I play with a guy that plays his instrument (hey, keep it clean, it's a family board!) incredibly softly. I have to jack his instrument channel and then turn the others down, then turn up the master as a whole. I don't like doing this because it seems that the rest of the instruments and voices suffer eq wise.

Anybody have experience with this? If I pick up his instrument and play, it's super loud. This will cause feedback if it's not dealt with, but it apparently hurts his hands to play louder.

Moved Reply:

Before this gets lost in a new topic:
Use the Compressor on his guitar channel! 1 or 2 should be enough and still leave some space for dynamics.

Hi Bryan,

Thanks for starting this new topic.

I was kidding around in your solo thread. Up until I got into the L1® way of doing things, in my bands (as lead guitarist), the guys in the bands would often comment (complain) that I wasn't loud enough in my solos.

So my little joke was my way of saying - "gee, you could be talking about me".

At one level I want to suggest that you solve this with technology - that is - add some more gain between the instrument and whatever you are doing to amplify it.

At another level, I've got to ask — Why doesn't he play louder?

When you say "apparently it hurts his hands to play louder", it sounds like you may not completely accept this.

In the days before the L1®: When I played lead, if I couldn't hear myself (bad monitoring, too much mud in the effects, stage volume too loud from other sources) I had these choices

• Play harder
  This sounds stupid but I play acoustic guitar too, and in that context it's not stupid, it's what you do. This DOES hurt my hands
  
  
• Turn up the amplifier
  This makes sense up to a point, but if it hurts the audience or me or the others on the stage or just contributes to the volume war on stage - count me out.
  
  
• Turn down or play softly and hope...
  This means: Maybe this time the other guys turn down a bit so they can hear me, and then I will be able to hear me too.
  
  
• Get away from other loud sound sources on the stage
  
  
  
• Turn down or play softly because ...
  Because I give up - you guys (the rest of the band) has won the volume war.
  
  

Anyway - please tell us about his signal chain:
Guitar (what kind)
Effects / Pedals if any
Amplifier (L1® or T1® or directly into a PA board, or amp with microphone or ???)



Quotes to put this all in context below.

quote:

Originally posted by ST:
Hi Bryan,

quote:

Originally posted by Brywool:
well, the "issue" I'm having is that I'm playing with a lead guitarist who plays INCREDIBLY soft. In all my years of playing, I've never met anyone with such a light tough. So I have to completely jack his channel, then turn everything else down, then turn things up with the master.- This is probably another topic.

This is a great topic for discussion.

PLEASE start a new thread for that.

It is probably best to do that in the Ensembles Forum.

Am I playing in your other band?

he runs his Taylor acoustic directly into the T1 as I do. I don't want him using an amp for an acoustic because I'd rather everything was coming out of the pa. Just easier to control. Also, it just adds another 'something' to interfere with the sound. If it was electric guitar, that'd be one thing, but it's acoustic. He bumps up his solos with an eq and that's okay, but the rhythm and bass parts he plays are so darned quiet that I have to really pump the bose to make it hearable.

The compressor's a good idea, but then he'll gripe about how it changes his sound. It's really difficult to mix this way.

Hi Bryan,

What T1® Channel is he using for the Taylor?

If it is Channel 4/5, try 1, 2, or 3. The gain staging is different. Try it.

interesting. It IS 4/5. However my vocal's in 1, my guitar's in 2, his vocal is 3 and his guitar is 4/5.

what would you do to change this?

Swap your inputs - Channels 2 and 4/5.

Just see if that helps.

I understand that you may not want to re-order the Channels, but please try it - it will help with respect diagnosing the problem. Then if you really want Channel 2 back, we can talk about other solutions.

Can you tell us / or remind me... EXACTLY what model of Taylor is he using and is it and ES system or something else?

If it is an ES system - have you tried a balanced connection between the Taylor and Channel 4/5?

not sure what you mean here... do you mean using an xlr instead of a guitar input? I have not tried that.
Can't remember the Taylor model. If I swap his guitar and my own, won't that just make me have the problem he is? Again, when I play his guitar through 4/5, it's really loud. When he does, not so much. I need all 4 channels is the thing... It seems more an issue of his lack of attack than an equipment issue.

Hi Bryan,

I am just suggesting that you run his guitar into Channel 2 and yours into Channel 4/5.

Unless you are using an XLR connection for your guitar this should simple to do, and we're just doing it to try and diagnose the problem.

quote:

Originally posted by Brywool:
If I swap his guitar and my own, won't that just make me have the problem he is?

Maybe, but probably not because we already know that you can play his guitar and it is really loud.


I understand that his guitar is loud when you play it, and that this may all be a non-technical issue. I'm trying to help isolate or eliminate a technical issue, if there is one.

okay.

I think I'm missing the point.

Hi Bryan,

The input sensitivity on T1® Channels 1,2,3, (¼ inch jack jack) is higher than Channel 4/5.

If you move his guitar into Channel and he is is now loud enough, then we learn something. He needs more gain than he is getting in Channel 4/5.

If you move your guitar into Channel 4/5 and you lose volume, but you can turn up enough to compensate for that, then you could consider keeping the connections as they are at that point.

If everything is loud enough but you don't like the arrangement of the Channels, then you can probably switch things back to the way there were, but then you will need to get some kind of inline preamp to go between the his guitar and the T1®. However, if he is using an ES system equipped Taylor, then he may get more gain with a balanced ¼ inch jack Tip-Ring-Sleeve cable.

Does that help?

Yes, this helps and makes sense.

I reed rilly goodly and will make this chanj.

Hi Brywool

Just a thought. Do you have the L1 closer to him than you?

The reason I ask this is;

I had a keyboard player and a fiddler going through the same L1 but I had the fiddler standing right in front of the stick(space restrictions) he just wasn't loud enough.

During the break I moved the L1 further away from him and suddenly the Violin was sitting nicely in the mix.

He told me that he heard everything so loud that he felt we all should turn down and was leading by example. Once I moved the sound source further away from him he turned up in order to hear himself. Problem solved.

Hope this helps.