Tracked shows and other sources of really lousy audio...

Of course, if I were King of the Park, all those awful Atlas horn speakers would be gone in a heartbeat. Especially the two on the High Striker game next to the Lake Erie Eagles.

But as much as I hate those, on my last visit to the park (July 4), I had the unfortunate experience of seeing a couple of shows. Maybe I said that wrong. Both shows looked pretty good. The unfortunate experience was having to listen to them.

My first tragic experience was my first visit to the Jack Aldrich theater...well, since it's been the Jack Aldrich theater. In fact, last time I was in there, there was a band on stage. This time, it was a band in a can, with a very talented crew of singing and dancing performers. All the dancing was live, as was the singing. It's a shame I could barely hear it over the band, which was Memorex.

In truth, I could barely hear the band. What I could hear was 25 minutes of a thumping kick drum and a string bass? EVERYTHING else was equalized down and drowned out under that damn drum and bass. This isn't EDM tracks we're talking about, these are Broadway show tunes. It's not even that the track was too loud, it's just that the balance on the track is horrible. I'd even venture to say it probably isn't even the mix, but the equalization of the playback that is screwed up. Which means it can probably be fixed!

I don't really want to call out that show so much, because this is a problem I have noted on a few tracked shows, both at Cedar Point and at Kings Island. Are the people who set the venues up totally deaf? Do they have no idea what the track is supposed to sound like? Don't they understand that the audience would like to be able to hear the melody line, not to mention the live performers?

I do have a theory. My best theory is that the bass line is so pronounced on these shows so that the performers can hear it and stay in sync with the track. Audible cues are how they stay in sync with the show, especially when the show contains video, lighting, and pyro cues that have to be hit accurately. But I have to think there has to be a better way. Better stage monitoring, for example, so that the performers can hear the track. Or give them IFB earpieces. Or there is always my favorite option, bring back the live bands! Not that the live bands are a perfect solution...

My other audio nightmare was, in fact, a live band. A stretch golf cart rolled past with a portable proscenium and a complete sound system. It parked in front of a building in Frontiertown, and for a few minutes at least, served as the performance venue for the Bluegrass Jamboree. This talented quintet actually played their own instruments...well, except for a stunt in the show where they played each others' instruments, anyway. The unfortunate thing about this was that it trly sounded horrible. Again, it was a lousy mix with worse EQ. Okay, perhaps it can be explained because there was no sound man, and the audio mixer was sitting on the 'stage' so anyone who could adjust it could not hear the show.

But how difficult could it be to get a reasonable preset? Bluegrass music is fundamentally live acoustic music. That they need amplification at all has more to do with being heard on a noisy midway than with making the music. A little bit of equalization and adjustment would have really gon a long way for this one. It's a decent show, and the performers have talent. It's just a crying shame that the amplified sound quality so totally masks that.

Am I way out of line here? Am I the only one who has noticed lousy show audio?

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

ObDisclaimer: Maybe I am a little hypersensitive. I was, for a few years, the house recording engineer for WCBE-FM, and worked very hard to get great broadcasts and recordings out of Studio A...

--DCAjr

I'm a musician and I can feel your pain. I too have an ear for music, and proper balances as well. If you think Jack Aldrich theater was bad, try going to see the Lusty Lil show in frontier town! WHOA!! It's way off over there! You can't hear the singers, only the tracked music! AAHH!!! IT drives me nuts, but, I love live entertainment, and I know these people get paid peanuts, so, it is what it is. You should check out luminosity and post your opinions about THAT show here sometime...I'd be curious to hear what you think.

I took in the Aldrich and Red Garter this year,I thought they were both terrible.The performers were great,but overall production was bad.Maybe the 'audio' in your comments was influencing my opinion.

I haven't seen any shows this year, but I really didn't like the sound in the Jack Aldrich Theatre when I saw it last year. It was really muddy.

I'm a huge fan of live sound, and I love the thump of a kick drum in my chest, but I also like the crack of the snare drum to hit me just right but roll off enough that it doesn't cut my head off. I also like vocals that can be heard, and understood. When they fall so far back in the mix, it doesn't hold my attention.

To me, vocals are a fine line. They need to be balanced enough to blend in with the music, but just far enough forward that they stand out from the instruments. After all, if it's a singling based show, shouldn't the vocals be the star? I guess that's why it's called a backing track.

Something I've often thought about - I think music has been tainted by Beats, Monster, and other super bass-heavy headphones that seem to be so popular these days.

Music drowning out the vocals has been an ongoing problem when I've seen shows at CP. It affects the enjoyment of the show and does a disservice to the performers. When I saw the Red Garter show the audio mix was horrid, especially when compared to the band they brought in the week before the show started who had a really good mix and sounded great.

If an outside band can walk in and get it right, why can't the sound guys who work for CP? You're probably right, it's the Beats and Monster philosophy that has people mixed up in knowing what's good. Walk into any club and all you hear is thump, thump, thump.

It could also be that a live band is the purest form of sound, unaffected by any mastering, compression, every instrument is on its own input on the board, etc.. so you can manipulate the sound as you please, whereas a backing track comes already mixed, mastered and in a single compressed track.

Then again, with professional sound companies and their ability to digitally process signals like that these days, that shouldn't be a problem.

I didn't notice a lot of EQ issues at the shows last year, but the mixing was definitely hit or miss. I give them a little room because I know that in some cases you've got a college kid running audio and lighting together, which is completely suboptimal. The performers were mostly very talented last year, so a poor mix is a real distraction.

But hey, the really crappy speakers on various midways are finally going away, and that's a plus. Unfortunately, there are places where it's way too loud and crosses the line from energizing ambiance to annoying noise.

I like the OneDesigns speakers they've been using now, but I've noticed on the Gemini midway, the highs are a bit sharp and the low end is a bit flat. The ones they use up front are perfect.

I'm glad we weren't the only ones that noticed the sound mix for the Bluegrass Jamboree. Live music is almost always welcome and I was very happy to see bluegrass make its way to Frontiertown and Frontier Trail. It was a bit of a bummer to see/hear such a talented set of performers be undermined by the sound mixing.

At the Jack Aldrich we assumed that we were just sitting too close to the front speakers or something but as we tried different seats throughout the season the audio situation never improved.

Is the sound mixing left to the discretion of the technician at each venue or do they all receive some kind of SOP from someone higher up?

Sound mixing by its very nature has to be done by the sound engineer on site. In the case of the Bluegrass show, clearly a simple mixer was set, then forgotten. The mixer was sitting on the truck; I was half tempted to go twiddle some knobs but that would have been disruptive to the show 8-).

For the tracked shows, there isn't much to the actual mix. The music bed is already mixed and I would presume it is a competent recording with a near-perfect studio-quality mix. Just lay the voices on top of that, and you're golden. It's a little more complicated for a show like Luminosity where you have live instruments playing over the track, but only a little. The track mix should be built to 'leave room' for the instruments being added in, and again, the people developing these things are presumably smart, capable, talented people just like the people doing the performing.

The question is, why is the 'suck' knob turned all the way up on the playback equipment? Or are all of the high-end speakers blown up?

( http://photos.imageevent.com/wiley/jetsam/large/FarSide.jpg )

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Almost related, the booth for the shows on the pool decks of the Disney ships are behind glass (they're in the funnel facing forward). So what do they do? They put a guy with a virtual mixer on an iPad in the crowd.

From working as an auditorium technician, you definitely need to be in the house to properly mix audio. Not surprised to see someone out with a virtual mixer on an iPad, very cool use of tech.

Speaking of Luminosity 2014 edition, I was really pleased, as a musician, that they added more live instruments this year, specifically the guitar player and the sax player. Only thing is, these instruments are BURIED in the mix!! You have to really listen to pick them apart from the back track...c'mon, crank that guitar up! I wanna hear him wailing on that thing!!

I think its a combination of things that can lead to a poor mix. The shows are produced musically down in Florida, just outside Orlando in Winter Garden by a company that has some really talented people (and a sweet studio!). Their sound designer comes to Cedar Point each spring and fall to “tune” in each venue to the best it can be. The problem is that most of the venues at Cedar Point were never meant to be a live vocal theater. Jack Aldrich was a picnic shelter back in the day. It also doesn’t help that the FOH location is stuck in the corner of the theater.

If the sound could be mixed by the sound designer all summer, it would probably sound amazing. But as Jeff pointed out, the park hires college kids who are still learning to do what they do. In the case of Jack Aldrich, most kids hired for that venue have probably never mixed 12 live mics before all at the same time.

TimChat2 said:
Is the sound mixing left to the discretion of the technician at each venue or do they all receive some kind of SOP from someone higher up?

It initially comes from the sound designer who worked on the show in the studio during the recording process. When he visits the park during the rehearsal process, he goes over how the show should be “mixed” with the Sound Tech that the park hired for the summer. After that, its up to that Tech to followthrough or do his own thing. I can tell you that sometimes they hire that “I know what Im doing” guy who just does what he wants.

That said, I am the farthest thing from a sound guy. I handle lighting and pyrotechnics when it comes to theater/live shows. Hopefully my two cents helped a little.

My own story reminds me... do they still have the window on the Luminosity booth? That's obviously a horrible idea.

I review the shows every year -- and my one single complaint year after year has been the absolutely horrendous sound mixing in the Red Garter and it gets worse as the season goes along...The Aldrich is hit or miss depending on where you are sitting. Sit closer the sound is better. Sit further away its too loud. That could be a problem with speakers being incorrectly placed.

My own theory is that the tech is set at the beginning of the season and adjusted to the right levels. That's the last you see of the professionals who know what they are doing. Once they are gone, the house "techs" crank up the sound cause they think it sounds better -- and you get the horrendous mix you have at several of the shows. What they really should be doing is setting the shows, and then locking their levels so that they can't be changed by the house techs, whose job really is mostly turning the equipment on, making sure cords aren't disconnected, and turning it off at the end of the 30 minutes. But then you get the house techs complaining that they can't do their "jobs" correctly and you have a big problem.

I direct a lot of musicals, professionally and on an amateur level -- I have never had a problem with professional sound techs, but almost to a show I have had to demand that the sound techs turn down the volume in the band and crank up the volume in the vocals in the amateur shows.

As to the "bass line" turned up so the performers can hear it -- nope -- those shows are so over-rehearsed and performed 6 to 8 times a day that they can sing those songs in key and on beat without hearing a single tracking note...I still hear stuff in my sleep from shows I was in 20 years ago.

If I was in charge, I would have all the speakers use Beats audio, but that's just me.

We had only seen the show at the Jack Aldrich once but we must have had a good seat because we heard the singers just fine and superseding the music. I would say that all of it was just a little too loud, I noticed my kids were covering their ears, I'm sure they're more sensitive than mine at my age, but the singing was fantastic.

A little O/T but we noticed last night many of the speakers along the midway leading the Gemini sounded blown.

In my earlier message where I posted the Far side cartoon I found online, I also wanted to share this photo (but it wasn't available):

https://www.flickr.com/photos/26035820@N03/14638350524/

That is a crossover (directs high and low frequencies to the appropriate speaker drivers) from inside an EAW loudspeaker. The church where it was installed had complained that the speakers didn't sound good. I was on the repair crew. When the lead tech pulled the LF driver, I believe his comment was, "Well, there's the problem!".

When the speaker coil failed, it failed short, which caused 1,000 watts from the amplifier to pour through the resistor and blow the electrolytic capacitor out like a party favor.

I wonder how many blown speakers there are in Cedar Point Live-E...

Incidentally, while I have not seen Luminosity, I did walk past it once while the show was going on. At that moment, the music was too loud, which is interesting because it was kind of quiet. Oh, I have a very specific definition of "too loud." For me, dangerous SPL making your ears bleed might not be too loud. It's too loud when the sound is *distorted*

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

99er said:
I Jack Aldrich was a picnic shelter back in the day. .

I believe Jack Aldrich was the Hollywood Wax Museum before becoming the Centennial Theater in 1970.