If not, you’ll need to choose carefully!Ī semi-parametric EQ controls the volume of sound at a specific frequency. If you have four of these semi-parametric EQs, then you can move onto the other three instructions when you’re done. Picked one? Then follow the instruction below that fits. (Wait, what’s a semi-parametric EQ? It’s just two knobs: one for the frequency, and one for the level.) Now listen to the vocals (with the whole band playing), and pick the problem that’s most obvious: muddiness, a nasal sound, lack of warmth, or lack of presence. You’ll likely have at least one semi-parametric EQ for the vocal track mids. Maybe it’s the rumble of nearby traffic, or some low-frequency electrical hum. So, any sound below those frequencies that makes it into the microphone is probably not what we want. Women generally don’t sing much below 200 Hz for men it’s 100 Hz. (We focus on vocals here, but many of these tips will apply to all instruments.) To get a good vocal sound out of a basic soundboard, you can do a few simple things. And this can be quite a small change too - even just a 1/8 turn can do wonders. A simple way to cut high-mids on an electric guitar or bass is with the tone knob usually found on many electric instruments. In a classic four-piece (guitar, bass, vocals, drums), give the bass the lows below ~200 Hz (turn these down on the guitar and vocals), give the guitar the mids (up to roughly 1 kHz), and let the vocals pop by owning the high-mids (around 4 kHz). So what do you do? A rule-of-thumb for beginning EQers is to let each instrument own a zone. Just turning that guitar up-instead of tweaking the bass’s settings-could cause more problems. For example, if the bass guitar has its highs turned up loud, the guitar may not pop through. To make one instrument sound its best, consider everyone’s settings. At a show, you play together-so that’s how you should EQ too. That’s OK! All these instruments leave a bit of space in their sound so they can jigsaw together into one impressive band sound. If you take a great sounding band and have one member play on her own, don’t be surprised if it doesn’t sound great: a bass may sound dull, a guitar or vocal may sound thin. EQing a group of musicians is about making sure they sound excellent as a unit.
Even if all instruments sound great on their own, they may not sound good together. We’ll hear some examples of this once we get to the video! EQing the band: it’s a team sport!īefore we get into some specifics, there are two HUGE points often overlooked by beginners, and I can’t emphasize them enough:ġ. Knowing this, we can just turn up or down the right sliders to fix the problem. Our ears generally hear between around 20 Hz and 20 000 Hz (that’s 20 kHz), so this EQ has us covered!ĭifferent frequency ranges have different qualities, different characters, different feels-and knowing this stuff is the foundation of your future EQ mastery! For example, too much volume around 1 kHz is going to sound nasal too little 8 kHz will sound dull. Those numbers at the bottom of each slider are the frequencies-e.g., the slider labelled “32” controls the very low sound around 32 Hz. You’ll see a 10-band EQ like the one on the right. Let’s take a look at the iTunes equalizer (if you have iTunes, just click “Window” and then “Equalizer”). The graphic EQ in iTunes controls 10 frequency bands
Getting comfortable with the idea of frequencies is a great first step in gaining control of your live sound. For example, think of the “Bass” knob on a stereo: it’s just a simple EQ that controls the low frequencies. There are many different types of EQs-graphic, parametric, semi-parametric, and so on-and though they’re each used a little differently, they all do a very similar thing: an EQ makes a group of frequencies louder or quieter. Looking to get your head around the basics? You’ve come to the right place. This article is for new bands looking to take control of their sound and bring it to the next level. This is fantastic, because if you spend a bit of time developing your EQ skills, you’ll suddenly be able to bring a lot more control to your sound-no matter what venue you’re playing in. As a musician, you’re going to see some form of EQ on virtually every soundboard and amp you play through. Open up iTunes and click on the “Window” menu.
The equalizer (EQ) is a very powerful tool that is EVERYWHERE.