The SOS Guide to Live Sound ─ Optimising Your Band's Live-Performance Audio

If you’ve handled live sound, you know that the recipe for creating good sound in any venue has many steps. The ingredient list starts with an understanding of sound and how it behaves, the know-how to effectively use a sound system (including that little issue of not electrocuting yourself or your audience), and the knowledge to choose and use your gear well. Add a dash of miking ability, and stir in a pinch of thinking on your feet for when your system starts to hum or the vocals start to feed back. And mix.

In fact, there really is no "recipe" for creating a quality performance. Instead, musicians and engineers who effectively use sound systems have a well of knowledge that informs their every move before and during a live performance. You can slowly gather that knowledge over years of live performance, or you can speed up the process with The SOS Guide to Live Sound.

With these pages, you get practical advice that will allow you to accomplish your stated live-sound goals in every performance. Learn how to choose, set up, and use a live-performance sound system. Get the basics of live-sound mixing, save money by treating your gear well with a section on maintenance, and fix issues as they happen with a section on problem-solving, full of real-world situations. You’ll also get information on stage-monitoring, both conventional and in-ear, along with the fundamentals of radio microphones and wireless mixing solutions. Finally, a comprehensive glossary of terminology rounds out this must-have reference.

Paul White is Editor-In-Chief of Sound On Sound. Trained in electronics, he has been recording music since the 1970s. He also performs and mixes live gigs, and is the author of a number of music recording textbooks.