Brian Clark is Production Director for Resonate Church in Fremont, CA. Interview conducted 5/13/15 over lunch.
Ted: At the beginning of a live performance, what is going through your mind as you are mixing?
Brian: [long pause with laughter] It is five minutes of panic no matter what type of event it is and regardless of how well we prepared. I’m thinking about the cues and that all mutes that need to be off are off before we start [laughs]
Also, if my scenes are set and if I’m using wireless microphones that the batteries are replaced, and that I made sure I scanned the wireless frequencies enough that they don’t get stepped on.
Ted: Since you brought up wireless… do you have a preference for wired or wireless and why?
Brian: Definitely. My motto is if you can go wired, go wired. It eliminates a lot of variables that can go wrong – frequency interference, cutout, reception, quality of sound, etc. It just gives me more peace of mind to go wired. Things are more stable.
Ted: What suggestion would you give to musicians to help make the soundman’s job easier?
Brian: [pause] Well this has to do with relational equity… that the engineer feels that the musicians trust him. This can b in the form of the musician asking for feedback from the soundman. For example, “is my amp too loud?”, “how does it sound out there?”. Those types of interactions bring the soundman into the band. When musicians can acknowledge and engage the engineer it makes him feel he is a part of the family. Especially for the worship leader, he or she really needs to engage the soundman. For example, giving a roadmap to the soundman to help him play the console. Since the console is an instrument, it helps him to play it. So I would encourage the musicians to get feedback from the soundmen.
As a soundman, I always encourage people that I train to solicit that feedback from the musicians. It makes our job a lot easier and creates unity.
Ted: What is your approach to instrument tones? For example do you preserve the musician’s concept of tone or modify to meet your concept?
Brian: My approach is to preserve as much as what the musician wants from his equipment as I can without it negatively impacting the overall mix for the audience. My approach is finding out from the musicians what they are trying for. During rehearsal or soundcheck is the time for going back to musician and talking about any modifications that might be needed. That may be asking the musician to tweak something or modifying it at the board.
Recently, I had two guitarists with similar tones, in the same frequency spectrum. Both sounded good on their own but together it became muddy and hard to distinguish one part from the other. One of them had to separate to differentiate them by either adjusting how they played, the amp or the EQ at the board. At the end of the day, what works for the audience is what we are trying to get.
And that needs to be communicated during band practice because I want the musicians to be heard.
Ted: Since you brought up guitar tones, let’s talk distortion… Guitar distortion is one of those things that can sound really good when the musician is practicing at home but doesn’t work in a mix. Do you have suggestions for guitar distortion?
Brian: Well that’s a difficult one for me to answer because I’m not a guitar player. From an engineer’s standpoint… I like guitar distortion where it can sit in its own space. It is very easy for it to step on another guitar player’s space. Often times, the distortion competes a lot with what keys. The low mid frequencies can get crowded real quick.
It can make it difficult to get a clean mix. I personally don’t like a lot of distortion, I prefer cleaner articulate sounds. I think it is important for the musician’s to play off each other tonally. I think that’s what separates the really good musicians from the ok ones. They realize they don’t have to play all the time if it is getting too crowded.
Ted: How do you handle criticisms of volume?
Brian: [long pause with laughter] I hand ’em earplugs [laughs] Just kidding. It all depends on the environment. It is important to remember you are mixing for the audience, not necessarily for yourself, so you have to constantly be aware of it. For houses of worship, I want whoever comes to me with a complaint about volume to know that I hear them and that I care. My approach is letting them know that we value their input and are monitoring volume with the tools we have available to us. We aren’t just haphazardly turning things up, we make sure things are at safe levels for the environment. I also explain that everyone in a room will hear things differently. Some will say its not loud enough. Then there are psychoacoustic dynamics of how people perceive what they are hearing. If I know what is bothering the person (high frequencies for example), I can pay more attention to it using my RTA and my ears. In the end I don’t want what I am doing to become a distraction.
Once I had this conversation with a lady who was very upset [about volume]. But after having that conversation with her (explaining that we value her input and monitor levels, etc), she responded to me that as a lifeguard she always had people saying the pool wasn’t hot enough and those who would say it was too hot. She acknowledged that she could never make everyone happy. So in a way she was supporting my position and was open to my suggestions of where to sit in the venue that might be more pleasing to her.
So in summary, my approach is not to devalue them but to assure them that we are doing the best and that we mixing for the audience to have a good experience.
Ted: What are some of the challenges a sound tech faces when coming into an established church (one where a significant portion of the equipment is in place).
Brian: [long pause] Something that I learned from a highly respected engineer in Austin, TX, is that a good engineer is going to use the gear that they are given and make it sound the best that it possible can. Anyone can take a top of the line rig and have it sound good. Its the good engineers that are going to take a system with subpar gear and squeeze every ounce of goodness that is possible out of it.
Another challenge when coming into an established house of worship environment is knowing that things need to change and convincing leadership to move from one set of equipment to another or better yet a whole philosophy paradigm shift. The key is to do your best to help leadership understand the value add of making the change. Just remember to not take is personally, you are all there for the same reason, to proclaim the Good News. At the end of the day we must submit to our leadership.
The other major challenge is being respectful and honoring to the team of staff and volunteers that may have setup the venue to begin with. Helping them become owners of the vision, I think its the best way to make changes.
End of Part I
Part II can be found here
Contact Brian Clark:
brian@resonatemovement.org
