Running a Sound Check

Sound men (and women) are so very, very important. They are critical to preventing distractions by providing clear sound in a prayerful environment. I've seen sound people looked down on by bands and seen bands looked down on by sound people.  Stoppit. We are all children of God and capable ministers.

Here's how I've learned to run a sound check. My hugest thanks to Kenny of the Matt Maher Band for filling in the gaps!  I'm going to assume 1) your band is using a typical three part system - front of house (FOH), monitor and backline, 2) your mixer (FOH) is probably being used to drive your monitoring system, 3) your drums are miked, and 4) you have a sound person running it all.

If you are blessed to have in-ear monitors and/or some type of personal monitoring system like AVIOM, God bless you, stop reading and go do something else. Otherwise, read on. 

If you don't have "mains", assume your church system is your "mains".  Any speaker pointed at a choir member would be a "monitor".

Start the sound check after you have prayed.

Once everyone is in place and attentive, start with the drums. Have the drummer hit the kick drum with full force going to be used for playing. Do not have any sound in the monitors or in the mains.  Bring the channel used for the kick up to a nominal level well before clipping.  You should strive to average around 0db or "Unity". 

Once you have the kick at a nominal level, set the monitor levels.  With the drummer still hitting the kick, go to each sub mix and set the level for the listener.  And ask the person (or people) who are in front of that monitor to give a thumbs-up or down to increase or decrease the volume of the individual instrument.

As the sound person, be aware of the following fun facts and goals:

• The sound system is for REINFORCEMENT. It's not a radio and sound that is not in the system may in fact be FINE without any additional monitoring.
• The person whose monitor is being set will need to hear themselves more clearly than anything else in the room. 
• The overall volume of all the monitors will ad to the noise in the room. Keep it to what is strictly necessary for the person to hear and not be distracted.

Having completed the above, repeat for the snare, hi-hat, etc.

I like to set-up in the following kind of order:

• Kick
• Snare
• Hi-Hat
• Overheads
• Bass
• Piano
• Electric Guitars
• Vocals.  (This one will take a while). 

To repeat, do the following for each input:

• Bring the signal up to unity.
• Bring the signal into the individual musician's monitor first.
• Bring the signal into everyone else's monitor to their liking.  No signal is great, if not preferred.

Importantly, do not put anything in the main speaker system until you have set all the monitors for all involved. You need to know how loud all your monitors are before you will know what to put in the mains. 

Once you've done all the monitors and the band starts playing, have them all play a song and have it stop part-way through and adjust. 

Repeat just a couple times, but don't dwell on it. Bands that dwell on monitor mixes will have a hard time being satisfied, so band members will often have to deal with imperfect sound.

Once the band is happy, start focusing on the room mix - the subject of a later article.

God bless you in your ministry.