Re: [Harp-L] Performance setup - hearing and feedback

[The Iceman <icemanle@xxxxxxx>]

Richard touches on a few reality points of 2011 music. However, there are plenty of arena bands that have learned the art of modified volume on stage, letting the mungo PA push the limits out front. It is not just 40/50/60s blues styles, but contemporary bands such as Steve Miller Band (who uses the BOSE PAS system on stage for their orientation) as well as a lot of jazz artists and even some rock bands. Don't remember which band, but a stage manager told me that one big name rock act had Marshall Amps lining the stage to the left/right of the drummer, but that these were dummy shells. Inside one shell was a Fender guitar amp mic'd for the sound. The Marshall's were a visual.


Having been fortunate to see a lot of live music via back stage passes, I was surprised at how low the actual stage volume was compared to what was pushed out in front of the stage.


I appreciate the importance of restraint in volume, especially when I'm playing 
with the band. I have always found it difficult to compete with loud 
guitars--everything's fine until they really crank it up, and then it's pretty 
tough to cut through no matter what you do.  I succeed in cutting through with 
at least some timbres most of the time, but I don't usually enjoy playing really 
loud even if the band is balanced and I can easily be heard. (Sometimes you're 
just really rockin' and it gets loud, and that's fun.)  Electric guitars fill up 
an enormous frequency range, loudly, especially if you add distortion, and I 
don't think there's an effective limit to how loud you can make one of those 
things.  So like I said, it's tough to compete.

However, I think these messages both miss an important point--1940s/50s/60s 
blues styles were relatively low-volume compared to more modern styles, not just 
because the players now are using different technology, but because current 
styles scale all the way up to pieces that are intended to be played at very 
high volumes in live settings that include an audience of tens of thousands.  
Chicago blues was developed in bars, and it's chamber music compared to a lot of 
modern stuff.  The volume level is an intentional part of the music in every 
modern rock style; it's not just four or five guys trying to be louder than each 
other, it's an aesthetic decision.  For a band like Metallic or Nine Inch Nails, 
the decision puts the volume north of what most of the people on this list 
consider loud.

I think most of the people on this list would resist playing that loud. But I 
don't see why younger harmonica players wouldn't want to.  Metal and its 
children are part of their era.  If guitar players are playing through huge amp 
stacks, why wouldn't a young harp player want to?  If a singer can be heard 
above that kind of big noise, why shouldn't a harp player?

It's nice if everybody decides to turn down to the point where a small rig will 
cut it.  But I think the big issue is the opposite one: how do we get the harp 
to work with modern band timbres and modern volume levels, both of which are 
very different from traditional blues?

James Antaki is working on one solution to that problem.  I'd like to be able to 
do it with a mic and an amp, but I dunno.  I wonder again: how do singers manage 
to be heard over that stuff?  Not because the guitarists are turning down, I 
bet.  I suppose the answer is that the singers are screaming up at the top of 
their range, so they're above the big frequency explosion the guitars are laying 
down.  Guess we all have to throw away our double low F harps and load up on 
High Gs.  Or at least the kids do. 

Regards, Richard Hunter