The Best Listener in the Room
Last week I was preparing for a studio session and planning my microphone selection.
“Should I go with under heads or overheads? Should I mic the hi-hat and the ride separately or just let the under heads pick them up? Should I use board eq or outboard eq? Should I save my eq choices for the mix?”
All these possibilities and decisions to make! And then, in the distance, I hear the familiar ring of my cell phone. I pick up. My wife is on the other end. “What time are you coming home for our date night tonight?”
Crickets… “Ahhhh yeah, about that….”
It turns out I fell prey to the familiar drift of mankind. I heard my wife, but I wasn’t really listening to my wife. When we scheduled that date night, I was maybe texting or on Facebook or had another distraction. Before you think this is an article on marriage counseling, let me apply it to our audio life.
Whether it is a church service, worship rehearsal, or your local band at the pub, when you are mixing audio, do you listen to the degree needed for the best outcome? We often hear the music, but are we truly listening? The audio engineer is the best listener in the room.
We are listening for a number of things. But for what?
Is the volume level appropriate? The key word here is “appropriate.” What is the agreed-on sound level goal? Is it a concert or a church service? Is it celebratory or is it sensitive? Do your levels reflect that?
Is the blend appropriate? Is it a piano-led long or is it guitar-led? Are the drums too loud or are the drums too soft? Are the background singers appropriately in the background or are they louder than the lead singer?
Are you catching the musical nuances that are happening? Did you notice the piano flourish at the beginning of the second verse? Did you pick up on the guitar lead in the turnaround?
Is your mix overly bright or is it overly muddy? Does the acoustic guitar take up too much headroom in the mix to the point that it masks the vocals?
Can you understand every single syllable of the lead singers and speakers? If you never heard the song before, could you follow the words?
These questions are the tip of the iceberg for how we need to listen. I told an apprentice engineer just yesterday that it is very much like defensive driving when operating the soundboard. We are constantly checking our “audio mirrors” as we drive down the road and looking for anything that will cross our paths and distract our fellow listeners from receiving the message.
So. Are you the best listener in the room? The good news is this is a skill you can and must develop. You are not born with it. You can grow and become better at your craft. So get in there and start listening on a whole new level.
- Audio Coach Tony Guyer
(purchase our book, "Worship Fertilizer: (the first hundred)" HERE)
The Best Listener in the Room (Nº 46)
