Posts by jpoelmans

    Hmm, it seems that indeed, in all those 3 countries the duplex gap is the only free to use band... but that'll leave you with only 9MHz for frequenty planning, if you're the only user that'll be fine, if there are many transmitters in that range that might be a problem.


    I found this file: https://www.apwpt.org/download…requencies2018.pdf#page10
    Licencing prices for the non free ranges are mentioned. Something to think about... but in general it seems that we are just spoiled here in Belgium with those 500MHz free bands :D


    With 4G and 5G I mean the data connection your mobile phone uses for internet. That lives in the 832 MHz to 865MHz range in most european countries, details are here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik…of_LTE_networks_in_Europe
    There is a small duplex gap between 823 MHz and 832MHz which seperates upload and download frequenties for 4G (not doing this would cause intermodulation issues in the radios of our phones). Because that gap is abandoned by mobile phone operators, and is useless for any other pro radio use, the EU has designated this to be free to use for wireless mics...


    Well, there is one advantage about the E band: you will probably be safe for a longer time than 5 years, as 4G is a rather new technology and wont fade away that quickly ;) And 5G is around the corner to eat some other UHF frequenties, probably around 700MHz.


    So anyhow, if you're not planning to use this E band transmitter together with more than 6 other users (concurrent musicians and rental firms in the neighbourhood included), than that'll probably be fine. The alternative is to pay for a licence for a transmitter in another frequenty band, but it seems youll have to do that in 3 countries! Ouch!


    I think that the Kemper clock is too accurate. I don't even know of any other devices that can read a bpm like 121.3. I can't even programme that kind of bpm in Logic, so it's obviously not a common thing.

    NI Traktor software is down to 2 digits after the decimal. And I can asure you, 1 BPM as tolerance is quite a lot. That would mean that @130 BPM after 2 measures or so your BPM is more than a 16th note off: for DJ use inacceptable. If you're using long complex delays ditto...

    Well I know a 4 headed band which is doing it like that, and they dont really seem to complain: the behringer beltpacks are taped to their amps, and they taped the 3,5mm jack jack lead to their guitar cable. They only have to plug in the guitar and their in ear set.


    The alternative is more convinient, but more expensive, and doesnt give you much guaranties in the long future. But if you stay out of the 5G range, you will be safe for at least 5 years or so ;)

    Hey Cederick, I know how you feel. Here in Europe, we had this situation with 4G, rendering more than a few systems illegal, even expensiove Sennheiser stuff...


    Now, first of all, most of those frequenty auctions (where a government owned frequenty band, which was put freely available to microphone and IEM users, was auctioned to mobile phone operators) are planned, years beforehand. So if you read through your local regulator's (here in Belgium BIPT) literature, you'll know what will happen with your planned frequenty band.


    I'll give you some examples about Belgian regulations:


    At this point the 5G-frequenties will probably be the next major worldwide auction. Research showed me that EU UHF channel 27 and 29 (which are free in belgium) are not affected by 5G, and that there are no plans to auction this band, at this moment. But offcourse, I have no rights in this band whatsoever.. But if you would use your set intensively, the cost would be justified, given that your investment pays off in like, 5 years...


    In Belgium there is talk however on moving the "free" to use" channels around, but those arent concrete plans yet. What does this mean? You have 3 kinds of frequenties: those unsuited and illegal to use, because someone else has a license (like your telecom operator), those free to use, and those not free to use but which are able to be licenced to you. So, even if BIPT moves the free to use channels out of reach from my wireless kit, I will still be able to license frequenties within that band. I also looked up the price, and despite I don't remember them correctly, the prices are OK. If you are a band which performs more than 10 times a year, I would without a doubt license some frequenties, because they will give you the right to keep your own wireless kit turned on, and have anyone elses equipment turned off, in case there would be interference....... :D Remeber that that free to use band can get crowded quickly (at a festival or so...)


    So yes, doing al this legaly and correctly requires some research and planning, and you'll only have guaranties within a political timeframe (I mean, what frequenty bands will they auction after 5 years???)


    BUT, I have to admit, I'm one of they few musicians who are that technical. I see (second hand?) wireless kits run in 'illegal' bands around me all the time, and nobody seems to care. They tend to work, even in the middle of a 4G band...


    Also: do you really need wireless? A drummer for example just sits in his throne. Can he live with a cable? As a guitar player, do you play guitar wired? Are you able to tape the wired IEM to your guitar cable? In the end wired allways sounds better...

    Hmm, some personal expierience here:


    Back in the day when I was 12 and started playing piano (that was 23 years ago), I just sat down at my fathers piano and had a go with scores from "Fur Elise" and such. With some basic music notation skills that they thought me in the lower grades from highschool I was able to decipher that level of scores, and over the years became quite proficient at playing scored stuff. On a guitar that self-teaching route never worked for me, because, remember, on a guitar you have to play quite precise, otherwise you'll have all sorts of bad side-sounds (or no sound at all), and you need a lot of time to master techniques like string bends first, before you learn even an easy solo, while on a piano, well, a button is a button, so you'll have to do your best to hit that button in the wrong way...


    Oh and piano vs hammond vs synth. Piano and hammond (or synth) are very different in the way they are played (due to the lack of a sustain pedal and hammer action/dynamics on a hammond), but when playing from score you'll master either on your own. Key is to find and recognize scores within your capabilities.


    The one thing on the other hand, you will not learn when doing this on your own is "feeling". Remember, it's a piano, not a forte, and I needed a teacher to point my attention to the difference the dynamics of your playing make in the sound of your piano. And eventually you'll need to be able to put different dynamics with all your fingers at once: your pinky plays a melody on top of a right hand chord, so your pinky has to stand out.... But then again I'm not the most sensitive person in the world, so maybe you got this, maybe not, but there isn't any book or internet lesson in the world which will teach you that... If you don't have this by nature, there has to be someone at your side, constantly pointing out that you are pushing way to hard on the keys ;)


    And than you have all the improv stuff, which I wasn't able to master on a piano yet. I did buy a few books, but in the end I tend to rush into those books and forget to practive the basics properly, to the point I'll give up, because at some point in that book, after skipping all the easy stuff, your mind can't handle all the information (different scales with chord changes, and then 2 hands... weird voicings, etc etc) which is involved with improvisation. On the other hand, I took guitar lessons at the local music school, and had the luck to get a really good blues/jazz player as a teacher. And the weekly character of those lessons force you to first learn the basics (improvise with a simple pentatonic scale for example), and then move on step by step. That's only been 3 years, and I can't say I'm even close to a really good jazz player, but I am way ahead of my piano improv skills... On a sidenote, a fellow guitar player I know had classical guitar lessons from 8 years old, but plays in a rockband since his 20s, and I allways hear him saying that he wished to be more proficient at improvising. I keep wondering, why isn't he? He's a way better and experienced player than me, but does he have the same problem with books and online lessons?


    In the end, If I would have to learn piano again, I think I would go to the local music school, and find me a good blues/jazz teacher. I'm quite jealous to what those jazz pianists can do, and after 3 year trying out books and online lessons, I still can't commit to learning improv from a book, while on a guitar with a teacher, I feel I'm on a very "productive" learning path. Well, my teacher forces me to be....


    That's unless you don't want to improvise (which would be a shame :D), in that case, just go to to imslp.org and find yourself a few easy beginner scores. Fur Elise would be one (allthough the middle part is very advanced, the main theme is beginner material and can be played on its own), Erik Satie's Gymnopedie would qualify too. And then musicnotes.com would be your other resource, for more modern stuff which still has copyright on it ;) Philips Glass' Truman Sleeps comes to mind, Maxence Cyrins' cover of Where is my mind too... Maybe all this sounds a little classical, but in the end, when it's scored out, there isn't really much difference between pop and classical.


    jus my 2 cents... good luck! ;)

    As heldal said: if you want universal, you need a full fledged splitter setup. And thats a lot of work to do properly! It would be much easier just to hire a FOH-tech and do front of house too from your mixer... Has a couple of advantages:


    * No hassling around with cables and compatibility issues with the setup which was hired by the promotor
    * The promotor doesn't have to hire a full fledged PA for your band (around 500-1000 euros depending on quality), so even if you charge like 100-200 euro for your equipment it'll be way cheaper for the promotor to hire you (if it gets too expensive they'll just get a DJ)
    * If your soundtech is willing to mix your show on an iPad, the promotor will be able to get 10 extra paying customers in the venue instead of a bulky PA (beware, soundtechs and iPads are like drummers en digidrums, or guitarists and modellers....)
    * You travel with the same IEM setting every time


    Oh, and speaker set can still be provided by the promotor: just 2 XLRs from your mixer to the ampracks...


    And in case you've wondered what a rental company would say about this on small festivals? Well, if you bring just your own IEM mix, you would still have to unplug their whole stageblock to get your IEM mixer in between. If you would just bring the IEM wireless rack, you would still have to plug that into their monitor mixer (if they have it). Well, and now they'll have to put their mic stands aside for yours, but can leave everything connected... Just connect your stereo feed... They'll be crossed anyway :D


    Mixed a few bands who went this route, and since I've been in a band myself I can't picture myself doing this any different...

    The monitor out solution abpove will offcourse enable you to use seperate volumes and monitor cab off option from the Kemper.


    For a more hocus-pocus solution: If that wouldn't for some specific case not be possible (ie using an FX loop), most active fullrange monitors have XLR loop throughs (which internally is just parallel wired), so you can go from kemper to monitor to FOH. If that isn't the case, you can make a passive Y cable... Hmm, just make sure there is no phantom power coming from the mixer, the Kemper can handle it, but maybe not your monitor. If that would be the case you can still use a DI.

    Headphone or monitor out + fx loop send, doesnt really matter. Offcourse youll be able to tidy your cabled with the monitor + fx loop out, but youll lose other outboard gear options, just as when youre using the alternate input as one side of a stereo aux input.


    A way around this could be a 1HE submixer which mixes master out and monitor feed together for your iem.

    I use a stereo monitor mix straight from the X32 and have more me (quite a lot more actually) on the monitor mix app for the iPad. Our IEMs are wired but I don’t think that affects the general principle. The app has a pan function as well as balance so you can put you exactly where you want.

    Just be carefull as the X32-Mix iPad app does not pan the aux-busses, only the master, so you'll be messing with th FOH sound. M32-Q (the iPhone app) allows you to pan the selected aux-bus ;)

    I wouldn't go the mono route, all the sound gets squashed into the middle of your head. Even with mono floor monitors, you still have a lot sense of direction, but with mono headphones or in-ears... On top of that, if you would have a keyboard player who puts out a lot of stereo info (and piano sounds tend to do that...), mixing this down to mono will give you all kinds of nasty phase-problems, which causes that Nord Stage to sound like a Casio kids piano...


    You can go into FX return and alternate input, you can mix that stereo signal under the aux settings into the monitor, headphones or master mix, at will... But, in my experience, when you have your mix properly set, you won't be adjusting a whole lot... Also, you can use your iPhone or android phone to adjust your monitor mix on the X32... I would ust put yur transmitter into the X32's rack and save a few cables to connect ;)

    Thank you, jpoelmans, very interesting! So, in your opinion, the 180w of the camplifier might be OK with the 60w cab in a normal situation, right?

    I said that in that case you'll need a good limiter, and last time I checked neither the kemper or the camplifier has one ;) Without a limiter, one wrong feedback squeel and gone is your driver...

    A speaker can handle peak powers, up to 4 times the rated RMS power. But You'll have to limit your amps very carefully if you'll do that: by no means your RMS power may rise above the rated speakers RMS power! So in effect this is a rule which is practiced by professional sound engineers in larger PA systems...


    The tube vs solid state amp explanation explains some of the above: a tube or solid state RMS watt is exactly the same thing. but: a solid state amp cuts off your signal immideatly after that, resulting in a very unpleasant distortion. So when using a solid state amp, that 100W RMS power will be used as peak power, and by no means we allow it to distort. As a result, the outputted long term RMS power is more like 25W.


    A tube amp starts to compress and distort in a very musical way after that. Because of that we guitarists like the sound of a tube amp, and drive it into distortion, right up to the point that the long term average power outputted by that 100W tube circuit is indeed 100W. (By then every little wrong move of your fingers will be heard as loud as the notes you played on purpose...)

    as a very general rule, since one of you is playing rythm (you cant both play lead at the same time, dub), the guy with the rythm task can dull out his sound a bit, even add more reverb than the lead sound. And dont forget to make room for vocals. In the studio you can balance lead instrument and vocals with compression and some heavy automation (fader riding), but this isnt set and forget, so for live, a soundtech can become handy ;)