for Hartwood, the folk-pop act I recorded earlier in the year.
I often find these small scale gigs more difficult than big venue events, as they are nowhere near as well set up and a bit more thinking is required rather than just plugging in, setting levels and cracking on. As the in-house PA was woefully inadequate, even for a pub gig to 50 people, I decided to bring in a simple setup comprising of a small analogue console, one FoH PA speaker and a single wedge monitor. Placing the single speaker was tricky, as the pub has several corners and the stage is not in a optimal position, but with careful placement I think I managed a pretty decent sound coverage.
My ethos when running live sound is to primarily focus on monitoring during sound check, and then move over to tweaking the front of house mix once the performance has actually begun. I am very much of the opinion that if the artist cannot hear themselves clearly then they will not be able to perform to the best of their ability, and a quality performance will always be more important than whatever an engineer can do a few metres further down the cable.
Thankfully, Hartwood did not fail to deliver and put on cracking show with super cheesy repertoire choices and some epic vocal harmonies which pretty much mixed themselves. The only thing I would really improve on if I had the chance would be to pop myself at the back of the room so I wasn’t mixing next to the speaker.
What a great way to spend a Sunday evening!
