August 6th, 2009 | Posted in Clay's Corner
Last night we had our weekly worship team rehearsal. Everything seemed normal except for a new soprano and a new acoustic guitar player. I’ll have new team members occasionally, but almost never two new members at the same time. The new singer I had heard sing several times in different settings, and each time I was impressed with her abilities as well as her heart for worship. The acoustic guy I had heard play classical guitar at a wedding and was aware of his involvement in one of our satellite campuses, although on electric guitar. That particular campus’ worship leader was confidant he could pull it off, and since I had heard his classical chops and that he was easily holding his own on electric guitar for over a year now, I was comfortable in bringing him on for rehearsal and the subsequent weekend services.
As the rehearsal got underway, two things quickly became apparent: the singer was holding her own and seemed very comfortable, while on the other hand the acoustic guitarist was struggling and clearly not comfortable. The struggles were to the degree that his involvement in the worship for the upcoming weekend needed to be re-evaluated.
Tags: Clay, correct, discipleship, lead, leadership, minister, music, praise, training, vision, worship
August 6th, 2009 | Posted in Clay's Corner
Recently I received a letter addressed to me at the church. The address was hand written so I knew it was unlikely to be a solicitation. Then I noticed there was no return address, so I knew right then that I was in for some kind of correction/rebuke. As I began to read the letter [...]
Tags: Clay, Conflict Resolution, confrontation, discipleship, leadership, minister, worship
August 6th, 2009 | Posted in Clay's Corner
Auditions can often be an intimidating process for both the auditioner and auditionee. It doesn’t need to be. I was asked the other day by a visiting worship leader, “How do you do auditions, and how do you tell somebody they’re not good enough and then face them week after week in the congregation?” There [...]
Tags: audition, discipleship, leadership, minister, worship
August 6th, 2009 | Posted in Clay's Corner
Matthew 28:18-19 tells us to “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, “teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the [...]
Tags: disciple, lead, minister, pastor, shepherd, train, worship
August 6th, 2009 | Posted in Gearheads
In Noise Gates – Part 1 we discussed some of the various uses of the noise gate in live audio mixing. In this installment we’ll look a little closer at the various noise-gate controls and their respective functions. The most common parameters found on the typical noise gate are Threshold, Ratio (sometimes called Range), Attack, [...]
Tags: audio, engineer, gates, gear, microphones, mix, monitor, noise, sound
August 6th, 2009 | Posted in Gearheads
What’s a noise gate…and how do I use it? In an earlier tech note that I called “Stage Mud”, I casually mentioned the use of noise gates to help in taming what I call stage mud. I’ve had many people ask me about what noise gates are used for and how to adjust them. So [...]
Tags: audio, condenser, dynamic, engineer, Microphone, mix, monitor, sound
August 6th, 2009 | Posted in Gearheads
This topic is yet another very important facet of audio production that could use some clarification, particularly in the world of church audio production (where many of the hard-working soldiers in the trenches are volunteers). To illustrate this, and hopefully clear up some of the misunderstanding, I’ll use an email inquiry I received concerning the [...]
Tags: audio, condenser, dynamic, engineer, Microphone, mix, monitor, sound
August 6th, 2009 | Posted in Gearheads
Here’s yet another area that I feel is neglected by many a sound engineer. Back in the dark ages of audio, audio mixing boards generally consisted of a small number of individual channels with a single master output control. As audio consoles grew in size, so did the challenge of mixing. At some point, someone [...]
Tags: audio, condenser, dynamic, engineer, Microphone, mix, monitor, sound
August 6th, 2009 | Posted in Gearheads
This installment of audio tips has a similar theme to the last one, in that we will continue to deal with methods for cleaning up unwanted artifacts in the mix. We previously dealt with the use of high pass filters to clean up unwanted audio clutter and cloudiness. In this case, we’ll examine ways to [...]
Tags: audio, condenser, dynamic, engineer, Microphone, mix, monitor, sound
August 6th, 2009 | Posted in Gearheads
This installment concerns the use of high pass filters in the mixing process. I have found this to be one of those mixing basics that is often misunderstood and neglected, yet one of the most important tools found on the mixing console. For those new to audio engineering (and some not so new), the high [...]
Tags: audio, condenser, dynamic, engineer, Microphone, mix, monitor, sound
