If it was as you suspect and you gave the sound guy a mono CD, you'd hear
basically silence from his board, but it'd sound fine if you plugged a set
of headphones into his CD player. There'd be no question it was HIS problem
then.

Julian

wrote in message
.. .
I've been editing music for dance companies for over 20 years, starting
with
reel to reel and razor blades before you could edit anything but a 5k text
document on a computer. I had a rather unpleasant incident a weekend ago,
and was looking for some advice on what went wrong, and how to maybe
prevent
it again.

I edit using Protools and Bias Peak and do enough CDs that I don't think
I've got any problems with the equipment on my end.

I put together a CD for a local company that was doing a short outdoor
performance. The original source material came from a combination of
commercial CDs and iTunes downloads. I decided to drop by the performance
just to see what this group was doing. I did not know the sound guy or
company in charge of the event.

My group hits the stage. The music sounds like CRAP. In fact, it sounded
*exactly* like it was being run through a vocal eliminator. Everything in
the center was gone. Vocals were dropped out with nothing but the reverb
signal left and right - argh! Sounded like everything was in a big tin
can.

The director immediately attacks me.

"WHAT DID YOU DO TO OUR CD???"
"UH, nothing, it's using the exact same masters on my hard drive as the
last
8 CDs I've made for you."
"YOU DID SOMETHING WRONG!! IT SOUNDS LIKE S**T!!!"

..and away walked a client I'll probably never see again.

I walk over to the sound board. They were using a dual Nuemark CD player,
and from what I could tell, each side of the CD player had a Y connector
on
the outputs summing it down to mono, and then each mono signal going into
a
channel of the board. Oooo - not good.

So I'm thinking, hmmm, there's a phase cancellation problem somewhere in
their wiring. I tried to talk to the sound guy a second to see if I could
come up with a quick fix like pull one side of the Y but he was a jerk and
I
got "Who the crap are you and what the hell do you think you know? Leave
me
alone.". So, nothing I could do from that end.

The director walks back over with a sour look on her face to say
something,
and I tried to explain my phase cancellation idea, which was pointless -
but
her answer, "Then why didn't you record the CD in *MONO* if the PA was
mono?"

"The CD you're using is no different that any other CD. I don't think
anybody ever makes a mono CDs on purpose for this type thing, plus I had
no
idea what type system it was going to be played back on. I don't know what
to tell you. I swear there's nothing wrong with the CD."

Then the bomb, "Well, I'd believe you if the group before us didn't have
PERFECT sounding music. Answer for THAT!" and she walks off again.

Now that I think about it - I heard the last number they did and there
wasn't a problem. It sounded fine.

Hmmmm.

I take the CD back to my studio after the performance is done. I check the
master files on the computer first. Phase appears correct and playing it
back in mono produces no ill effects. Same for the CD, I can play it in
mono
with no problems. All seems fine. Plays back great in three different jam
boxes too. So, I drive over to the dance studio and it plays back fine on
all the systems there as well (JBL Eons) - in stereo or mono.

The *only* thing I can come up with is that the was a phase problem with
the
hookup for *ONE SIDE* of the Neumark, and the previous group got their CD
in
the "good" side.

So, ideas? I can't think of a single way to compensate for every single
sound problem that may crop up once a CD leaves my studio. Nothing I could
have done to prevent this happening then or again, other than running
sound
myself, which I often do but am not always the one contracted, is there?