live band sound setup open air ( basket ball court ) 300pax

Yorkville has some good recommendations for various instruments.

[ vocals - all flat ]
[ acoustic guitar - bass flat, mid -3dB, treble +2dB ]
[ bass drum - bass flat, mid -3dB, treble flat ]
[ snare drum - bass -6db, mid & treble - flat ]
[ floor toms - all flat ]
[ tenor toms - bass -3dB, mid & treble - flat ]
[ cymbals - bass -12dB, mid & treble - flat ]
[ trumpet, tenor & alto saxophone - bass -3dB, mid & treble flat ]
[ trombone, barritone saxophone- all flat ]
[ guitar amp - bass & mid flat, treble -3dB ]
[ bass amp - bass flat, mid -3db, treble flat ]
[ harmonica - bass -6dB, mid flat, treble -3dB ]

If your mixer has a mid-sweep they offer these further suggestions.

Together, MID and SWEEP controls can be used to accomplish a variety of tasks from combatting feedback to improving the way things sound through the PA or on recording. Here are some of those tasks & settings:

Killing feedback; set MID at -6dB and slowly rotate SWEEP until the feedback stops. If needed cut Mid further.
"Bonky" sounding snare drum; -6dB @ 200Hz (and roll off LOW EQ -6dB)
"Boomy" bass drum; -6dB @ 300Hz (with LOW EQ at +6dB & HIGH EQ at +3dB)
"Fwashy" sounding cymbals. -9dB @ 300Hz (roll off LOW EQ -15dB)
Excessive hiss from guitar, bass or keyboard amp; +3dB @ 5kHz (with HI EQ rolled off -9dB)
Fading vocal range (notes too low for singer); +3dB @ 80Hz (with LOW EQ rolled off -6dB)
"Puffing" on harmonica mic; -9dB @ 80Hz (with LOW EQ rolled off -12dB)
Rack Toms; -3dB @400 Hz
Floor tom; -6dB @ 200Hz
{Note: These are approximate settings only. Use them as a starting point and "tune around" them.}
Generally speaking, you will probably end up with the MID in cut mode for most problem-solving uses of the SWEEP control. In any case you will learn to use this feature judiciously. The best PA EQ setting is the one with the LEAST adjustment, but when you need to solve a problem it's good to know how to use the tools.

Here is the link to the Yorkville Professional Audio Guide, very helpful advice.

Yorkville Professional Audio Guide

thanx wes , what is your band setup like? m not too familiar with setting up aqoustic drums

i would be using my 8 channel mixer dynacord , will be using

five channels for the mics
one for my aquoustic guitar
one for keyboard

and one channel stereo out will take it to a mackie mixer . will put the drums, bass, lead guitar, in that mixer.

will this settings be fine which u gave me in mackie? . though i will be checking it with ear.

i need to buy a 16 channel dyna cord mixer . will be buyin it soon

what is your set up like? with a drummer( aqoustic drums)?

Shane

We don't play many big gigs, so for most gigs it is very simple, a Shure SM58 on the kick drum, and a SM58 vocal mic for our drummer. But the vocal mic also does a nice job of picking up the snare, toms, and cymbals. On the kick I boost lows and highs a little and cut mid a little. We just experiment on the spot to get the best kick. The other mic is set fairly flat for vocals, maybe cut bass a little and boost highs a little.

We have mic'd the snare and toms at times, but really it is not needed, our drummer Jeff is a very powerful and hard hitter. You can hear him well even in a large venue without mics. But we like a little thump for the kick drum.

Those EQ settings are from Yorkville. They are a good starting point, and then make small changes for your particular venue and mics. Those settings should work well with your Mackie or Dynacord.

thanks wes ,
took a print out of the settings , will have a go on saturday , n let u knw how it went ,
cheeers bro

Shane

Yeah, good luck and great sound at your gig. Basketball courts are notorious for being very difficult for live sound (hard floor, walls, and ceiling). Best bet is get there as soon as possible before the show and doing a good sound check. Even helps if you have a friend who can play your guitar and sing so you can walk around and listen to the sound.

Let us know how your gig turns out.

Wes

the organisers will be bringing their own sound. EV speakers , dynacord pm 2600 amp with built in crossover , total power 2600 watts , four channels 700watsx 2 for the subs and 600 x 2 for the tops , ( two way) . pluse 4 monitors powered , will be taking an out from my dynacord and connecting to their mackie mixers for all the instruments . 5 vocals n my keyboard,acoustic guitar in the dynacord mixer.

hope the sound 2600watts would be enough . what do u think? its a hotel staff campus , basketball court surrounded by the accomodation walls.

that is plenty of power for that gig. Wes has given you great advice...........but also try this.

Make sure you put compression on your cymbals,and atleast snare..........the best thing to do is have compressors on all the drum mics if you have enough channels ( i have 18 channels of compression so this ino problem). 8)

As far as acoustic drums it easy don't think to hard about it. Their acoustic which means they need NO amplification to be heard. So all mics are doing is pushing the sound tad bit. Get a Shure 5 Piece mic kit, and complement it with 2 Audix F15 overheads (these are awesome overheads for cymbals and drums in general). This is almost the perfect setup and works great.

Compression on acoustic drums is your friend, it allows you to control that cymbals volume no mater if he hits it hard or soft, if he hits it light it will bring it up to where its heard, if he smashes the hell out of it it will drop it down to a good level and balance the set and the group. *(this is if the compression is done right)

Any questions email me [email protected]
You can reply to the posts but I'm not sure when I can check it but I check my mail 3 times a day at least.

hey leear thanx for your advice . saw it late though. r u a drummer ?

wes the show was fine . the acoustics of the place was horribly bad . walls surrounding . and hitting back rather echoing very fast like a rebound was horrible .

2600 watts power was ok for 300 people outdoor . but would have prefered some more power say another 1000watts as the crowd was crazy and was on the floor right from the first song. needed to pump some more volume . but it was ok in the end crowd enjoyed.

thanx for the settings wes. i used all my mics as i said on my dynacord 8 channel , and put the instruments in the mackie board, there were no db levels mentioned on individual channels . dint like the mackie at all . will buy CMS 1600 dynacord in this week .

no just a sound guy who has had his time mixing drums, i work for a company (plus own my own) and I always ALWAYS get put mixing drums cuz the other 3 guys hate doing them, and ones a drummer go figure.........I'm just a guitar player

Shane

Glad your show went well, basketball courts have got to be the worst scenerio for live sound possible.

Glad you liked those settings, but they came from the Yorkville site. Check it out, they have lots of good info on sound.

Yorkville

Yorkville makes excellent PA gear and speakers.