I should probably ask these questions on the live music Usenet group,
but I've been reading RAP for almost a decade and know and trust many
of the people here. Also, I hope you'll forgive my ignorance as you
read the following paragraphs.

Lately, I've been playing keyboards in a "corporate band," playing
through a conventional system (a Barbetta amp which has a "line out"
for the house mix), but in a couple of weeks I'll be getting a pair of
cabs from Euphonic Audio and will be updating my system accordingly.
I'm asking questions now so I'll be ready to go when the cabs arrive.

I plan to use the following components:

1. Roland FantomXR rack synth, L & R out (which are balanced, "+4"
outputs).
2. Hafler P4000 stereo amplifier.
3. Two EA CXL110 10" speaker cabs.

First of all, can I run the synth straight into the Hafler power amp?
There should be enough level to drive the amp with a pair of +4 outputs
- right? (To mention the obvious, the Hafler *does* have variable input
gain.)

Assuming that is okay, is there any way for me to get a stereo feed to
the house mix? I can't seem to think of an elegant solution other than
using a mixer with multiple stereo outs (I was trying to avoid using a
mixer). I think there would be a problem using balanced Y cables on the
synth output, no? Is there a better solution for splitting to avoid
load problems? Or would the Y cables be okay?

Any ideas? It seems silly to bring in a mixer and all those extra
channels, gain stages, weight, and rackspace just for an extra feed of
a mere two channels of audio.

I have to get in and out of a lot of San Francisco hotels in a hurry
(often tricky with parking, elevators and whatnot) so I'm trying to
stay simple, light and portable....

Thanks,

-Naren

"Naren" wrote in message
oups.com...
I should probably ask these questions on the live music Usenet group,
but I've been reading RAP for almost a decade and know and trust many
of the people here. Also, I hope you'll forgive my ignorance as you
read the following paragraphs.

Lately, I've been playing keyboards in a "corporate band," playing
through a conventional system (a Barbetta amp which has a "line out"
for the house mix), but in a couple of weeks I'll be getting a pair of
cabs from Euphonic Audio and will be updating my system accordingly.
I'm asking questions now so I'll be ready to go when the cabs arrive.

I plan to use the following components:

1. Roland FantomXR rack synth, L & R out (which are balanced, "+4"
outputs).
2. Hafler P4000 stereo amplifier.
3. Two EA CXL110 10" speaker cabs.

First of all, can I run the synth straight into the Hafler power amp?
There should be enough level to drive the amp with a pair of +4 outputs
- right? (To mention the obvious, the Hafler *does* have variable input
gain.)

Assuming that is okay, is there any way for me to get a stereo feed to
the house mix? I can't seem to think of an elegant solution other than
using a mixer with multiple stereo outs (I was trying to avoid using a
mixer). I think there would be a problem using balanced Y cables on the
synth output, no? Is there a better solution for splitting to avoid
load problems? Or would the Y cables be okay?

Any ideas? It seems silly to bring in a mixer and all those extra
channels, gain stages, weight, and rackspace just for an extra feed of
a mere two channels of audio.

I have to get in and out of a lot of San Francisco hotels in a hurry
(often tricky with parking, elevators and whatnot) so I'm trying to
stay simple, light and portable....

Thanks,

-Naren


A problem I can forsee with the setup you've considered is the relative
level sent to the FOH (and perhaps monitors) mixer relative to your onstage
monitoring rig. Yes, you could control this with the gain controls on the
amp itself, but this is not really the purpose for those controls. A more
elegant solution would be to get a rack-mount mixer (you can get these from
Behringer, including a 1U version, for really cheap). Take the main outs to
send to FOH, then use aux outputs to send to your power amp. Since your amp
and Fantom are both rackmounted, a 1 or 2U rackmount mixer should fit into a
6-space rack with the other gear. This would still be nicely portable and
simple to set up (you could even have most of your rear-mounted connections
wired up in the box with little fiddling during setup). The mixer approach
has several advantages. First, if (and likely when) you decide to add
additional sound modules, you will have a place to plug them in. Second,
each input channel will have an EQ that you could use to obtain optimal
sound from your rig. Third, you can control your monitor rig volume
independent of the FOH (something the FOH engineer will certainly
appreciate).

Craig

"Naren" wrote in message
oups.com...

Any ideas?

You could take the output of the instrument to the house mixer, and get a
monitor mix from the house mixer to your amplifier and speakers. That way,
you can ask the person running the house mixer to also feed other
instruments to your speakers, so you can hear the other band members. .

Tim

CeeDub wrote:
A problem I can forsee with the setup you've considered is the relative
level sent to the FOH (and perhaps monitors) mixer relative to your onstage
monitoring rig.

The sound guy has been dealing with this already with my present setup.
He is a very patient and nice guy. Perhaps I should give him a break
and give him a consistent level.

Yes, you could control this with the gain controls on the
amp itself, but this is not really the purpose for those controls.

I didn't express myself properly. I would never do that. I've been
controlling from the master volume on the synth itself - which feels
odd but works.

A more
elegant solution would be to get a rack-mount mixer (you can get these from
Behringer, including a 1U version, for really cheap). Take the main outs to
send to FOH, then use aux outputs to send to your power amp. Since your amp
and Fantom are both rackmounted, a 1 or 2U rackmount mixer should fit into a
6-space rack with the other gear. This would still be nicely portable and
simple to set up (you could even have most of your rear-mounted connections
wired up in the box with little fiddling during setup). The mixer approach
has several advantages. First, if (and likely when) you decide to add
additional sound modules, you will have a place to plug them in. Second,
each input channel will have an EQ that you could use to obtain optimal
sound from your rig. Third, you can control your monitor rig volume
independent of the FOH (something the FOH engineer will certainly
appreciate).

Actually, I went from an 8U rack full of synths to using just the
FantomXR. It has half a gig of sampling, and it is now loaded with the
useful sounds from the other modules. It was a lot of work sampling,
but well worth it. The Fantom has all the EQ I need.

But you have pointed me in the right direction. Behringer has a 1U line
mixer that will take up little space (RX1602). For live use it will be
fine. I have an old PowerPlay headphone distributor and it has
performed very well, so this one should probably have similar quality
(hopefully). And the FOH guy can get the right feed. Craig, thanks, I
appreciate the response very much.

-Naren

Tim Martin wrote:
You could take the output of the instrument to the house mixer, and get a
monitor mix from the house mixer to your amplifier and speakers. That way,
you can ask the person running the house mixer to also feed other
instruments to your speakers, so you can hear the other band members. .

Tim

The way we set up, the cable lengths would be rather prohibitive and
bulky in and of themselves (and I am running stereo). But thanks for
showing me a little commonsensical thinking. It never occurred to me to
use the existing house mixer. However, Craig's solution will work best
for me.

I was hoping that someone (MikeR, ScottD?) would clue me in on the
implications of splitting the signal with Y cords, at least to satisfy
my curiosity. Or perhaps that someone (PhilA?) would skewer me for even
considering such a thing - but, alas, I remain ignorant.

Thanks again, Tim.

-Naren

On 28 Sep 2005 20:13:08 -0700, "Naren" wrote:

First of all, can I run the synth straight into the Hafler power amp?
There should be enough level to drive the amp with a pair of +4 outputs
- right? (To mention the obvious, the Hafler *does* have variable input
gain.)

God and the Devil dwell in the details, and Yes, you can.
Good question; very insightful.

Assuming that is okay, is there any way for me to get a stereo feed to
the house mix? I can't seem to think of an elegant solution other than
using a mixer with multiple stereo outs (I was trying to avoid using a
mixer). I think there would be a problem using balanced Y cables on the
synth output, no? Is there a better solution for splitting to avoid
load problems? Or would the Y cables be okay?

Yes. Quibbles abound below. Fear not.

Any ideas? It seems silly to bring in a mixer and all those extra
channels, gain stages, weight, and rackspace just for an extra feed of
a mere two channels of audio.

I have to get in and out of a lot of San Francisco hotels in a hurry
(often tricky with parking, elevators and whatnot) so I'm trying to
stay simple, light and portable....

Again, this is a possibly significant issue well framed for
public discussion. The possible issue is one of ground loops,
and you can avoid it safely by your present technique (?) of
keeping all of "your world" isolated to a single location,
everything on a single power (Edison) cord to the venue's
wall.

And no copper connection to anything else.

It's late here, so if this doesn't make good sense,
please respond and forgive and I'll try to do better.

Good fortune,
Chris Hornbeck

Having your FOH/Monitor feed being controlled by the same volume (on
the keyboard) as your personal monitor mix is a sure way to **** off
many a live sound engineer and insure level issues during the show.
It's a rare one who will deal with this well. Does you keyboard have
any type of aux out that is NOT controlled by your master volume but
stays constant? If yes, this would be what you want to send to the
Sound system, and you could still control your own amps volume.

Dan Fox

"Naren" wrote in message
oups.com...
CeeDub wrote:
A problem I can forsee with the setup you've considered is the relative
level sent to the FOH (and perhaps monitors) mixer relative to your
onstage
monitoring rig.

The sound guy has been dealing with this already with my present setup.
He is a very patient and nice guy. Perhaps I should give him a break
and give him a consistent level.

Yes, you could control this with the gain controls on the
amp itself, but this is not really the purpose for those controls.

I didn't express myself properly. I would never do that. I've been
controlling from the master volume on the synth itself - which feels
odd but works.

A more
elegant solution would be to get a rack-mount mixer (you can get these
from
Behringer, including a 1U version, for really cheap). Take the main outs
to
send to FOH, then use aux outputs to send to your power amp. Since your
amp
and Fantom are both rackmounted, a 1 or 2U rackmount mixer should fit
into a
6-space rack with the other gear. This would still be nicely portable and
simple to set up (you could even have most of your rear-mounted
connections
wired up in the box with little fiddling during setup). The mixer
approach
has several advantages. First, if (and likely when) you decide to add
additional sound modules, you will have a place to plug them in. Second,
each input channel will have an EQ that you could use to obtain optimal
sound from your rig. Third, you can control your monitor rig volume
independent of the FOH (something the FOH engineer will certainly
appreciate).

Actually, I went from an 8U rack full of synths to using just the
FantomXR. It has half a gig of sampling, and it is now loaded with the
useful sounds from the other modules. It was a lot of work sampling,
but well worth it. The Fantom has all the EQ I need.

But you have pointed me in the right direction. Behringer has a 1U line
mixer that will take up little space (RX1602). For live use it will be
fine. I have an old PowerPlay headphone distributor and it has
performed very well, so this one should probably have similar quality
(hopefully). And the FOH guy can get the right feed. Craig, thanks, I
appreciate the response very much.

-Naren


Naren:

I understand you can control your level via a vplume slider on your sound
module. I was trying to come up with an alternative that would allow you to
maintain a good gain structure that would remain consistent at the FOH, but
still allow you to control your monitor rig. Besides the obvious problem in
frustrating the FOH engineer with varying levels, your current method is
problematic from the perspective of not getting an optimal gain structure.
Since you are sending line-level signals to the FOH board, likely along a
fairly long run, it's really best to send the hottest signal you can
(without distortion of course). So, your volume slider should be set at
sound check so that you are getting hot signal to FOH, thus minimizing noise
along that run. A local mixer could be used to maintain this gain structure,
while still giving you control over your local rig. But, yes, that's the
mixer I was thinking of. I think you will find this will work out quite
nicely for what you want. The existing powerplay might actually work for
this too. I've worked with the 4700 and that one has a couple of outputs
that could be used to send to your local monitor and the FOH. Cheers...

Craig

CeeDub wrote:
Naren:

I understand you can control your level via a vplume slider on your sound
module. I was trying to come up with an alternative that would allow you to
maintain a good gain structure that would remain consistent at the FOH, but
still allow you to control your monitor rig.

Okay, gotcha; I thought you misunderstood me and... never mind. ;-)

The existing powerplay might actually work for
this too. I've worked with the 4700 and that one has a couple of outputs
that could be used to send to your local monitor and the FOH. Cheers...

I have the 4000 which only has one set of stereo outputs (hardwired
from the inputs). These could be sent to the house mixer. Then I was
contemplating actually sending a headphone amplifier output to my power
amp. The impedances are okay (I think), but of course the level would
be high (and dangerous to my speakers if I overdrove the power amp) and
possibly somewhat noisy as well. Too risky. Anyway, I'll just keep the
4000 set up in my project studio and buy the line mixer instead. At
only $110, there is no reason to quibble.

Thanks again,

-Naren

Daniel Fox wrote:
Having your FOH/Monitor feed being controlled by the same volume (on
the keyboard) as your personal monitor mix is a sure way to **** off
many a live sound engineer and insure level issues during the show.
It's a rare one who will deal with this well. Does you keyboard have
any type of aux out that is NOT controlled by your master volume but
stays constant? If yes, this would be what you want to send to the
Sound system, and you could still control your own amps volume.

Dan Fox

This requirement of sending a consistent level to the house mix has
been elevated in importance in my mind due to this thread.
Unfortunately the synth cannot send on two pairs of stereo outs let
alone control them independently as to volume. So that brings me back
to the mixer (which I have already resolved to get).

But there is one thing I don't understand. My volume changes on stage
are usually dynamics-based. For instance, on a ballad, everybody in the
band plays more quietly, and, because MIDI instruments are sometimes
less than ideally dynamic, I use the volume knob to bring things down.
This correspondingly brings it down in the house mix, but so what? It
seems to me better than an unaware soundman allowing the keyboard to
blast at high levels through a relatively quiet situation. I guess I'm
not sure I trust FOH guys completely - especially the house engineers
that come with a venue that has never even heard us before.

Most of my live experience is on the guitar. Obviously a guitar amp is
at greater or lesser volumes depending on the context, and, since the
guitar cab is miked, it follows that the house mix will get variable
levels from the guitar. And also from the miked drummer who will play
more quietly on say a ballad, and so on...

Assuming that I am not capriciously turning my monitoring levels up and
down, how is my situation any different in house requirements from the
drummer and guitarist referenced above? Anyway, I'm not really
prompting you to respond, but I'll be contemplating this for a while.

Thank you for taking the time to respond,

-Naren

"Naren" wrote in message
oups.com...
Daniel Fox wrote:
Having your FOH/Monitor feed being controlled by the same volume (on
the keyboard) as your personal monitor mix is a sure way to **** off
many a live sound engineer and insure level issues during the show.
It's a rare one who will deal with this well. Does you keyboard have
any type of aux out that is NOT controlled by your master volume but
stays constant? If yes, this would be what you want to send to the
Sound system, and you could still control your own amps volume.

Dan Fox

This requirement of sending a consistent level to the house mix has
been elevated in importance in my mind due to this thread.
Unfortunately the synth cannot send on two pairs of stereo outs let
alone control them independently as to volume. So that brings me back
to the mixer (which I have already resolved to get).

But there is one thing I don't understand. My volume changes on stage
are usually dynamics-based. For instance, on a ballad, everybody in the
band plays more quietly, and, because MIDI instruments are sometimes
less than ideally dynamic, I use the volume knob to bring things down.
This correspondingly brings it down in the house mix, but so what? It
seems to me better than an unaware soundman allowing the keyboard to
blast at high levels through a relatively quiet situation. I guess I'm
not sure I trust FOH guys completely - especially the house engineers
that come with a venue that has never even heard us before.

Most of my live experience is on the guitar. Obviously a guitar amp is
at greater or lesser volumes depending on the context, and, since the
guitar cab is miked, it follows that the house mix will get variable
levels from the guitar. And also from the miked drummer who will play
more quietly on say a ballad, and so on...

Assuming that I am not capriciously turning my monitoring levels up and
down, how is my situation any different in house requirements from the
drummer and guitarist referenced above? Anyway, I'm not really
prompting you to respond, but I'll be contemplating this for a while.

Thank you for taking the time to respond,

-Naren


Naren:

I think most experienced BEs wouldn't have a problem with some dynamics,
though velocity sensitivity should give you the control you need for this.
But, I guess it really depends on the BE and your communication with him. It
is his job to ensure that each part in the mix fits. If all else is lower in
volume in the quieter passages in your tunes, it's likely he'll leave your
levels alone (unless your keys are muffled and too far removed from the rest
of the instruments). There is a certain level of trust that you must give
them. Yeah, not all of them are the best. But try as you may, you really
can't win a war with the BE over levels. He can't win at this war either.
It's all about compromise. So, it's my opinion that the best bet is to try
to keep the lines of communication open and put a little trust that the
person on the other side of the signal is trying hard to make you sound
good.

Good luck bud and thanks for an interesting post...

Craig