2019 Top 20 | #3: Roundtable: Unconventional Convention — Upsides Of Not Always Following The Norm

Mike Sokol: Several years ago, I sat in for one of the other professors at Shenandoah Conservatory who normally taught songwriting and music production. (I serve as an adjunct professor at the school.) I taught the students how I write, produce and mix songs, with my spin on the workflow being to arrange and write the song from the end to the beginning – backwards, so to speak.

We first wrote and arranged a big finish, from that derived the bridge, moved along to the chorus, and finally picked a melody line from the big crescendo finish. When we played it from the beginning, there were cues and hints of what was to come at the end, and it sounded like all of the jumbled pieces in the beginning fit together like magic at the end.

In essence I drew a picture of what the end product was to be, cut it up like a jigsaw puzzle, put it in a box, and shook it up. When it was finally assembled in the last verse it all came together like some chaotic genius discovery. My student writer said it was the most polished piece he’d ever done.

Similarly I’ve read that Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys would drive the recording engineers nuts by singing the top harmony line first, then the middle lines, and only at the end would he sing the melody.

They couldn’t hear his vision until the final melody track anchored the harmonies. Of course, Brian heard it all in his head before the session had even begun and liked to focus on the important vocal harmonies without the distraction of actually listening to the melody. He was simply great at hearing the entire production in his head before recording any of it.

So going backward can be better than going forward at times.

Chris Huff: I’m pretty conventional in my church tech/engineer work, or at least I don’t think I do anything that’s out of the ordinary. That said…

I place some of the responsibility for the gear on the musicians. All vocal microphones, wireless packs, and wireless personal monitor mixers are stored in organized bins before the event, and the musicians are responsible for picking up their gear and then returning it when finished.

This is very helpful for church services where there are two music sets, and we can check the batteries between sets. It saves time tracking down equipment and running around both on stage and backstage.

Oh, and I don’t always wear black.

Michael Lawrence: When I’m in system tech mode, I work really fast intentionally to keep myself from getting hung up on the little details.

Those 1 dB filters are not the make or break issues that need to be sorted out for the show to happen. Everything is bird’s eye – I zoom out the analyzer screen to show something like a 40 dB range, enough so I don’t see trees unless I choose to go looking for them later in the process. I’m interested in the forest.

When I’m mixing, I’m all about economy and precision. As the show starts I empty my pockets and can usually be found at the console with no shoes on. I don’t want any distractions or extra weight, and I try to really focus on the tactile sensations of my fingers on the faders.

I try to float on that stream of consciousness of the artist’s musical performance and keep the technical parts of my mind in the distance. I always thought this was an exceptionally strange habit until during a show, I looked over at my long-time colleague, who’s a lighting designer, and saw him sitting at his lighting console with no shoes on.

Chris Mitchell: One of the great advantages of working with the same band for a long time is the ability to hone my mix. Finding the best mic (or DI) and position to allow each channel to be mixed with the least amount of processing necessary. Properly tuned drums and good sounding guitar cabinets can help make a beautiful mix with just high-pass filters.

Among other benefits, this reduces the collateral damage caused by excessive channel EQ. The EQ filters applied to your intended source (i.e., snare top) also affect the things bleeding into that mic (i.e., hi-hat and toms). One engineer’s bleed is another’s ambience.

Becky Pell: Well, I guess I’m pretty unconventional in that I also teach yoga to a lot of the bands and artists I work with. It keeps them happy, chilled and feeling good, which in turn makes my life as a monitor engineer easier!

On a more technical front, I often build lead singer in-ear monitor mixes, and then before they come in, I sing in their mic when the band is playing. (This is very definitely muted in everyone’s ears and I unplug the FOH split!)

It’s a great way to get a feel for how effective my mix is in terms of being musical and easy to sing to, because just shouting down the mic doesn’t feel the same in terms of skull vibrations or tell you anything about pitching.

Dave Natale: Just about everything I do is unconventional. As a result, I am mixing The Rolling Stones.

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