AUDIO
THE 9:00 AM SOUNDCHECK // FOUR PROBLEMS YOU CAN FIX BEFORE THE FIRST SERVICE | Steve Sattler
We’ ve all been there. It’ s 9:00 Sunday morning. Rehearsal went reasonably well Thursday night, everybody has coffee, the worship leader is running through the opening song— and suddenly the problems start.
The acoustic guitar sounds thin and brittle. There’ s a click coming through the PA. The worship leader’ s microphone starts feeding back when they step in front of the mains. And those two beautiful electric guitar tones that sounded huge when you were practicing at home have somehow disappeared as soon as the whole band starts playing.
Welcome to the 9:00 AM soundcheck.
This is not the time to redesign the sound system. You probably don’ t have an hour to experiment with EQ, and replacing equipment isn’ t an option. You need to identify the problem, make a sensible adjustment, and move on.
Here are four common Sunday-morning problems and some practical places to start.
1.“ MY ACOUSTIC GUITAR SOUNDS THIN” An acoustic guitar plugged directly into a PA can be a very different instrument from the guitar you hear sitting in your living room. The pickup, DI, console input, EQ, and PA all become part of the signal chain. When someone says an acoustic sounds“ thin,” the first temptation is usually to add bass. That may help, but don’ t immediately start boosting the bottom end. First, listen to the guitar in the context of the band.
Soloing the channel can fool you. A gorgeous, full-bodied acoustic sound by itself may become muddy when the bass, keyboards, and electric guitars join in. What sounds slightly lean when soloed may sit perfectly in the mix.
If it really is thin, start by checking the source. Is the guitar’ s onboard EQ doing something strange? Is the battery healthy? Is the correct input or DI being used? A bad cable, weak battery, or poor impedance match can send you chasing an EQ problem that isn’ t really an EQ problem.
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