SoundGirls Presents NAMM Mentoring Session
Join us for a Mentoring Session with Women Leaders in Professional Audio
You must be a member of SoundGirls, and you must register for the event. Space is Extremely Limited. You will receive venue address (venue is in Anaheim) with your confirmation.
This event will be a casual mentoring session – where you can get advice and answers to your questions. Groups will rotate between leaders specializing in Live Sound, Recording and Mastering, Broadcast Engineering and Professional Audio Sales.
Jeri Palumbo, a broadcast engineer, audio mixer and RF (radio frequency) tech
Jeri is a broadcast engineer, audio mixer and RF (radio frequency) tech who, for the past 25 years, has specialized in working on high-profile sports shows. Jeri is a technical whiz and a regular on the frontlines of events like the Super Bowl, NBA, NHL playoffs and most recently the World Series. Jeri is part of the RF Coordination Team each year for the Rose Bowl. She has also worked entertainment broadcasts including The Oscars, The Tonight Show, American Idol and others.
Karrie Keyes – Monitor Engineer for Pearl Jam and Eddie Vedder – Executive Director and Co-Founder of SoundGirls.Org
Karrie has spent the last 25 plus years as the monitor engineer for Pearl Jam. Karrie started out doing sound for punk bands in Los Angeles in 1986 under the tutelage of Dave Rat of Rat Sound, where she spent twenty years helping to establish the company. She was able to gain an immense amount of hands-on experience and technical knowledge at Rat, which eventually led to her becoming the monitor engineer for The Red Hot Chili Peppers from 1990-2000. She first met and started working with Pearl Jam who opened for RHCP on their 1991-1992 Blood Sugar Sex Magic Tour. She has worked with Sonic Youth, Fugazi, and Neil Young.
Erika Earl – Director of Hardware Engineering for Slate Digital and Slate Media Technology
From pulling out the soldering iron to setting up microphones around a drum kit, Erika Earl brings experience from all sides of the professional audio business. Her understanding of audio electronics was earned through more than a decade of experience repairing, servicing, and performing quality control for a wide range of top manufacturers, including Tube-Tech, Drawmer, Focusrite, Daking, Bock Audio, Avid, Little Labs, and many others.
She has also engineered for studios and run FOH throughout Arizona and California. Erika served as Head of Technology and Chief Technician for LA’s landmark studio The Village. When she’s not thinking through a schematic or evaluating the subtleties of a tube compressor, you’re likely to find her sifting through her collection of vintage records and rare books.
Leslie Gaston-Bird Vice President for the Audio Engineering Society’s Western Region & Associate Professor of Recording Arts at the University of Colorado Denver
Leslie Gaston-Bird Vice President for the Audio Engineering Society’s Western Region & Associate Professor of Recording Arts at the University of Colorado Denver. Leslie is also proud to chair the AES’ Diversity and Inclusion Committee. She has almost 30 years of experience in audio for film and video, music recording, and radio. She graduated from the Audio Technology program at Indiana University in 1989. She also holds a BA in telecommunications and an MS in recording arts. She has worked for National Public Radio in Washington, D.C., Colorado Public Radio in Denver, as recording engineer for the Colorado Symphony and as a sound editor for Post Modern Company in Denver. She has performed soundtrack restoration on films from the Sony/Columbia Pictures archives and is one of the pioneers of a music video production style she calls “Music Video Vérité”. She runs her own freelance audio post-production company, Mix Messiah Productions, LLC. She is also a Fulbright Scholar.
Katy Templeman-Holmes is the Director of Marketing for Professional, at HARMAN
At Harman, she has held several roles including; as a Product Manager based in Switzerland, running US Sales for Recording & Broadcast, training FOH & monitor engineers taking consoles on tour, running product development for a handful of different industries, and Director of Solutions and Marketing for Hospitality and Broadcast.
Grace Royse – Live Sound Engineer and Production Manager
Grace Royse is a Live Sound Engineer and Production Manager with 11 years of experience in world touring.Clients include Sublime with Rome, Fitz and the Tantrums, Maintaining a background in studio productions, business management, and artist development, she has mentored several young men and women over the years, all successfully working within the industry today.”
Vanessa Silberman is a National DIY Touring Singer (playing over 330 shows in 2015-2017), Guitarist, Songwriter, Record Producer-Engineer-Mixer, Independent A&R and has an Artist Development Label called A Diamond Heart Production (Down & Outlaws, The Punch) from Los Angeles. She was also the founding member of the LA band Diamonds Under Fire (2002-2013).
Jett Galindo Audio and Vinyl Mastering Engineer at The Bakery
Jett Galindo is an audio & vinyl mastering engineer from The Bakery, located on the Sony Pictures Lot in Culver City. With credits spanning different genres and legendary artists (Bette Midler, Nile Rodgers, Colbie Caillat, to name a few), Jett carries on the legacy left behind by her late mentor, mastering legend Doug Sax of The Mastering Lab.
A GRAMMY Voting Member (P&E Wing) & Latin GRAMMY nominee, Jett is also an accomplished soprano who specializes in choral ensemble music. Jett also devotes part of her time writing for SoundGirls and volunteering for Berklee College of Music as an Alumni Ambassador.
Ali “A MAC” McGuire has worked worldwide on albums, International/ US Tours, and charity projects alongside internationally recognized artists. Ali required recording, mixing, production, and live sound skills through a combination of experience and certification. Ali has worked with such artist as Fetty Wap, Post Malone, Hed PE, Big Daddy Kane, Dick Van Dyke, Whitney Peyton and more. Ali recently moved from Philadelphia to LA to take her business, Amaculent Entertainment LLC, to the next level. Ali is currently working out of a few great studio’s and venues in LA; recording, mixing and producing for the next generation of artists and more.
Sara Elliot VP of Operations and CoFounder of VUE Audiotechnik
With more than 20 years of experience in professional audio, Sara has held strategic marketing and operational positions with numerous sound production companies including Burns Audio, A-1 Audio, and PRG. Sara also served as Director of Marketing and Sales for Live Sound International Magazine and ProSoundweb.com, two of the industry’s most respected news and technical information sources. Sara brings to VUE Audiotechnik a wealth of industry relationships and a deep understanding of business operations.
Fela Davis Sound Engineer and Owner of 23db Productions
Fela Davis is a co-owner at 23db Productions based out of New York City. She’s a graduate of Full Sail University and has over a decade of experience in audio engineering. Her past experiences include working with industry powerhouses Clair Broadcast and House of Blues. When she’s not mixing or mastering songs for 23db Productions, she’s mixing front of house engineer for the 5-time Grammy award winning jazz artist Christian McBride, and Grammy-nominated Ottmar Liebert.
Claire holds a Bachelors degree in Music Technology from Hertfordshire University in the UK. She has 8 years of professional touring experience as both guitar/backline tech and as Tour Manager. She now lives in Los Angeles, having relocated from London and tours exclusively as a guitar tech. She has a business in the UK providing storage for bands and local companies in London, and previously provided rental sprinter vans.
Catharine Wood Recording – Mix Engineer – Owner Planetwood Studios – Catharine is a Los Angeles-based composer/producer/engineer with a recording studio in Los Angeles. With a background in audio post-production for commercials, Catharine engineered on the first iPhone commercial among hundreds of national and international campaigns – including the Geico Caveman and Priceline Negotiator spots. As a mix and mastering engineer, she has engineered on over 300 commercially released songs – including her own custom compositions which have aired on NBC, ABC, BBC, ESPN and more – both nationally and abroad. She is a GRAMMY® Voting Member and Producers & Engineers Wing member. Catharine currently holds a position on the LA Recording School’s Recording Arts Program Advisory Committee and is the former Director of Southern California for the West Coast Songwriters organization. She is a voting member of the Society of Composers and Lyricists, a Board Member of the California Copyright Conference and longtime professional member of NARIP and AIMP. Her company, Planetwood Studios, LLC (parent company of Planetwood Productions, established 2002) specializes in producing singer-songwriters and providing engineering, production and composition services to the TV, Film and Recording industries.
Tiffany Hendren Live Sound FOH and Monitor Engineer
Tiffany Hendren is a monitor engineer at The Pageant in St. Louis and the House Engineer for the Del Mar. She tours as the FOH Engineer for “A Silent Film.” She has been involved in sound professionally for around seven years, full-time about five. Tiffany is the Co-Director of SoundGirls.Org.
Jessica Berg – Tour Manager and Live Sound Engineer
Jessica is a freelance TM/FOH/MON engineer and is currently touring as the TM for Phoebe Ryan. Jessica is SoundGirls.Org’s Director of Development. She is honored and excited to be volunteering with a growing organization and community that is achieving its mission – to help empower the next generation of women in audio, expanding opportunities for girls and women in the audio and music production fields, and sharing resources and knowledge through cooperation, collaboration, and diversity.
Daniella Peters – Head of Sales and Management Team at Rat Sound Systems
Daniella has been with Rat Sound for over 15 years building their sales dept from a concept to a multi-million dollar part of their business. She started off her career working for an international cosmetics company doing their live event production. She then transitioned to HHB Audio and Ashdown Music, Emap Performance (Kerrang and Q magazines) in London and now with Rat Sound.
She is passionate about women’s issues and spends a good portion of her spare time using her production skills to produce and host music and fashion fundraising events for various women’s non-profits.
Mary Broadbent is a Tour Manager and Backline Tech. Mary is the Tour Manager and Backline/Guitar Tech for The Mowgli’s and The Staves. She’s also worked with Chris Isaak, Fitz and the Tantrums, and Big Bad Voodoo Daddy. Most recently she jumped behind the soundboard for the first time on tour with Wrabel as TM/FOH.
It’s easy to miss the SoundGirls news and blogs, so we have put together a round-up of the blogs, articles, and news from the past week. You can keep up to date and read more at SoundGirls.org
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https://soundgirls.org/holiday/
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I recently embarked on my first tour ever. Yes, I’m 27, and yes I’ve been playing in bands and making my music for over a decade. I’ve done long drives and weekend “mini-tours,” but I have never been on a real tour. And then this September, it happened!
Before I left, I was feeling grateful that I was going to go on tour this year and not last year, or the year before, or the year before. I had finally reached a point where I stopped caring about what other people thought of me. My anxiety about making an ass of myself in the years between absolute-and-total-beginner and goddess-of-pop-and-production-and-also-successful-film-composer—aka my ultimate dream—had pretty much diminished once I turned 27. I knew that this was going to be a very valuable asset on my first tour because my band was the opener for two other well-known bands, our budget was next to nothing, and at the end of the day, it was entirely possible that the headliners’ fans wouldn’t like us. The thick skin was a welcome change. My newfound penchant for not giving a shit, paired with years of work that had led to this moment was, without a doubt, feeling pretty good right about then.
Another reason I was glad to be touring later rather than sooner: I had worked in restaurants a lot, and my restaurant “skills” that I had previously seen as invaluable were suddenly feeling extremely valuable:
But one of the things I had not foreseen was how much my live set design* affected the entire flow of my band’s setup, our soundcheck, our show, and any challenges that came up along the way. My live setup was lightweight, looked good, and got the job done. At the onset of my first-ever national tour, my live set consisted of:
Drum World:
Bass World:
My World:
The music we were performing contained synth riffs and all sorts of expressive percussion sounds, as well as swells and other emotive drops that were integral to the songs. After tweaking frequencies and decibel levels according to the feedback of a number of trusted sources, I was proud of what I was going to be working with on stage every night, and I was excited about the live musicians I’d chosen to play with me.
However, midway through our tour, I had to fire one of the musicians I’d been so excited about. The reason? Sexual harassment of underage fans.***
That this happened mere weeks before the Harvey Weinstein stor(ies) broke and dominated our news feeds. Of course this person tried to defend himself with comments about how “no physical harm was done” and how “the Internet isn’t really real.” (Yes, these are real quotes from a real adult who was a working professional. And no, they had no bearing on my decision to promptly remove this person from my tour.) By the time he got home, our entire nation was fuming over sexual harassment scandals. Perhaps it’s silly of me to think that he learned his lesson by reading the news? I’m still hopeful.
Anyway. My remaining bandmate and I were five shows deep into a ten-show tour, and were suddenly faced with a huge task: play a set of (relatively complex) pop music for an audience of about 1,000 people in an expressive and engaging fashion, all while being short one musician.
So how did My World and Bass World pull it off?First of all, I was lucky. The Ableton project folder I had saved to my brand new, purchased-on-credit solid-state laptop**** happened to include the Ableton session I had used months before for a couple of impromptu two-person shows. The day after we fired our rogue drummer, I fired up said session in the minivan and promptly began adding any bells and whistles I believed we were missing in his absence. This consisted mostly of drums tracks and one-hits that I had to mildly adjust: some pocket issues here, some EQ issues there. I made a decision to add a bitcrusher effect to any drum tracks that felt too “acoustic” to play on the house speakers. For those who don’t already know, a bitcrusher is a rudimentary distortion that digitally alters resolution. It adds a bit of a prickly sound to sounds that don’t have much prickle. Too much bitcrusher and things can easily get chaotic, but the right amount and things sound more interesting. Put another way: drum tracks that sounded too angelic were transformed into a sample that sounds something like the lo-fi quality of Sleigh Bells or Crystal Castles. (Side note: I still haven’t decided if I am still a Crystal Castles fan after member Alice Glass’ public statement about her prior bandmate’s extremely abusive behavior toward her. Considering Crystal Castles is the work of both of them, is it more supportive to engage with her work, or to denounce his?)
After this brief editing, my bass player/backing vocalist (who herself is a talented producer and songwriter) and I rehearsed in our minivan while our photographer/tour manager drove us to our next show. Our rehearsal was my laptop, my Push, and us singing and playing air guitar and bass.
Our first show without a drummer I told the audience to “take care of each other.” Our second one I told the audience “we used to have a drummer but they had to be sent home.”
I was under the impression that something was wrong. But, as it turned out, I was the only person on the tour that had that impression. Myself, along with my team, had communicated with the tour team about what had happened, and we were scooted off with nothing but blessings and anecdotes from similarly sad experiences. For the remainder of our short but sweet tour, new fans poured their hearts out to us, took photos, purchased autographed posters and t-shirts, all without so much as a mention of the absence of a live drummer.
So what was at play when I pressed play each and every remaining night on that tour?
First: and foremost: songwriting. Before this tour I’d spent years working on singing styles, lyrics and character perspective concepts that (finally) seemed relevant and original to a wider audience.
Second: our live setup was simple, but it was also capable and flexible. I’d never anticipated needing to let a core player go in the middle of a tour, but I could when I needed to. My remaining bandmate and I were at a slight advantage because we had played a two-person set before (albeit to a much smaller and drunker audience), Also the fact that we were the first of three acts meant that it was totally okay that our setup was simpler than the other bands’. But, we were also open to the objective criticism of what we would be missing without a live drummer, namely dynamics and the energy of another person on stage with us. So we made up for that with some lightweight native plugins and mad stage presence. We had so much stage all to ourselves now! So we used every square inch of it to keep energy high.
We did not see any decrease in merch sales or new fans. We did not need to field any questions about the absence of a drummer. Anyone who spoke to us about our music was excited and wanted to know when they could come to support us again. Most surprisingly, myself and everyone on my team took it in stride. The weight of sexual harassment among our personnel had been dealt with swiftly and strictly. We had exercised morals we lived by, and now we had shows to play.
So. What’s my point?
Sexual harassment is never tolerated, even when the harasser’s role is theoretically indispensable. Make the most of what you already know. And most importantly, be prepared for anything. A good attitude will keep you going.
*Music Directing is the design of artists’ live setups and is a profession unto itself. I will be sure to devote a whole blog post to this topic soon.
**In the past I have played with having my own vocal rig. At one point I ran my vocals through Ableton Live because I anticipated the possibility of wanting to play with effects and looping in real-time without having to purchase expensive pedals. At another point, I invested in the TC Helicon VoiceLive Touch which afforded me amazing on-stage effects. However its signal flow also provided a great deal of noise and confusion, usually from front-of-house people. Ultimately it didn’t do the job I wanted, so I sold it.
***Again, this story will eventually be a blog post unto itself.
****If you are going to use a computer on stage (especially one that you interact with while you are performing), it needs to be a solid-state drive laptop. Traditional spinning drives can skip when they feel vibrations from drums, stage monitors, your own body accidentally knocking your computer over. And you don’t want that!
Sign SoundGirls Open Letter to the Professional Audio Community & Music to Address Sexual Harassment
Find Information on Sexual Harassment in the Music Industry
It’s easy to miss the SoundGirls news and blogs, so we have put together a round-up of the blogs, articles, and news from the past week. You can keep up to date and read more at SoundGirls.org
Prince’s sound engineer, Susan Rogers: ‘He needed to be the alpha male to get things done.’
Women Make An Impact on the 2018 MPG Awards Shortlist
Katie Tavini on supporting other members of the pro audio community
When I was 17 and an intern at Interscope Records in New York City, my boss, head of radio promotions, said to me, “Don’t get into this business. The music business is a terrible business.”
I can handle it. I thought to myself. I looked at the photos on the shelf next to her desk. “Haha, yeah, it seems pretty crazy. Hey is that you and Eminem?”
“We’ve been together since the beginning. He is a true artist.”
I sort of listened. And I sort of knew what she meant. Mostly I was thinking about how badly I wanted to prove, mostly to myself, that I could handle it.
When I was 11, I learned to play finger style blues guitar from the guitar teacher and music store owner in my town. He is now one of my closest friends, but at the time we barely knew each other (also I was 11, and he was a man who owned a music store so…yeah). One fall day he hosted an open mic at our community center. We never had stuff like that going on in town, so I didn’t even know what an open mic was. He encouraged me to perform, and I ended up playing “Foolish Games” and “Save Your Soul” by Jewel, and an old swing number called “Believe.” I was so nervous I was shaking. My dad filmed the whole thing on our camcorder, which my little brother recorded over a week later when he and his friends wanted to document their backyard dinosaur-bone excavations.
1991 – me and my older brother Ariel in 1991 in East Chatham, New York
For my 12th birthday, my dad took me to see Ani Difranco headlining the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival in nearby Hillsdale, New York. He bought me a pentagram—I was really into Wicca at the time—and sat on the grass hill with me, surrounded by RV hippies and babies on boobs, and watched Ani give herself to us. Her body was a channel, and her voice and guitar were the message. She hit the strings so hard that the buzzing and the sliding out of tune became part of her songs. She roared her lyrics like a lion, completely free of all fear. It felt like the first time she’d ever been in this moment, and simultaneously like she’d always been in this moment. She was her, and she was us. And yet she was beyond herself and us. I don’t know how or why, but I wanted to do that, and I felt like maybe I could. So I decided to try.
A few days later I performed a song I’d written for my dad and grandparents. It was called “I Am A Puzzle, ” and the guitar part was inspired by Ani’s playing. The lyrics were:
I am a puzzle
I am hard to complete
it’s hard to find the whole thing
and then put it all together
but I have a missing piece
I have a part of me missing
if you have a puzzle
and you wanna see
the whole damn thing
you’re gonna need
that last piece
I don’t remember exactly how 12 year old me felt at the time. But I do feel like those lyrics, however silly, bore an uncanny resemblance to my life that came later.
There are so many pieces to this puzzle.
I spent my teen years performing songs like “I Am A Puzzle” and “Tears On My Pillow,” and “Crying and Cold” to farmers, bikers and any friends and parents I could get to come out to whatever Columbia County bar and cafe would let me play. I took great pride in my ability to make bikers cry when I sang the sad songs.
2012 – Setting up Ableton for a show in Bushwick, Brooklyn
That summer at Interscope was the only summer since I was 14 that I didn’t have a paying job, and I didn’t know what to do with myself. I was living off the student loan I’d taken out earlier that year. I mostly stayed at home and worked out acoustic covers of my favorite songs by The Knife.
For my birthday in July, my then-boyfriend gifted me a Focusrite audio interface and a pair of AKG headphones. He’d given me a bootleg version of Logic 9 and was adamant it was going to be my “new favorite thing.” My grandparents gave me an SM58, which I’d asked them for. In my spare time between school and work, I would play in Logic. Over the next year or so my boyfriend and I collaborated quite a bit. But we ran into issues because he didn’t have to work and I did. I would get frustrated that he was making more than me, and he would want me to sing the things that he’d written. But I wanted to write and produce too. Was I territorial and stubborn? Or was I just in a different position than him?
Writing good songs was one piece of the puzzle. Producing was another. And yet another was the balance of work (for money to live) and art. It was becoming painfully obvious that the cards I’d been dealt in that regard were not the most generous.
2017 – Rehearsing with my live band this past summer, Los Angeles, CA
In the years since then, I have experienced all kinds of resentment toward those that have more cushion/support/time/money/etc. But resentment is a heavy thing to carry around, and I decided at some point to stop carrying mine. Perhaps it was when I realized that, even though I’d spent most of my life working on music, I still had many many pieces of the puzzle to find and put together before I was going to have a career.
Ten years later, I wonder where I would be if I’d heeded the advice to stay out of the music business. I have never truly considered another path aside from that of a musician and artist. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed by the complexity of it all. But mostly I still feel like I want to prove, mostly to myself, that I can handle it.
So you’ve gone to the studio to record your guitar tracks but the output seems off. It may not sound like the way you’ve envisioned, or there seems to be something lacking in your recording. Whatever the case may be, you know you can do better–but how? We’ve rounded up some tips to help you make better guitar recordings in the studio to get you on your way to becoming a pro!
Every guitar model has a different sound because of its size, make and strings, so it’s important to pick the right guitar. One guitar may be better than another depending on the situation, and while you may not be able to take your pick of guitars at the beginning of your career, it’s still important to be aware of this. If the recording studio has other guitars available, you can ask if you can borrow them to see which can give you the sound you’re aiming for.
Always make sure your guitar is perfectly tuned before each recording session. Use an electronic tuner if you haven’t learned to tune by ear.
It’s advisable to change out all your strings every recording session. Old strings tend to sound lifeless and dull–they may not sound that way to your ears since you’ve become accustomed to the sound, but trust us on this–you’ll get a better guitar track with new strings. Acoustic guitars will sound brighter and electric guitars will sound fuller.
The rule of thumb is the higher the action, the more “open” the guitar sounds and the greater sustain and resonance.
Strap buttons, jacks, pickup wires and washer tuners can come loose and create unwanted noise that can be picked up during a recording session, so make sure everything is stable and in place.
When the pickups are too close to the strings, they can reduce sustain. When they’re too far away, the output decreases and high frequencies are dulled. Find that sweet spot first before hitting the record button.
Make sure these are in working condition and not scratchy.
Try all of your mics to see which ones work best for the sound you’re going for. Different mics and where they’re positioned can impact the character and quality of the recording. Top tip: don’t use mics that might exaggerate the lows, mids or highs in a guitar that’s already too dark, middy or bright. If the guitar already sounds bright, use a dark-sounding mic to balance the sound. Also, Keep in mind that the closer a mic is to an instrument, the greater the proximity effect, or an exaggerated low-frequency boost, will be.
As mentioned, mic placement is crucial. Depending on where you put the mic you can get plenty of different EQ responses. It may make you feel like Goldilocks, but your efforts will pay off once you get things just right. Take time to listen to the tonal changes in each part when you position the mic.
It’s rare to perform and record a guitar track perfectly in one pass. Accept this and have patience with yourself, and your gear as well. Making adjustments a little bit at a time and taking note of which setup works will make things easier for you later on.
About the Author
Nicky Patterson is a music blogger and has written many articles related to acoustic and electric guitars. Nicky has been a keen acoustic guitar player for the past ten years and has been playing the electric guitar for five. She has also played in a number of bands and continues to play in her spare time.
No experience necessary. Beginner and intermediate users welcome. All genders and non-binary people are welcome.
$60 for the two-day course – email soundgirls@soundgirls.org if you require financial aid
Class Description
Do you want to start making beats? Do you want to learn how to make your own demos? Do you want to sharpen your DAW skills so you can get over that first learning curve and really start running with your creativity? Do you want to start performing live with Ableton, but don’t know where to start?
By the end of this two-day course, you will have learned all you need to know in order to really get your engines revved up about Ableton. I want to give you the tools to explore and to run as much of your show as you want to. With your newfound agility and excitement, you might even feel confident to explore parts of Ableton functionality that haven’t yet been discovered! Because that’s what creativity is all about—exploring and playing! But first, what is it exactly that you will be learning?
Day One will be all about the essentials of Ableton. What is the basic design behind this software? How do you get the sounds you want IN there, so you can edit them and play with them? How do you program a drum beat? How do you slow it down if you want to? How do you mess around with ideas and decide what parts you want to go at the beginning, the middle, and the end? How do you listen to it on your phone? By the end of the class, you will have a multi-track song that you create entirely by yourself using Ableton.
*Key items covered: time signatures & tempos, MIDI, audio, clips, arrangement view, bouncing
Day Two will focus on Ableton in live performance. You will learn how to make backing tracks that are suitable for the type of performance you want to put on. Maybe you want to push play at the beginning of the set and never really look at your computer again until your last song. Or maybe you want to engage with every sound that comes out of the house speakers. Or maybe your fantasy set is something in between! We will go over different approaches to designing your live set by using your new song from day one as a template.
*Key items covered: importing tracks, deciding on a playback concept, labeling, setting up loops and automation
Equipment needed (students):
-laptop with Ableton already installed – You can download a 30-day free trial
Instructor: Elana Carroll is a songwriter, producer and performer who has been making original music for 15 years. She holds a BA in music and critical theory from Bard College at Simon’s Rock.
Elana’s interests as a writer/producer span from electronic and dance to pop and country, and she co-writes with other artists as well. Her current focus is on teaching (she will be teaching a Beats by Girlz class this fall), and her own project, Party Nails. She feels it is part of her purpose in this life to “normalize” non-males in the music business through performance, teaching, and mentoring. She is particularly fascinated with popular culture and music in the age of technology.
Financial assistance available email soundgirls@soundgirls.org
When starting out as a Live Sound Engineer, you will encounter gigs that require you to wear two hats. The Tour Manager or Production Manager and Sound Engineer are the most common dual roles you will encounter. Being able to handle both roles effectively will make you more valuable, increase your skill set, and allow you to gain the experience you need to tour solely as a Sound Engineer or Tour Manager.
What do you need to know to tour manage? Tour managing is similar to herding cats. Why would anyone want to herd cats? It’s difficult, time-consuming, and the cats don’t like it. These days touring budgets are shrinking and the crews are often smaller. This means when you are starting your career in live sound, you will be required to do more than one job. Engineer/TM/PM is a favorite combination. If you gain the skills to TM/Engineer, you will be paid more and make yourself more valuable.
Come learn about “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of Wearing Two Hats”.
Rachel “Mr.Soundlady” Ryan is FOH for Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, Monitors for Silversun Pickups and The Strokes and has road managed/Foh for PHOX
Jessica Berg has worked at TM/FOH and Monitor Engineer. She has tour managed Dr. John, Quadron, Waka Flocka Flame and Phoebe Ryan. Most recently she has been TM/FOH/MON with Hailey Knox and ME for KIIARA.
Mary Broadbent is the Tour Manager and Backline/Guitar Tech for The Mowgli’s and The Staves. She’s also worked with Wrabel, Fitz and the Tantrums, and Big Bad Voodoo Daddy.
There will be plenty of time for Q&A. Feel free to send in questions you want to be answered –to soundgirls@soundgirls.org.
Light Refreshments will be provided.