How To Prepare For Gigs And Make Your Live Shows Better

The very best way to get more people to repeatedly come out and see your band play live is word of mouth. When your live shows are great, people will like it and talk about you to their friends both online and offline. Besides the obvious point of playing good music that people like, there are 5 main areas of preparing for your gigs.

1. Your individual playing
The most important thing you can do (individually) to prepare for your gigs is to focus on playing your songs ‘consistently well’. To improve this, practice your songs in a wider variety of environments and situations. Play your songs standing, walking, in the dark, under a strobe light (if you have one), while talking, without looking at your guitar, while friends are listening, etc. The key point is to practice playing consistently well in all those different scenarios. This will help your individual performances on the stage.

2. Your band’s performance

When your band rehearses, you should NOT be focused on playing the songs correctly. If your band mates cannot play the songs flawlessly BEFORE the band rehearses, send him/her home to learn the songs. Once he/she has truly done that, then bring that person back to band rehearsals. Band practice is not about ‘holding people’s hand through the process of learning the songs which should have been learned at home. If you have a band mate who needs your help learning the songs, you can do this by meeting alone with that person to help. However, if this is a consistent problem, then you may need to replace that band member for someone who is better (or less lazy if that is the case).

Band rehearsals should be about the band playing the songs TIGHT rhythmically, matching dynamic levels in various parts of the songs and developing great stage presence (more on this later).

Because it can be very difficult to really know how good your band is in any of these areas as you are practicing, I strongly suggest to record your band rehearsals in 2 ways:

A. Video record your rehearsals. When you watch the video, turn the volume OFF and simply pay attention to how the band looks visually. This will help you to really focus on the stage presence and visual impact your band may (or may not) have on your next audience.

B. Audio record your rehearsals. Do this with computer based recording software and make sure each instrument is recorded onto its own track (multi track record). [Do NOT listen to the audio from the video recording!]. The first thing to do is LOOK at the recording on the computer screen. You want to notice patterns of rhythmic flaws. Is your bass player always playing slightly before the beat? Is your guitar player playing slightly behind (late) the beat? For many people it is much easier to ‘see it on the screen’ than it is to hear it. Once you see it, then you will be able to hear it afterwards much more easily. Doing this exercise will really help your band to play much tighter rhythmically (which is absolutely critical for any band). Also listen to how the dynamic levels of the band are changing? Does everyone get louder and softer at the same time? Or is everyone doing their own thing randomly? It almost always sounds best when the band does this together.

3. Your stage presence

When you play live, your music is only 50% of what most people in your audience care about. The other 50% is what they see. Remember, they came to ‘see and hear’ your gig. Great ‘sounding’ bands often lack bigger success because their live shows suffer from lame stage presence. If you want more people to consistently come out to your gigs, you must develop great stage presence.

As mentioned above band rehearsals aren’t about ‘learning to play the songs’. Schedule at least 50% of your band’s rehearsal time to analyze your stage presence skills (watch the video as described above and take notes on what you notice), then begin to implement improvements to this part of your live playing. You can make a lot of improvement on your own simply by some self analysis.

4. Eliminate (or at least reduce) stage fright
If you have cool music, a cool band and have prepared well to give your audience an awesome show, that can all be quickly destroyed if stage fright gets in your way. Many musicians simply don’t perform well on stage due to anxiety. Don’t let this happen to you and your band. You have worked too hard to let fear cripple you. Your audience deserves better, and more importantly, YOU deserve better! You are on stage to have fun, not to be nervous every moment of the gig. To eliminate (or at least to significantly reduce) performance anxiety, check out this
Istage fright article.

5. Performance logistics

In addition to stage fright, there are other things that may happen during your gig that can hurt it. The main two issues are not being able to hear and not being able to see. If you’ve already played gigs, then you know that every gig sounds different on the stage. One night you can’t hear the bass, the next night you can’t hear yourself, etc. When you are the opening band, you typically don’t get a sound check before you play, so you have no idea what you will be able to hear (or not hear) on stage until you start playing the first song. While there are many different ways to deal with this problem, I’m going to focus only on one of them here. One of the best ways to prepare for not being able to hear all the instruments is to practice your songs with you and only ONE other instrument. So for example, practice playing only with the bass player. Next, practice the song only with the drummer. This will prepare you for live situations when you can only hear the bass or only hear the drums etc.

The next common logistical problem is not being able to see. Often live stages are dark in some moments and then extremely bright in other moments, making it very hard to see your instrument. My eyes are very sensitive to light, so I always play with dark sunglasses on (since the bright lights often blind me on stage without them). For dark situations you can add white out (or even glow in the dark markers) on the side of your fingerboard, so even in very low light you can clearly see your fingerboard. Of course practice playing the entire song without ever looking at your guitar is also a great way to prepare for unexpected

SOUND CHECK PART II: "HELLO ENGINEER..."

Improve Your Sound Check: For the Audio Team
Mike Pankau

Sound check is one of the most critical steps in delivering an excellent weekend service. It ensures that all the complicated patching, routing, conversion, and reproduction are happening the way you want them to happen. When sound checks go bad (coming soon to your local Fox station!), it can put off the mood of both the worship band, the worship leader, and the production team. It is an easy way for the evil one to interrupt and distract you from the reason you are at church. By taking the time to prepare for your entire service, you reduce the chance for failure, distraction, and frustration.

To The Audio Team

Sound check is NOT the time to find out if your lines work, or if that sketchy DI is going to hold up another week. Before the worship team even sets foot on the property, you should have already made use of a tone generator (like this). If you can’t find $21 in your budget for one, ask your team to sacrifice their Starbucks for a weekend and buy one. The following items, at a minimum should be checked every single time:

For guitars, plug an instrument cable into that direct box and use the tone generator into the instrument cable. Checking this tests your 1/4, your DI, your XLR, etc.

For keyboards, turn it on and play it! It doesn’t need to be pretty to know if it works. If you don’t have the keyboard there for whatever reason, test with the instrument cable, just like the guitars.

For instrument mics: snapping in front of them works great. Never tap or blow on them.

For vocal mics: Stand in the position that the vocalist will stand and hold it properly. You are more likely to identify sources of feedback or other problems if you mimic the actual use as closely as possible.

For headworn mics: PUT THEM ON AND TEST THEM. These mics tend to have cables that fail frequently and see a lot of rough handling.  By putting it on, you’ll not only check that the mic is passing signal but that the ear piece or head-basket hasn’t been damaged. It also checks that the wireless receivers are working properly.

Check any videos/tracks/CD’s that you’ll be using and ensure they are working properly.

While that might seem like a lot, it should only take ~20 minutes for a typical setup once you get used to it. The important part is that you check EVERYTHING, EVERY TIME. While all of that is happening, you also need to be ensuring that the test tone, or test voice, is being heard in wedges and the in-ear system. Depending on your setup, this can be a complicated system and needs to be part of your pre-band routine.

As the worship team and vocalists enter, remember a few key things:

They may not know your setup. Help them locate their position on stage, their microphones, in-ears, etc. If you have new members, make sure they understand how to ask for changes and how to work your in-ear system if you have one. The audio team serves the worship team in this capacity and being proactive will help things go well.

Have a few common things handy. People make mistakes; they forget patch cables, in-ears, batteries, etc. Having these nearby the stage ensures that a simple mistake doesn’t derail your service while someone has to go dig a battery out of a case somewhere.

Communicate to everyone the best way to ask for changes. Do you have a stage manager that everyone should talk to? Should they shout to the booth? Have they been through the school of audio hand-signals? Establishing a prescribed channel for communication helps them feel cared for and allows them to not worry about potential problems.

Once the time for sound-check starts:
Politely remind the worship team to not play during sound-check so you can tweak and tune each instrument as quickly and effectively as possible.

Establish a pattern and stick to it. I personally prefer to do drums -> bass -> electrics -> keys -> acoustics -> vocals. However you do it doesn’t matter, but sticking to a pattern helps the worship team know what to expect and how much time is remaining.

For each instrument, check your gain, EQ, compression, and effects. Spend enough time to get the sound 90% of the way there. Save the last 10% for adjustments within the mix. You’ll probably change just about everything you set here anyway, so taking an inordinate amount of time here serves no one well. When you finish an instrument/player, check in with the musician and make sure they can hear themselves adequately and are satisfied with the sound.

Once each player is checked, ask the team to play through a single song so they (or you) can rough in wedge/in-ear mixes so they can begin rehearsal. After that first song, check in and ask if anyone needs changes. If not, you’ll all done – nice job. Now the band is off and running for rehearsal.

Sound-check shouldn’t be hard once everyone figures out why they do it and how much better a rehearsal can go once it is done. If you and your team do it different, I’d love to hear what you do and why! Everyone has a different setup, different cultures, and different solutions. This isn’t the end-all-be-all sound-check guide, but if you’re struggling with technical problems and inconsistency, it’s a solid place to start.

Grace!!

SOUND CHECK PART II: "HELLO ENGINEER..."

Improve Your Sound Check: For the Audio Team
Mike Pankau

Sound check is one of the most critical steps in delivering an excellent weekend service. It ensures that all the complicated patching, routing, conversion, and reproduction are happening the way you want them to happen. When sound checks go bad (coming soon to your local Fox station!), it can put off the mood of both the worship band, the worship leader, and the production team. It is an easy way for the evil one to interrupt and distract you from the reason you are at church. By taking the time to prepare for your entire service, you reduce the chance for failure, distraction, and frustration.

To The Audio Team

Sound check is NOT the time to find out if your lines work, or if that sketchy DI is going to hold up another week. Before the worship team even sets foot on the property, you should have already made use of a tone generator (like this). If you can’t find $21 in your budget for one, ask your team to sacrifice their Starbucks for a weekend and buy one. The following items, at a minimum should be checked every single time:

For guitars, plug an instrument cable into that direct box and use the tone generator into the instrument cable. Checking this tests your 1/4, your DI, your XLR, etc.

For keyboards, turn it on and play it! It doesn’t need to be pretty to know if it works. If you don’t have the keyboard there for whatever reason, test with the instrument cable, just like the guitars.

For instrument mics: snapping in front of them works great. Never tap or blow on them.

For vocal mics: Stand in the position that the vocalist will stand and hold it properly. You are more likely to identify sources of feedback or other problems if you mimic the actual use as closely as possible.

For headworn mics: PUT THEM ON AND TEST THEM. These mics tend to have cables that fail frequently and see a lot of rough handling.  By putting it on, you’ll not only check that the mic is passing signal but that the ear piece or head-basket hasn’t been damaged. It also checks that the wireless receivers are working properly.

Check any videos/tracks/CD’s that you’ll be using and ensure they are working properly.

While that might seem like a lot, it should only take ~20 minutes for a typical setup once you get used to it. The important part is that you check EVERYTHING, EVERY TIME. While all of that is happening, you also need to be ensuring that the test tone, or test voice, is being heard in wedges and the in-ear system. Depending on your setup, this can be a complicated system and needs to be part of your pre-band routine.

As the worship team and vocalists enter, remember a few key things:

They may not know your setup. Help them locate their position on stage, their microphones, in-ears, etc. If you have new members, make sure they understand how to ask for changes and how to work your in-ear system if you have one. The audio team serves the worship team in this capacity and being proactive will help things go well.

Have a few common things handy. People make mistakes; they forget patch cables, in-ears, batteries, etc. Having these nearby the stage ensures that a simple mistake doesn’t derail your service while someone has to go dig a battery out of a case somewhere.

Communicate to everyone the best way to ask for changes. Do you have a stage manager that everyone should talk to? Should they shout to the booth? Have they been through the school of audio hand-signals? Establishing a prescribed channel for communication helps them feel cared for and allows them to not worry about potential problems.

Once the time for sound-check starts:
Politely remind the worship team to not play during sound-check so you can tweak and tune each instrument as quickly and effectively as possible.

Establish a pattern and stick to it. I personally prefer to do drums -> bass -> electrics -> keys -> acoustics -> vocals. However you do it doesn’t matter, but sticking to a pattern helps the worship team know what to expect and how much time is remaining.

For each instrument, check your gain, EQ, compression, and effects. Spend enough time to get the sound 90% of the way there. Save the last 10% for adjustments within the mix. You’ll probably change just about everything you set here anyway, so taking an inordinate amount of time here serves no one well. When you finish an instrument/player, check in with the musician and make sure they can hear themselves adequately and are satisfied with the sound.

Once each player is checked, ask the team to play through a single song so they (or you) can rough in wedge/in-ear mixes so they can begin rehearsal. After that first song, check in and ask if anyone needs changes. If not, you’ll all done – nice job. Now the band is off and running for rehearsal.

Sound-check shouldn’t be hard once everyone figures out why they do it and how much better a rehearsal can go once it is done. If you and your team do it different, I’d love to hear what you do and why! Everyone has a different setup, different cultures, and different solutions. This isn’t the end-all-be-all sound-check guide, but if you’re struggling with technical problems and inconsistency, it’s a solid place to start.

Grace!!

WORSHIP TEAM: "SOUNDCHECK PLEASE...!!!"

Improve Your Sound Check: For the Worship Team

So, these days churches are becoming more profound in their use of many musical instruments and thus their sound tech is becoming more elaborate and complex. This introduces a very important term in the overall preparation of every worship team for any service.....SOUNDCHECK!

Sound check is one of the most critical steps in delivering an excellent weekend service. It ensures that all the complicated patching, routing, conversion, and reproduction are happening the way you want them to happen. When sound checks go bad (coming soon to your local Fox station!), it can put off the mood of both the worship band, the worship leader, and the production team. It is an easy way for the evil one to interrupt and distract you from the reason you are at church. By taking the time to prepare for your entire service, you reduce the chance for failure, distraction, and frustration.

To The Worship Team

Just as the audio team has preparation to complete before you arrive, you also have preparation:

# Change your instrument batteries (or at least check them)
# If you need to change strings, do it before you get to church.
# Warm up your voice in the car on the way over so you’re not singing over sound-check.
# If you come with a lot of gear, get there a little early so you can get setup and ready to play when sound-check starts.
# Remember that the audio team has already been working for at least an hour already and are in what I call ‘work mode’. They are ready to go, so don’t go grab a cup of coffee. Be serious and focused!
# During sound check, don’t play unless you’re asked to do so. Even when your instrument might be muted in the house, level meters moving at the desk can be confusing if there is a problem being resolved, and not all instruments are silent when muted (looking at you excited drummers)!

# During your check, play as you expect to during the set. While playing a rocking solo might be fun, if it’s not matched to what you’re going to play during the service, then the value of sound check is almost completely erased. If you need to adjust pedals, communicate that to the audio booth so they know you are making changes and they should expect that change.

# Know how you want to sound, and try to articulate that. Simply telling someone that your guitar sounds ‘bad’ doesn’t help improve anything. Be as descriptive as you can, even if it doesn’t make total sense. Brightness, mud, crunch, harsh, boomy, etc., are all good words because they communicate a specific thing to the engineer. If you’re unsure about what you want, consider setting up a time to come in early or on another day with the audio team to try some new things and get it dialed in. I can’t imagine an engineer that doesn’t enjoy playing with tone controls and tweaking mic placement until it sounds absolutely killer.

# During your first song run-through, remember that the audio team may still be getting levels right so be patient as things move around in the mix. If there are things that you cannot hear or are simply way too loud, send that information back to the desk at the end of the song. When you stop playing mid-song, the rest of the team loses their reference of your instrument and the problem escalates.

Assuming the audio team has done their job, things should go fairly smoothly and you should be rehearsing and worshipping your face off before you know it!

In Summary

- Come prepared, regardless of your role.
- Respect the people you work with, and their responsibilities.
- Communicate as clearly as you can at all times.
 

Sound-check shouldn’t be hard once everyone figures out why they do it and how much better a rehearsal can go once it is done. If you and your team do it different, I’d love to hear what you do and why! Everyone has a different setup, different cultures, and different solutions. This isn’t the end-all-be-all sound-check guide, but if you’re struggling with technical problems and inconsistency, it’s a solid place to start.

Grace!

Mike Pankau

CAN I BECOME A BETTER MUSICIAN...?

HOW TO BECOME A BETTER MUSICIAN
Hillsong Worship Feature

1. Welcome feedback

Those that listen to you sing or play will be listening from another perspective and may be hearing something different to what you hear. In fact, they might hear something you’re not hearing at all. They may make suggestions in order to aid the context you’re working in. It’s important to welcome feedback, both for the bigger picture and to keep you learning and gaining experience personally. Besides, it might just be an awesome idea!

2. Maintain a teachable heart

It is important to remain teachable. No one ever finishes learning in their lifetime. You can always glean something from another person, even if it’s a lesson in attitude.

3. Surround yourself with people that have more experience

There are many people I look up to – both near and far. It’s a pretty simple thought, but it’s great to have that uncontrollable laughter when you see your favourite player or singer play something awesome – you learn things, especially when you have a close friendship with them. As a toddler, I can remember sitting behind a mentor as he played during a church service and it invested in me a type of experience that cannot be bought.

4. Worship

When you worship with your gift from a genuine heart, it impacts those around you and helps you lead. You may not even realise it at the time, but when you hand over your gift to the One that gave it to you, it opens a door for people to have a greater encounter with God!

5. Practice!

Yes, that’s right, ladies and gentlemen. Not everyone loves this word with gleeful passion, but there are always ways to make practice fun. How about bringing a friend along or learning a piece of music with someone? When others aren’t accessible, I like to grab ahold of a good quality play-along album of an artist I love, throw it in the iPod and play to it. The benefit of most play-along tracks is that you have three things – the click reference, a chart to read and the feeling of playing with real musicians. In turn, this helps with timing, reading music and feel/ groove. The play-alongs can be found at most music shops.

6. Find new ways of getting excited about your instrument

As mentioned previously, there are always ways to make your discipline exciting and not just something that you do for work or service. Find new ways to keep yourself passionate about your instrument. Be creative!

7. Read & listen

When listening to your favourite music, reading it (or about it) helps you understand how it was created and how it was written.

8. Find your voice

Once you’ve seen or heard how things are written or produced, try the same or similar things, and see if you can get the same or similar results. You may even find something that you love more! This helps develop your own musical voice, because you start to pick the aesthetic characteristics in the music you listen to that suit your personality – characteristics that suit you.

9. Get first-hand experience

Start playing! Organize some jams with the people you love. It develops confidence, along with feel/groove and unity.

10. Be generous

It’s important that we always fill ourselves up, but also that we pour ourselves back out. Be generous with your gift and your service! God works generationally, not just within the small frame of your life span. Those that you give back to inherit what you learnt/experienced, allowing God to work through more and more people.

Written by Harrison Wood

THE FORCE OF MUSIC...

Have you ever wondered at what age music came into existence? Well do not bother trying to find out because music was in existence long before time began. It is one of the forces of this life that you will find has its origin traceable back to a timeless God that was before there was anything as time. For if there was an archangel who was made to be a musical instrument and who was also responsible for music in God’s presence long before man was made to be, then music is indeed timeless! And interestingly it will continue to be timeless even after time becomes once more collapsed into eternity.

The very first musical instrument and personality shown to us in God’s word was Lucifer, the archangel that went on to fall from grace with God. Unfortunately after he fell, though he lost most of his true personality to falsehood, he still had the force of music left to work with. No doubt that as man in time relinquished his God-given authority to this fallen entity now known as Satan, one of his greatest tools of warfare has been music. This is because he understands that music is one of the greatest forces that is relevant both in the realm of time and in the realm of eternity.

But sadly, man that was created by God to be a perfect replica of his personality in this realm of time does not fully grasp that truth that music is one of the greatest forces of all times and a most effective tool for reclaiming the reins of authority in this realm. The anti-God personality of Satan the former great Lucifer knows too well the weight of this force, little wonder how he’s exploiting it maximally especially in this generation when he knows his time is running out fast.

Have you ever wondered how you feel timeless every time you are exposed to music especially one that is made by someone with great understanding of its power? That is the force of music and that is what God gave us to use in directing the souls of men to His influence. It brings us closer to a timeless realm where God dwells and where our spirits originate from. Have you also wondered why it’s so annoying to your spirit every time you come in contact with music that is secular (without God)? It is simply because music is a force that has great power over the soul. The devil is using this very same power that we donate to him every now and then to torment us on every level and every side. Every time another ignorant man yields control to the force of evil, then music becomes more available to be used for evil. And also every time a wise man yields to God and his cause, this same force becomes a great tool in God’s hand to reach out to the souls of men.

What does this tell us? It simply shows that the force of music is one that is at the disposal of every living thing both human and non human to enable us reconnect back to its source, our timeless God. Nature gives musical praise to God incessantly. We as humans ought also to give worship to God through music with a better understanding of its force. No wonder scripture says that God “inhabits the praise of His people”. Wherever you find praise, especially musical praise been directed to God, that’s a sure place to find God.

So the next time you think of music as being solely an exclusive preserve of music ministers or musicians, please think again! There is music inside of every living thing, so don’t let your own stay inside of you. Bring it out to God’s glory. The next time you find yourself in a worship gathering, wondering if you need to take part in making music to God or not since the music ministers are there doing “their job”, my friend listen closely to your heart. There is a sound that resides in your belly. Open up your mouth and let it come out for “out of your belly shall flow rivers of living water”.

And to all devoted music ministers, there is a call to minister music with this understanding and at a level of eternity. Music is not just a “now” thing, it is an eternal force. Please do not go into performing music because of a “now” desire for fame or fortune. That is the trick of the prince of this world, to make you perceive music as a temporal force to benefit you now and now alone. Music is your soul’s escape passport to eternity just as you still dwell in time. Music is your channel of expressing your heartfelt love and devotion to God. God still desires worshippers that will worship Him in spirit and in truth. Be one today! Make melody to the Lord in your heart, with your mouth and in your life so that the world around you gets to know....HOW GREAT OUR GOD IS!!

WELCOME...!!

Welcome everyone to this "hotspot" for the sharing of soul food for everyone that desires to deal with music from a place of understanding, or that already does.

There is a great virtue in sharing, one that is intricately woven into our very essence as human beings. We become and gain more as we desire to share more.

So here's to the one that seeks to know more, experience more and give more through music....... Welcome!!