This is an audio engineering term but musicians can benefit from the knowledge, because good sound is not only a product of world’s best gears and a great mixing engineer but also in musician’s playing techniques and singer’s vocal techniques.
I have been to several concerts where Top Nigerian musicians and Top American musicians performed, of course when our guys perform you feel so good, but when the Oyinbo people get there everyone begins to argue; they are playing a CD, no they are not! I mean same loudspeakers, same mixing console, same musical instruments, but different performers. Why, because they are not just playing, they understand sound the way a trained and experienced sound engineer does. This is why I’m bringing this topic: Audio Spectrum. Not that I’m there yet, I’m also learning as I’m sharing all these.
So, what is audio spectrum? Simple definition: This is the range of audio signal from Bass through Mid to High/Treble that human ears can recognise. The frequency is between 20Hz to 20KHz.
For instance if there’s a pianist and a vocalist on stage there’s so much room for the piano to have all the depths and highs you can get, the voice can also be as full as possible to fill up the audio room. But imagine a situation where there’s a talking drum with a very big bottom and crazy bite, a kick drum with a very big bottom and crazy bite, a thumpy bass with a full round bottom, a piano that is as full as grand piano should be, a big sounding vocals that are very robust and edgy, what do you think would happen? Of course, it is what we are used to that we call “that sound was good” ; music that is choking, unbearably edgy, unclear low end and sometimes with unwanted distortions. Well, how can you get a perfect live sound from a musician’s perspective
- Don’t use up the whole spectrum by competing the instruments, they ought to complement not compete for space.
- If you can’t hear what you are playing during performance even though you heard yourself well during soundcheck, it’s better to have other musicians bring down their volumes than you increasing yours. Once you increase it the other guy would say I can’t hear myself again, then he would increase his and you wouldn’t hear yourself again due to masking, then you would have to increase volume again, till the circle repeats itself and then everything gets out of hand. But, rather set your maximum volume once and forget it, use intensity in playing to get heard more instead.
- Engineers and Musicians should know that instruments can sound good on their own but there will always be a need to shed some frequencies to make room for other instruments when everyone plays together. Otherwise, you get into errors depending on individual sound check alone.
- High frequencies from vocals coupled with high frequencies from all the frequent instruments like hi-hats, percussions, strums to create a harsh sounding sound if you don’t make room by cutting excess frequency.
- When you keep asking for more treble or bass know that it’s going to have overall effect on the sound.
Good sound quality (the type you hear in your car) will make your music more covetable and it can be achieved with your cooperation as a musician.
Cheer!