Howling sound from PA system is nothing new to us in Chennai. But this season I found that too often @ Music Academy
Perhaps it was at its peak yesterday during Subha Ganesan's concert. There were too many howling which distracted both the artist (who herself was having a hard time with sore throat) and the audience.
At one point of time, I lost my patience and went to the back and gave my piece of mind to the PA guys. I asked them to reduce monitor volume. Perhaps they did that and the howling stopped after that.
The problem is , the PA guys in the halls are not Audio engineers but normal guys who know what some of the knobs in the PA system are for. The bane of today's acoustics is the "monitor" on the stage or near the stage that gives "feedback" to the artists on the stage.
While the intention of "feedback" may be noble, its implementation by the PA system guys who have no idea of electronics engineering is the problem.
When a portion of output from speaker is fed back to the microphone, the amplifier sometimes looses its stability and starts oscillating , resulting in howling sound.
The angle of monitor speakers w.r.t the mics and the volume level of monitor speakers are key parameters.
How to educate PA guys on all these ??
Howling PA system @ MA main hall
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eesha
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Howling PA system @ MA main hall
Last edited by eesha on 01 Jan 2013, 13:40, edited 1 time in total.
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sureshvv
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Re: Howling PA system @ MA main hall
Sandeep Narayan's concert was really marred by the incessant feedback from the sound system. What good is a million $$ sound system if you can't use it right? May be the MA sound engineers should be sent to Sekhar of Raga Sudha hall for training 
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Nick H
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Re: Howling PA system @ MA main hall
The Music Academy, of almost all the halls I have visited at least, has the best auditorium, the best chairs (although not perfect: lack of lower back support and aircraft-like leg room) and the best sound system. I've been lucky: on my visits that sound system has been well set up and adjusted. It seems that those were the good times.
An institution like this has no excuse for not employing properly trained and qualified engineers. At the very least, they should send their people for such training.
The guy at Raga Sudha Hall is just an electrician by trade, but gives, consistently, good results on the equipment that they have. Imagine transplanting the Academy equipment there!
An institution like this has no excuse for not employing properly trained and qualified engineers. At the very least, they should send their people for such training.
The guy at Raga Sudha Hall is just an electrician by trade, but gives, consistently, good results on the equipment that they have. Imagine transplanting the Academy equipment there!
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eesha
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Re: Howling PA system @ MA main hall
Or employing that guy in MA...Nick H wrote:Imagine transplanting the Academy equipment there!
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Nick H
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Re: Howling PA system @ MA main hall
NOOooooooooooooo!
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His smile is almost as much a part of Raga Sudha Hall as Jaya's is!
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His smile is almost as much a part of Raga Sudha Hall as Jaya's is!
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PUNARVASU
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Re: Howling PA system @ MA main hall
Like this Nick HNick H wrote:NOOooooooooooooo!
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His smile is almost as much a part of Raga Sudha Hall as Jaya's is!
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shankarank
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Re: Howling PA system @ MA main hall
The violin mike is always set with enhanced Bass. Not having a monitor that might target a violin mike might help. When setting Audio I have seen vocal artistes who want the maximum monitor volume they can get, dial up violin mike to the point of howl and then ask that to be stepped back a bit.