I need advice on EQ vocals on PA mixer!

[skier4467]

My band has a Carvin powered mixer with only bass and treble on each channel and then a 5band master EQ. The other singer usually sings middle range with treble and bite in his voice but occasionally gets a little mellow and bassy. My voice favors the bass end heavily and I have trouble being heard sometimes. 1). How should we set the master EQ? 2). For his voice, how would you set the bass and treble knobs? 3). For my bass voice should I boost the treble and leave the bass at 12:00?

[KenElevenShadows]

Can you try and use different microphones that accentuate both of your vocals differently? That might help. Choose a brighter mic for one, darker mic for the other, or some variation...maybe this might get around your problem somewhat.

[Tedly Nightshade]

EQ is the last place to address this... Appropriate mics, mic technique, and vocal tone are all things to address first. Most of the time things sound a lot better with no EQ, unless it's a really good EQ in the hands of a skilled operator (easy to do a lot of damage fast!) or there is a real problem to be addressed- which usually could be better addressed before it hits the board. A lot of these problems turn up though, and a lot of live sound guys don't have time to root down the core issues, which are usually with the band, so EQ is indispensible for damage control. A low cut is often useful live to skip a lot of thuddy noises, but your baritone friend might lose some of his voice to a low cut too. I mean a low cut button, down below 100 hz. A lot of mixers have one.

[KenElevenShadows]

I have a Peavey powered mixer. I suspect that it is somewhat similar to skier's mixer. You can somewhat tailor things to one person. When you try and tailor it for TWO people's vocals that are really different, you start running into problems. If it's like mine, the graphic EQ goes to everything. It's just whether you want to dial that in or not, but you are left with ONE graphic EQ. Then, on the separate channel strips, it's just bass and treble knobs with no Q, and no other selection. You can use those somewhat, but it's difficult. That's why I suggested using different sounding mics. I think it would help a lot more. Obviously, good mic positioning and usage goes a long way as well!!! We just have one singer, so lucky us.

[DC]

[quote]Originally posted by skier4467: [b]1). How should we set the master EQ? 2). For his voice, how would you set the bass and treble knobs? 3). For my bass voice should I boost the treble and leave the bass at 12:00?[/b][/quote]The master EQ should be used for overall tone and cutting feedback frequencys. There should be a band around 2.5 K to 4 K that will get rid of high squeaking feedback in the PA. If you're only running vocals through, then the other bands can adjust their tone somewhat. I'd set his channel flat (treble and bass at 12 o'clock) and set the graphic until it sounds good, then roll the bass out of your channel until it sounds good.