FRONT OF HOUSE
THE FUNNEL EFFECT | Kent Morris
When recorded music first appeared on the scene thanks to Thomas Edison ’ s original cylinder-based phonograph and subsequent disc-based upgraded versions , music composers were forced to alter their compositions to feature far fewer repetitions . They realized if audiences could listen to the score more than once , they would quickly tire of the repeated sections which , in a one-time live event , were needed to bolster the core musical themes . In essence , the phonograph forever changed how music was written and experienced .
In the same way , technology has altered our creation and perception of human speech . If you listen to a President Teddy Roosevelt speech from 1908 compared to a speech from President Joe Biden today , the vast difference in tone , enunciation and level are astounding . Where Roosevelt had to convey his voice across the entire audience unaided , Biden need simply speak in a conversational tone to reach around the world . As such , Roosevelt had to maintain a strident tone , streamline his words and press hard on the consonants while Biden can evoke any emotion and use any verbiage thanks to modern audio technology .
At the end of the nineteenth century , Billy
Sunday was known as a stand-out professional baseball player with a penchant for alcohol until his conversion when he became an itinerant preacher with a zeal for evangelism in highly public spaces . His frenetic delivery was based on the needs of his audience . Without I-Mag to make him twenty-feet tall , his hectic on-stage movements served as a viable substitute to draw and keep attention . In the same vein , his vocal pitch was much higher than normal , but it allowed him to connect with his audience . His voice , piercing and strident at close range , became clear and articulate two hundred feet away , allowing him to communicate unamplified . Had he possessed a smooth , velvety voice , he would have not been successful in his field .
In the same way , when snare drums were first mic ’ d closely , the resulting sound was anything but natural ; yet , this technique has been the standard for the past forty years while a distance mic ’ d snare is now the aberration . Need drives innovation which delivers a novel approach that is eventually accepted as the norm . Natural then ceases to be the rule of judging whether something sounds good or bad due to its inability to meet the current need .
The result of all this manipulation is a skewed understanding of validity for anyone who adheres to authenticity as a stated goal of sound reinforcement . For what is the point of pursuing perfect sound if the original is anything but perfect ?
However , there is another viewpoint . Consider the goal as delivering the totality of appropriate sound as it best fits the music , artist and audience . For example , paring down the musical expression to its core elements can clarify how the mix should be assembled . A popular exercise in this genre is to only use ten channels with simply gain , hi-pass filter and fader as tools . The result is usually a tight , focused mix void of the “ mess ” we have all become accustomed to hearing . Essentially , it is a “ cleansing ” exercise forcing us to realign the mix ingredients in their proper order .
Modern audio tools and toys have proliferated at an unprecedented scale , leaving mix engineers with too many options and superfluous notions of what reinforced music and speech should be . Let ’ s be proactive and take it down the funnel to find beauty in simplicity .
Kent Morris Kent is a 40-year veteran of the AVL arena driven by passion for excellence tempered by the knowledge digital is a temporary state .