Jose Carreras with UMC Philharmonic
Soundco
On Stage Gear, LLC
Venue
Anderson Center, University of Mary Washington
Fredericksburg, VA
AC/DC Takes Their ‘Rock or Bust’ Tour Home to Australia
The AC/DC Rock or Bust tour, now through most of its slated 55 dates, has already played to millions across 21 countries. Following a four-week break after their last Los Angeles show, the boys boarded a plane and headed for where it all started for them: Australia. The band’s makeup is different this outing: Drummer Phil Rudd is currently battling legal problems in New Zealand, so Chris Slade is on the drummer throne; and original guitarist Malcolm Young has been forced into retirement and is currently fighting dementia. But keeping it in the family, his nephew Stevie Young is slinging his guitar parts.
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Straight No Chaser’s ‘New Old Fashioned’ Tour: Anything but Old School
In discussions about music, style labels and genres seem to be all-encompassing. However, when someone is asked how to describe a band that is different or somehow breaks out of the mold, a difficulty ensues from those who want every act to fit inside a “box,” whether it’s rock, jazz-pop or whatever. And so it is with Straight No Chaser (SNC). Simply dismissing this act as a “male a capella group” might bring up images of the Yale Whiffenpoofs glee club or perhaps a barbershop quartet, but SNC are far from either of those vocal performance stereotypes.
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Capacitors and Change
Sound is fundamentally about change. Changes in pressure on the eardrum lead to bone movement in the inner ear that triggers changes in neurons that cause the brain to perceive sound. And for pro audio, the initial change in air pressure results from a loudspeaker whose physical movement caused the change in pressure.
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The Walking Dead
Halloween is just behind us, but there may be plenty of goblins ahead. I’ve written before, here and elsewhere, about that moment of frisson when, at the 2012 Coachella festival, the audience was stunned by the reunion of deceased rapper Tupac Shakur with a very alive Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg during a performance on stage.
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Metering: Let’s Close That Can of Worms
Last month, we talked about dynamic range, headroom and signal-to-noise ratios, and how these concepts relate to the metering used on analog and digital gear. Since there was a bit of brain damage involved with last month’s T&P, we’ll quickly review a few important highlights. First, Zero on a VU meter is known as “operating level.” Second, In the pro audio world, when we see 0 on a VU meter, the signal level is approximately 1.23 volts. This signal level “standard” is known as +4 dBu. Third, Digital gear — such as mixing consoles, drive processors — often use meters calibrated in dBFS (deciBels below full scale), whereby 0 is at the top of their scale. When you hit 0 on a dBFS meter you are out of headroom. If we send +4 dBu (1.23 volts) into a dBFS meter it will typically show up at -18 dBFS.
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When Do You Need a New System?
Sound system purchasing decisions are among the largest financial decisions a church has to make. Depending on the size of your worship venue, a new sound system can exceed $100,000 or even $200,000. Even if you’re working at a smaller church that is only in a position to spend $10,000 or $20,000 on a new system, that’s a major expense. As a church technical director, I feel I have a responsibility to spend the church’s money wisely, because let’s face it, we are ultimately spending the hard-earned money of our congregants.
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Roland M-5000 Digital Console
The digital console market is crowded in 2015. Every new console I encounter is better (and cheaper) than the last. Features that were previously only found on high-end mixing consoles are cropping up on sub-$30,000 boards left and right. It’s simply amazing how fast the market is moving, and how far prices have fallen in just a few short years.
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