Join Us

Empowering the Next Generation of Women in Audio

Join Us

Beckie Campbell – Versatility and Passion

beckie-1Beckie Campbell is the owner of B4MediaProduction, a growing production company, supplying anything from small corporate set-ups and medium to large concert system set-ups. Being versatile, Beckie also works as an independent contractor to several companies around the US. Beckie’s experience  in the audio field is comprehensive, having the ability to work as Production Management, FoH/Monitors, and as a PA/System or monitor tech.

B4MediaProduction works with an impressive list of regular clients including the City of Orlando, PennellChing Development (Corporate events), Hibiscus Festival/New Year’s Eve Bash/Freedom Fest(Florida Festivals) and Next Level Productions and Promotions (Concerts and Festivals).

Raised in McMillan, Michigan, Beckie’s interest in music started when she was a kid. She remembers locking herself in her uncle’s jeep and listening to Three Dog Night on an 8 track as loud as she could. She would close her eyes and visualize being on stage with them. She was just five years old! She would also sit in the living room with her ear up to her dad’s stereo listening to old Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings records until she could pick out every instrument and sound. Her aunt and uncles would go to concerts all the time and bring her back heaps of concert swag. Beckie remembers the feeling of wearing a new REO Speedwagon shirt, and jamming out to Tina Turner on her Walkman, all the while dreaming of being backstage with them.

When Beckie turned 18, she started working at a radio station doing on-air concert announcements and interviews with artists at festivals. This experience showed her another side to the business, and all she could think of was that she couldn’t wait to run sound. Beckie attended every concert event she could between the ages of 18-25. After several years of this, Beckie returned to school with the aim of getting a degree in live sound engineering. Beckie attended Full Sail University graduating in 2001 with a degree in Show Production. After graduation, she interned as a tech in a Mega Church in Orlando, and six months later they asked her if she would be interested in becoming their Technical Director. Beckie took that role on full-time and continued to freelance around Orlando. Eventually, Beckie moved beachside to Florida to run FOH for another church.

Since starting B4MediaProduction, she has worked all over the United States as a Monitor Engineer, FOH Engineer, Stage Manager, and Production Manager. She is in a position now where she is called weekly asking if she can fill in for others on their tours, as well as for festival work and corporate gigs. B4MediaProduction have a mix of systems available from small QSC K systems and JBL Eon systems for the corporate gigs and a D.A.S. Aero 8 line array for middle-of-the-road stuff. The business is continuously building its inventory and has its sights set on either L-Acoustics or a d&b rig for the next purchase. Beckie says these are her favorite PA’s to mix on.

When touring, she loves the fact that she gets to play with many different pieces of gear. She has many favorites depending on the gig and budget. For a console it would have to be Midas Pro series, Microphones: Shure ULXD series for vocals with Neumann KMS105 capsules or SM68, saying her new favorite all-around application mic is Heil Pr 30, & PR 31BW. d&b, L-Acoustics, or Meyer rigs are the favorites for cabs. Beckie still has an old-school Lexicon PCM90 verb and says she loves it so much – it will be with her till she dies!

Beckie is known for her experience and her ability to step into many roles. She has been in the live sound arena for the past 16 years and has an impressive resume that showcases her versatility within the industry. In addition to providing systems and working as both FOH and Monitor Engineer, Beckie works as a production and stage manager. Her list of clients is extensive; from Amy Grant, Nicole Nordeman, Ellie Holcomb, The City of Orlando Parks and Recreation, Blue Mountain Brandon Heath Tour, and numerous local events and festivals.

Her advice if you are looking at becoming a FOH or Monitor Engineer is that it helps to know your microphones, DI’s, and mic techniques. If becoming a Production Manager is your thing, then communication skills go a long, long way in this job. Learning proper ways to communicate with different personalities and learning to actively listen and ask questions is essential.

beckie-3She loves seeing new places and meeting new people, but she says “my favorite thing is about 1 minute before the show when the house lights are going dark and you can feel the anticipation in the air from the crowd and then when the first sound hits and everyone goes nuts. “Nothing in the world like that feeling”!  Her least favorite things are cold showers at festivals and people with bad attitudes saying “Everyone has a bad day now and again, but if this is not in your blood or your passion and it’s just a job to you it will quickly weigh on you and everyone you’re around”.  

When on tour her favorite day off activity is going anywhere there is water (swimming, kayaking, hiking, sitting by a river or ocean, etc.) She likes to visit places she has never been to and have little adventures and try new foods. She also enjoys the occasional peace and quiet once in a place she has never been to before. If a day off is near family one of her favorite things is to visit nieces and nephews.  Or just a day with Netflix, a bag of chips, and an ice-cold beer.

During her career, she has faced her share of obstacles – while just doing her job. She tells me she has run into a few guys (mostly old school ones) that refuse to let her do things based on the fact that she is a woman. Beckie hears the little comments here and there and finds that at times, they have treated her like a clueless child. For example: being on the ramp hearing comments like “hey this is super heavy and you shouldn’t be here”, or, “do you even know how to run sound?” “Is there a manager or someone who knows what they’re doing here?” Over the years Beckie has learned to deal with these issues as they arise with pure grit and determination and when they see that she doesn’t just give up and walk away, they realize that she CAN handle anything just like a guy and accept her into the pack with open arms.

Beckie shares some good advice about gaining respect from your peers saying “I tend to show what I can do and not run my mouth about it. I have run into the occasional jerk that is just old school in the way they think, and there is nothing I can do to change that. I have found more often than not that even the guys who don’t think I can do it to start with, watch and see and notice that I can and then they too come around. Even the guy who asked me “Is there a manager or someone who knows what they’re doing here?” came back to me after the show and apologized profusely for thinking I wasn’t aware of what I was doing and said “I am sorry for not giving you the chance you deserve, you work harder than most guys I have worked with and you really know your stuff”

Being professional and friendly goes a long way. Beckie says that as a female in this industry it can be hard to break into work but by keeping your head in the game, networking and making contacts, and generally being a nice person that you will never lack for work. Being pleasant and communicating properly without being a jerk, or having her defenses up, helps toward being treated as an equal member of the team. There are always exceptions to this rule, but by following her own advice, Beckie is still working and making it in this industry saying your character will take you much further than your mouth.

The majority of the people Beckie has dealt with are at first a little hesitant about a female in charge of their event, but they quickly realize Beckie knows her stuff and does the job with excellence. She then becomes their go-to person for events and has a steadily growing list of returning clients.  

beckie-4Beckie has great advice for other women and young women wishing to enter the field. She says “Stick to your guns, remind yourself that there are others like you who have been doing this a long time and that you too can accomplish anything you set your mind to. Be responsible, if you mess up – you mess up, no one is perfect all the time. Stay humble, not one of us knows it all, and it’s ok to ask someone. Stay close to some seasoned professionals and ask lots of questions and take their advice. Above all never think you have arrived. You’ll always have something to learn. Our business is growing and advancing all the time with new gear and new ways to do things – continue to learn!”

Up until July this year, Beckie also taught part-time at Full Sail University. She remembers having a class of 12 students (both guys and girls) and asked them if they were hoping to tour and be on the road. Beckie says she was excited when 8 of the class raised their hands and 6 of those were women. She left Full Sail on a friendly note and has a great relationship with them which means she can reach out to the teachers to help fill in some intern needs. Beckie hires some of the students for events she does locally so that they can gain more exposure. Beckie is currently training a young woman, taking her on a job to Ohio. Beckie says “We are making a difference in the industry and I am grateful for those who have paved the way in our industry. We SoundGirls ROCK!”

beckie-2Her long-term goals are to continue growing her production company and staff to give the next generation more opportunities to tour and do gigs. She would like to develop successful, affordable training camps/sessions for church production technicians to teach them the proper way to do things. One day Beckie will purchase a beach home, find a hot single sugar daddy and (gasp) retire with a beachside bar/live music venue and bartend in her old age.

Last words from Beckie are that she loves SoundGirls.Org and the opportunity it’s providing for young women to feel accepted and encouraged in this business as well as intern and learn. When Beckie started out, she was not aware of other women working in the industry. She knew there must be other women somewhere, but she never saw any or worked with any.  The first woman she ever met was in the ’80s, and she was the drummer’s girlfriend who happened to tech with the band. When Beckie attended Full Sail, she was the only girl in the class.
Beckie is passionate about encouraging others and helping to be part of a growing community that strives to educate and help each other become better at what we do and says she will see you on the road!

2019 Update from Beckie:

“I am currently out on the road as the FOH engineer for the Indigo Girls, I have been incredibly blessed to be able to tour with such an accomplished team of people and to be welcomed into their camp. They are absolutely amazing and so talented. I love that after all these years they are still so down to earth, but professionals. It’s a great team of people and I am honored to work alongside of them all. I am running a Digico SD10 and Waves server (both new toys for me) so it has been challenging and rewarding at the same time.

I am about to step into a full season of corporate gigs with my company, B4Media Production. We will be all over from Dallas to Manhattan to Naples and Orlando, FL. in September. I am advancing these shows and building them now while out on the road with IG. So it has been a fun summer so far, and busy season is about to start. I am looking forward to what the road holds when busy season in Florida is over and I am currently looking for the next tour I can join when that time comes. I love to tour and be out there, but also love to train and build our business at home, so being able to do both this year successfully has been a super huge deal and very rewarding. I am still training church tech teams and doing SoundGirls expos and meet-ups when I am home. All things I love to do! I even got some beach time with the nieces and nephews this summer, and I am currently sitting by the pool with an ice-cold beverage while writing this, so all in all, life ain’t bad.”

aaeaaqaaaaaaaadkaaaajgvjzwrlyzewlwuxnzytndfloc04yjlmlwq0zge1m2u2ymqwyg

Profile by: Toni Venditti

Toni Venditti is the director of G.V. Productions that provides PA and Lighting equipment and is based in Sydney, Australia. She also is a senior industry writer for the CX Network and a contributor to SoundGirls.Org. Toni has worked in audio and lighting for over 25 years.

Erin Barra – Educator, Songwriter, Producer, Music Technology Consultant

erinErin Barra has a wide-ranging skill set educator, songwriter, producer, multi-instrumentalist, and music technology consultant. Erin specializes in music technology integration; she works with artists/bands looking to integrate laptops and digital technologies into their writing, production and stage setups. She has developed, taught and executed several music technology curriculums at the open source Coursera, and ROLI, K-12 Beats By Girlz, and collegiate levels Berklee College of Music, Berklee Online.

Erin is an Associate Professor in the Songwriting Department at Boston’s Berklee College of Music and is one of the leading product specialists for Berlin-based music software company, Ableton.  She has worked with an array of artists, from Grammy-winning artists engineers and producers; John Oates, George Massenburg, Kathy Mattea, Elliot Scheiner to those at the front lines of the independent movement Res, Miles Robertson, Ari Raskin.

SoundGirls caught up with Erin for an interview.

What is your specialty in music production?

I specialize in helping people reach their goals, whether it’s through collaboration, education or consultation. I communicate with people really well and have the creative and technical skill set to make most things in the music and technology realms happen.

Are you independent or do you work for a company?

Berklee College of Music is my home base, but I have my own consulting company MAMMA BARRA LLC that I freelance under, and work for private clients and for different brands such as Ableton, ROLI and Beats By Girlz

How long have you worked there?

This is the beginning of my 3rd year at Berklee, and I’ve been working for myself for about ten years

What is your current position?

Associate Professor

Give us a little background on what led you to work in music production?

I was pursuing a career as a singer/songwriter and felt completely out of control of my own content so one day I decided I was going to figure out how to produce myself.

How long have you been working in music production?

I’ve been producing for about ten years

How did you get your start?

In my bedroom studio haha.  No, but seriously, it was the work that I did at home on my own time that led to most of the opportunities I’ve had. I don’t think there’s any one thing that was a beginning for me; it’s just been this one very long and nonlinear journey.

How did you get interested in music production?

My father is an audiophile and places speakers for a living, so I was always interested in how things sounded.

What is your educational or training background?

I was classically trained as a pianist from ages 4-18, got a piano performance and songwriting degree from Berklee right out of high school and then learned all the music tech stuff the hard-knock way by teaching myself and asking a lot of questions.

What are your long-term goals?

Hold on to my sanity – I used to worry more about my career, but now that things in that arena seem to be less of a concern, it’s really more about maintaining my happiness in the midst of all the work. My other main goal is to have children, which affects both my work and happiness. It should be a huge adventure.

What are your current projects?

I always have about five irons in the fire at any given time, but right now I’m focusing the majority of my efforts on developing new curriculum for Berklee and building the Beats By Girlz initiative.

What is the Beats By Girlz Initiative?

Beats By Girlz is a curriculum and initiative designed to empower females to engage with music technology and build communities. We provide young women with the guidance, access, tools, and role-support to develop their interest (and ultimately their ability to pursue career opportunities) in music production, composition, engineering, etc. We are working towards gender equity in a field where women are highly underrepresented and strive help other groups mobilize and create similar change in their own communitie

What if any obstacles or barriers have you faced?

I try to view obstacles as opportunities, so I’ve had many many opportunities. Working in the music industry is full of barriers, but I think the biggest one for me was coming up with my definition of ‘success.’

How have you dealt with them?

Work harder than everyone else – keep learning – be open to change

Advice you have for other women and young women who wish to enter the field?

Find a good support system and communities to be a part of. It has so much to do with who you surround yourself with.

Must have skills?

Communication skills

Favorite gear?

I’m a laptop musician, so I’m more of a software gal – I’d have to say Ableton

You learn more about Erin thru her website – 

unspecified

There’s More Than One Way to Peel an Orange

A week of experiences

At the end of July, the sound and broadcast department welcomed Omani staff from other technical departments for a week of experiencing some of our specific skills and processes.

img_2791

Table shows examples of a small portion of our regularly used microphone selection.

Led by Bruno Silva for sound and Maxwell White for broadcast the aim of the week was to give an exciting overview of some of the varied techniques that we are required to use throughout the season. Hands-on training combined with foundation-level theory will be recognised at the end of the month with a certificate of achievement.

Day 1 kicked off with an introduction to the infrastructure of the building. From the comms room to the amp room, back down to the control room, front of house mix position, and speaker positions.

As a department, we then took it in turns to give a brief overview of our microphone collection, including radio mics and the Digico SD9 when used as a monitor desk. We agreed that it was important to include as much information about equipment that we regularly use and is often seen by other department members. For example, the stage department often comes into contact with our Crown PCC 160 microphones downstage for many of the operas that we record.

After a tea break, the project for the day was introduced. The visiting staff was able help set and record a piano concert. The following areas would be reproduced as per a regular performance at ROHM:

  1. Audio recording in the control room via the Pro 2
  2. Front of house mix via the SC48
  3. 2 x camera recording
  4. Monitor mix for the performer

The recordings would then be edited in subsequent days in the manner that would normally be required for the archive of a performance.

Feedback from the event was very positive and really helped cement the environment of enthusiasm and passion for the job between departments.

Although a huge array of skills were covered throughout the week, it was impossible to cover all areas that the department deals with. One constant throughout the season is recording performances in order to archive. This is a brief description of how we select microphones for recording via the Midas Pro 2 onto the DN9696 hard disk recorder.

Recording performances at ROHM

We make an archive recording of every performance. This could be a ballet, Arabic music concert, an outdoor event as well as Opera. Over the five seasons that the Opera house has been open a number of techniques have been tried and tested. The joy of working with an international team is that everyone brings their own experiences and ideas to the table. As a department, we are keen on a minimal number of microphones onstage during nonamplified performances. It would be easy for an audience member (or sometimes a performer) to mistake a microphone used solely for recording purposes as extra amplification. In a concert hall that is as audibly refined as ours, that would be a great travesty.

With this in mind, we have developed a system of mic’ing an orchestra in the pit for Operas and ballets that can be quickly and easily rigged and then added to when necessary. The patch sheet below shows examples of mics that we used for the opera ‘Lucia di Lammermoor’ last season.

screen-shot-2016-09-05-at-14-49-34

As well as mic’ing the orchestra, you will also see we have a small and select number of microphones onstage. In this case, the staging was very much downstage and our trusty Crown PCC 160’s covered most of the vocals. Two Schoeps MK4’s, rigged from the tormentors covered any mid-stage action.

img_2807As I mentioned before, in concert mode the placement of microphones away from the view of the audience is just as crucial. When we have a singer performing alongside an orchestra we often use our Schoeps on table stands downstage. We vary the capsules we use (either MK4’s or MK21’s) depending on the style of the performer. In addition, we also own a Neumann USM 69i. We rig this from bridge two which is front of house, above the first few rows of seating, depending on the format of the staging of that particular performance. By using fishing wire, we can get the perfect placement. Although fiddly when we started using this method, the team is now super-efficient at getting it spot on!

By the time of my next blog, the long-awaited season 6 will have commenced. Of course, our previous experiences will inform the way in which we approach new productions but it is important to bear in mind that there is always more than one way of mic’ing an orchestra, or a singer, or a drum kit! May we continue to be open to ideas and new ways of thinking.

.

SoundGirls Workshops – Rat Sound Systems

Soundgirls.Org Workshops – Dec. 2016 and Jan. 2017

All Seminars are held at

Rat Sound Systems

486 Constitution Ave

Camarillo, CA 93012

Seminars taught by Ivan Ortiz

10 am to 2 pm

Cost per seminar $40

20% discount for two or more seminars

Financial Assistance Available

Dec. 10 – Workshop on Best Practice for Throw and Go FOH and MONs

Seminar will cover:

Venue Limitations (Stage dims, proximity effect, House gear)

Priority in dialing a mix

Foldback mixing

Microphone selection and placement

File Storage

Digital console file management

What size USB, Virus protection

Festival file management for guest engineers (output patching, global, scenes, etc.)

Overview on different consoles – Hands on

Digico

Midas

Avid

Soundcraft

 

Dec. 17 – Power / Networking – Workshop on Best Practice for Power

Seminar will cover:

3 phase power vs. single phase

Clean power source

Isolating transformers

Battery backups

What you must know

Multi-meter

Dynamic Load

Generator power

Load Balancing

Networking

TCP/IP and the dot whatevers

Audio via Cat5 (Dante, AVB, etc.)

 

Jan 18th – What skills You Must Have

Seminar will include:

Listening/Mixing

Technical

Bring your many hats

People Skills

Communication

Know your place in a production

Working with Stage Crew

What are Sound Companies looking for in a technician

Qualities

Knowledge

Personality

 

Jan 14 – Understanding RF

Seminar will include

Transmission

Antennae

Cables and Impedance

FCC regulations

Active / Passive / Helical

Best Practice

Ideal and not so ideal scenarios

What not to do

Having a plan of action

Coordination

US Major cities

Tools / Software

Reality check

Limited Spectrum

 

Registration – Space is limited

If you would like to register for these seminars – please email soundgirls@soundgirls.org with the following info.  We will send you an invoice to pay for the seminars. You will not be registered until payment is made. We will send you confirmation of registration.

Please include

Name:

 

Phone:

 

Email:

 

Seminars you would like to register for:

Dec. 10 – Workshop on Best Practice for Throw and Go FOH and MONs

Dec. 17 – Power / Networking – Workshop on Best Practice for Power

Jan 18 – What skills You Must Have

Jan 14 – Understanding RF

All seminars are $40, there is a 20% discount if you register for two or more seminars.

Financial Aid is available.

 

Good Foundations Part Two

Last month we looked at preparing for a monitor gig – all the planning that happens long before we make noise. This month we’ll look at how to run the initial soundcheck and dial the band’s mixes up in an efficient and stress-free style! Good Foundations Part One.

You may have heard the old adage about monitors being 50% technology, 50% psychology. Well, there’s a lot of truth in that, although I’d probably go with thirds each of technology, psychology and good organisation!

So let’s say we’re now in the rehearsal studio or setting up for soundcheck. Everything is neatly labeled and patched in – organisation – and it’s time to get busy with the technology.

My first task is always the RF, and the first part I address is the setting on each unit. I make sure all the sensitivities, hi-pass filters, volume boosts, limiters etc are set to where I want them, then I turn to the RF itself (I highly recommend getting a hand-held scanner). I make sure the frequencies are both clean (no outside interference) and intermodulation-free (not interfering with each other). Once tuned to the chosen frequencies, the easiest way to check this is to have all the transmitters switched on (including mics and guitar packs), then switch off one transmitter at a time and see if the relevant receiver goes ‘quiet’ (displays no RF). If that’s the case, happy days; if not then there’s work to do, which I’ll address in greater detail next month.

When that’s all clear, I send pink noise to each IEM in turn and listen to the packs – left then right so I know they’re patched correctly. I walk the performance space and listen to each pack, to check that there are no drop-outs. Then I follow the same pink noise process with any hardwired packs on stage (again, check any filter switches are where you want them), and then the wedges, including my PFL.

Now I know that my outputs are good, I turn to the vocals. I set the gains, then dial them into the relevant IEM packs along with a touch of reverb.

Then it’s time to EQ the wedges. Using the main vocal mic, I first reduce any frequencies that just don’t sound good; then I see how far I can push my send before feedback, and pull out anything troublesome on the output EQ. I copy that EQ to all the wedges as my baseline. For the wedges with a vocal mic in front of them, I like to have a good 6dB of spare headroom on my send so that I have someplace to go, and I’ll often make that change on the mic input EQ.

If you have a singer who uses both IEMs and wedges (I don’t encourage it, but sometimes people are set in their ways), then it’s a great idea to split the vocal mic across 2 channels – one for the IEM, one for the wedges – so you can have different EQs.

The final stage of tech-checks is the inputs – it’s time to get the backline techs and FOH engineer involved for a line check. Good communication speeds this up – make sure you and FOH can hear each other, and if you’re in a big space then put both your shout mics through the wedges, or give the techs an IEM pack each so they can hear you too.

Finally, you’re ready for the band – and the psychology! A common mistake amongst new engineers is to have the band all pile in and play at once. This is a bad move because you won’t have time to set your gains and dial mixes in before they all start telling you what they can’t hear! One at a time is the golden rule. Have the drummer hit each drum individually – around 30 secs per drum should be sufficient to gain it and set a rough EQ – you can fine-tune later. When you’re fairly happy with each drum, bring that up in the drummer’s mix and move on to the next. Then have them play sometime, so they can tell you what they need more or less of.

Next up is bass. Set the gain and then have bass and drums play together. When the rhythm section is happy, I dial a rough drum and bass mix, minus overheads, into the other IEM packs (but I don’t do this if the band are on wedges, because they’ll get a lot of what they need acoustically).

Then I have guitars, keys, and any remaining musicians play one at a time, set each gain and bring them up in their own mix. Now they can each hear themself and the rhythm section.

Next, I ask them all to play together (no hard drive tracks at this stage, just a jam) and dial whatever else they need to hear for their ‘starting point’ mixes.

I then add hard drives if they’re being used, and finally, I hear the vocals.

It’s time to run a song and see how it’s all sitting. You’ll still need to tweak as you go along, but this process gets you to a really good place with the minimum of fuss.

Newer bands, in particular, will sometimes do two things which you, as the monitor engineer, should take charge of. Firstly, they often get excited and all want to play at once when they get behind their instruments. Make sure they can hear you, explain that you’ll build their mixes methodically and ask them to play one at a time. Secondly, they’ll start apologising every time they ask for a change (although this may be because I’m English and we apologise for everything!) You need to offer reassurance that you are there for them, so they can ask for what they need without worrying about it.

There are different ways of working, and you’ll develop your own over time, but this is a process that has never let me down. It leads to a happy band. And a happy band equals a happy monitor engineer!

After all, our purpose is to give the band the best audio environment possible, so they can get on with their job – giving the audience a truly kick-ass performance!

Training Your Ears

If you’ve been in this business for more than a week, you know how important training your ears can be. Training keeps your senses sharp and out of any ruts. Our hearing is very sensitive and in addition to protecting it, you need to keep it in shape.

Focus

An important ability for sound mixers of all kinds is the ability to focus your hearing onto individual sounds within a larger mix. This allows you to do a sort of zoom-in, analyze, and zoom back out, and analyze again. Another way to think about this is selecting “solo” on your console, without all the show-stopping awkwardness of actually solo-ing the channel in the middle of an event. It takes some practice but once you get it down, you should exercise it frequently. Your goal is to be able to focus in on something to make slight adjustments and then re-add them into the mix to finish making adjustments. This assures that you’re able to find issues deep in the mix, while still mixing the entire image. Another metaphor for this would be a magnifying glass to a painting; the smaller details matter, but we mustn’t forget the larger picture. Being able to focus your hearing will also let you hear whether not every instrument is audible. One of my top 3 mixing must-have’s is being able to hear every single instrument. A good training for this would be to listen to some of your favorite songs to try and find the quietest instrumental part. Focus on that and be sure you are able to recognize what rhythm they are performing to truly know that you have focused in on them. When you start to get comfortable, try going in and out of that instrument as quickly as you can.

EQ

Knowing your frequency ranges, and where common instruments fall on it, is a necessity. You should always know where to start when something going through your board needs to be EQed. You should also be able to identify at least the octave an issue is occurring in and the octave on either side. This gives you a 3 octave variance to find an issue. That’s significantly smaller than the entire spectrum. Then you don’t have to try to wildly sweep around and attack the problem. This can expedite the sound check process, as well as the process we as engineers go through in the heat of an error mid-show.

There are a few different ways you can go about training your ears for EQ

Pick out one of your favorite songs that you won’t mind listening to 300 more times. Import it into your favorite recording software or play it through your desk console. Apply a graphic EQ and set a 10dB or 15dB attenuation starting at 20hz. Bypass the EQ and listen to the song as it normally is, then turn the EQ back on. Listen carefully. Toggle between the bypass of the EQ and see if you can hear the difference. Then double the frequency on the band to go up an octave and do the same thing. Begin to learn what each one sounds like. Try to find identifying characteristics about each octave. Be sure to take frequent breaks to keep your ears fresh. When you don’t rest up, your ears get fatigued and try to enter into homeostasis. If homeostasis occurs, the differences will be skewed and all of the sudden you aren’t hearing any differences at all. If you start to get really good at hearing differences in a 15dB attenuation, make it 5dB, or even increase octaves of frequencies. When that gets boring, I recommend trying a program called Golden Ears. It’s a quality program that can blindly quiz you to really stretch you to the limits. Another great option that I tell my interns to use is SoundGym. It’s a free website that gives some great training on not only EQ, but sound quality, dynamics, and even sound location. It’s going to be tiring and it’s going to take some time, but doesn’t all training?

Recovery

For all those in training, for as hard as you go in practice, there needs to be a recovery period where your body can repair the damage to build muscle. The same thing goes for hearing training. Protect your ears and like I mentioned before, you need to rest. I also recommend not overthinking. If you let your mind get clouded or distracted, you won’t be able to focus, or to train. There are times when I need to stop multitasking, close my eyes, and focus on 1 event, and 1 event only. I should also take a moment to remind all of you reading this that you need to protect your hearing. That rock band does not need to be 120dB. Get some molds for custom ear plugs and protect your most valuable asset. Consider it insurance.

So if you’re brand new to the field, or you’ve had 15 years behind the board, you should really keep your ears as fresh as possible, and as sharp as possible. Come up with brand new training to push yourself. If you care about your career, you’ll want to be great at it as possible. Training breeds greatness. Go, train.

 

Kirsty Gillmore – A Diverse and Rewarding Career

kirsty3Kirsty Gillmore is a London-based sound designer, sound engineer, voice demo producer, and voice actor. She started working as a sound engineer in 2000 in her home country of New Zealand. She has had a diverse career since that start, working across a variety of fields including music, post-production, broadcasting, theatre, opera, and live sound.

Musical since the age of five Kirsty was always part of the choir and orchestras at school. As she grew up, she played around with recording technology using cassette players and her mum’s record player. One of her favourite toys was a Casio PT-1 Synth and Kirsty credit’s this with an endearing love of vintage synths! After secondary school, she applied to study for two degrees in music and arts at the University of Auckland in New Zealand because it seemed like the logical choice. At this time. Kirsty wasn’t aware that studying sound engineering was an option until the second year of her degrees.

While playing viola in an outdoor production of Macbeth she struck up a conversation with the composer about a gig they had both been to and how it could have been improved by changing the mix. It was the first time she had thought about what went into making that music and sound happen, and it grabbed her. It was around this time that Kirsty decided that she didn’t have the talent to make it as a solo musician and the only other career option that seemed to have a clear path for music graduates was teaching. Kirsty was already teaching and didn’t consider this to be a lifelong career at this stage of her life. Being a sound engineer gave her an entirely different career path and a way of using her musical training without being a musician.

After that conversation in the mid-1990s, Kirsty spoke to a lot of sound techs and sound engineers, all had learned on the job by attaching themselves to particular bands. At the time, it was a pretty closed shop, exclusively male, and Kirsty couldn’t see a way in. She started looking into courses when her composer friend suggested a course that a friend of his had done. In the ’90s in New Zealand, there were only two institutions that offered sound engineering courses, so Kirsty applied to the one with the best reputation, the Music and Audio Institution of New Zealand. She almost had to decide on studying stage management and technical theatre, as she had been involved with theatre all the way through university, but the only technical theatre course in the country was brand new and didn’t cover sound. She spent two years training as a sound engineer, mostly in music production and also synthesis, live sound, post-production, radio sound, electronics, and sequencing. In her second year, Kirsty did a placement at a post-production studio and was offered a trainee role, which then led to a freelance position.

Her first job after graduating from the Music and Audio Institution of New Zealand was as a freelance ADR & Dubbing Engineer at Native Audio in Auckland, New Zealand. One of Kirsty’s jobs as a dubbing engineer was for a series of English-speaking children’s programmes that were dubbed into Maori. At the time in New Zealand, there weren’t many opportunities to work in sound and in 2002 Kirsty made the decision to move to London, UK. She threw herself into the local scene and applied for any audio job she could find and surprised herself by getting a job within the first month as an audio archivist at the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC).

For the next eight years, Kirsty built her experience working in various roles at the BBC where she learned about sound for speech-based radio, TV and online.  By 2010 her job had somehow become entirely administrative, and she was pretty unhappy, so when the opportunity for a redundancy came along, Kirsty took it and went back into freelance work.

By the end of 2010, Kirsty had set up her company, Sounds Wilde and spent the next year doing various freelance sound jobs in post-production, live sound and theatre before deciding to focus on theatre, voice acting, and voice production. Currently, Kirsty is looking to expand into sound design for games, which works well alongside voice acting work and directing for voice acting. She is also interested in more composition work.

Kirsty is a big believer and advocate of educating yourself both formally and with ongoing training. Her initial formal training gave her a solid understanding of the basic concepts and a common language for sound, but she finds that since she has been working in sound, she has consolidated these concepts, and it’s allowed her to build and expand her knowledge. Kirsty says there are topics she covered in her formal training which she only now really understands. In the past few years, Kirsty has done short courses on mixing for musicals, radio production and various aspects of theatre sound.

Through the early years of Kirsty’s career, she didn’t have much support, in fact, asking for support was actively discouraged in the jobs she held in the first five or so years of her career. Kirsty found that everyone was just expected to get on with their jobs and learn through mistakes. While Kirsty never had a mentor, (though she would have really loved one) there were people whose work she admired like Nigel Godrich, an English record producer, recording engineer and musician best known for his work with Radiohead, Butch Vig, an American musician and record producer, who is the drummer and co-producer of Garbage and also Sylvia Massy who, at the time was the only female producer, mixer and engineer Kirsty knew of. Massy is recognized for her work on Los Angeles’s alternative metal band Tool. When Kirsty started to specialise in post-production, she found she definitely admired the work and career of Leslie Ann Jones.

In her studio, Kirsty has Focal CMS50s as monitors, (which she loves). Kirsty does all her mixing in the box and in doing it this way – she doesn’t need a console.  Her main go-to mic for voice-overs currently is an AKGC414 and for software, she uses ProTools for most of the recording and mixing she does, Ableton is used for looping and Qlab and Ableton are used for the theatre sound design work. For theatre sound, Kirsty prefers DiGiCo desks (with the theatre sound “T” software) and definitely DPA mics!

kirsty2Kirsty has had her share of discrimination and is a prime example of self-belief and determination to come out the other side. Discussing how she has been accepted in a male-dominated field, Kirsty will tell you she has been discriminated against too many times to count.

Thankfully, the more experienced Kirsty became, the discrimination issues seem to be fewer. She is not sure if the climate is changing or if her body of work speaks for itself but says it’s nice not to have to deal with it as frequently.

Looking at what’s ahead for Kirsty seems pretty exciting. In her studio, Kirsty is looking to invest in more mics. She is interested in what Advanced Audio can offer as alternatives to the Neumann U47 and U87. She is also looking at replacing her soundcard soon and is hoping to trial a Focusrite Claret with Thunderbolt, and the equivalent from Apogee as well.

Hopefully, there will be more international opportunities. After years of working in London Kirsty is looking forward to working at least a few months next year in her home country of New Zealand both as a sound designer and sound design tutor. She would also like to expand into game sound design and develop a composition portfolio, as well as taking on more voice-over directing opportunities.

Kirsty’s message is about being consistent, persistent, and open to opportunities.  She says “It’s great to have your heart set on a particular career in sound but don’t be put off if that doesn’t pan out at first. Once you know the fundamentals of sound, you can apply them to lots of different career paths as long as you’re willing to learn and take the time to meet people and build relationships. Technical skills are obviously imperative, but it’s your people skills that will get you the job. You’ve got to be prepared to hustle and find the opportunities; the jobs won’t come to you. Don’t be afraid to sell yourself, be proud of your achievements and confident in your skills while being open to learning from others”.

By Toni Venditti

 

Los Angeles Intern Needed

PrintTime: Every Sunday

Call time: 7am

Band sound check: 9:30am

Service: 11am

Place: Paul Revere Charter Middle School

1450 Allenford Ave. Los Angeles. CA 90049

Console: Behringer X32

You will be assisting SoundGirl Member and Head of Audio Kate Lee. You will gain work experience setting up and tearing down backline and sound for the services working alongside Kate.

Candidates should have basic audio knowledge – signal flow, mic placement, wrapping cables, etc. This is not a paid internship – but you will gain work experience. Candidates should plan on interning for at least six weeks.

If interested please send cover letter and resume to soundgirls@soundgirls.org

 

A Teaching Guide to Monitors

This month we welcome a new Omani team member to our department. With only a few weeks left until the beginning of the season, we are focusing on desk training. In particular, programming for monitor engineering. This article can be used as a tried and tested teaching aid for those new to monitors.

We usually use our Digico SC9 or our Venue SC48 for monitors. This step-by-step guide can be used for any desk.

1. Get a copy of the rider. Check all the stage plans are clear and that you have enough information about who needs what mix and where. It is best to clear up any ambiguity at this stage so that your programming can be as ready as possible for when the band arrives. At the opera house, we always have a senior member of the department in charge of a show who is in communication with the visiting band. This can be an extremely difficult job as quite often English isn’t the first language of the visitors. We also have at least two members of the department assigned to the stage.

2. Use a template or set up a new show file to save your work to! Sounds obvious but during the season quick load-ins and outs can often mean that files are not saved accurately. We aim to back everything up to a USB stick too. Sometimes we may need to access files after a company has departed so this is important! Good practice is also crucial to our teaching objectives for the Omanisation programme.

3. If necessary ensure that the desk is set up in the correct configuration for inputs and outputs. Both our desks can be changed during programming but it is good to think these things through before you start. Using the stage plan and rider information, label all the inputs. Don’t forget the talk-back mic and FX returns. Check your gain structure and that all EQ’s are flat and compressors and gates are switched off. It is worth doing this now rather than trying to troubleshoot later.

4. Now label all the auxes. We like to add an extra two or three auxes for effects. Depending on the desk you will also need your own monitor aux – (cue).

5. Patching next. Depending on your set up check your desk patch. We have an optocore system so the desk is fed by madi. This should be nice and straightforward!

6. Now go back to your auxes. Referring to your rider you can feed a few inputs to mix auxes in preparation. For example, the drummer will probably want some kick in his sub. Less is best at this point.

7. Set up your FX auxes. We go for a couple of different reverbs. In most cases, the internal effects in the desks are quite ample. Sometimes bands ask for specific effects units. The set up is exactly the same procedure.

8. Use the FX return channels that you labeled on your inputs earlier. Remember not to send the FX back to itself (awful, awful feedback… just don’t do it).

9. Check and save!

Other things to consider:

– Digico (and other desks) have an iPad app so that you can control the desk remotely. This is useful after the soundcheck. You can walk around and make adjustments as the band are playing.

– In conjunction with this, consider having the monitor mix on a wireless belt-pack so that as you walk around you can solo mixes and actually hear what the musicians are hearing. This is especially useful to us when there is a language barrier! Up can surprisingly often be misconstrued as down!

– You might also want to insert a graphic EQ over each aux send. This will give you a bit of fine control if needed.

X