Books on Audio

[soundman1024]

I'm looking into getting some reading material for my birthday about audio. I'm currently looking into getting "Sound Reinforcement Handbook by Gary Davis & Ralph Jones" but I'm not sure what else is good. Amazon has a deal on that book and "Guide to Sound Systems for Worship by Jon F. Eiche" when bought together. Can anyone make advisements either way on either book? I am curious if the second book is intended towards traditional worship, or worship that resembles concerts. I can't say that I'm looking for a book about anything specific, so long as it applies to doing sound pretty well. I'm more interested in music than vocals. Does anyone here have any advice or other recommendations to make?

Thanks for your time.

[Andy_Leviss]

Are you more interested in theatre (plays and musicals) or concert work? Or both?

[soundman1024]

concerts...

[Andy_Leviss]

Okay, let's see what we can do. First, let me state that I'm primarily a theatrical engineer, which is a very different style of mixing than concerts. That said, I do have a decent knowlege of concert work*, but there are certainly guys around with more "street smart" experience with concerts than I have. That said, I can definitely recommend a couple books written by guys with those street smarts...

For concert mixing, the two books I can grab right off my bookshelf off the top of my head are:

-Professional Sound Reinforcement Techniques, by Jim Yakabuski. Jim's done sound for all sorts of acts, including Van Halen, Aerosmith, and, on another extreme, Julio Iglesias. He wrote this book as sort of a journal while he was working with these various acts, scribbling down notes on advice he thought worth passing on to other engineers. You definitely need to have a basic knowlege of what you're doing before you read this book, as it's definitely an advanced, "Now you know how to mix, so let's learn how to mix great," book. He goes beyond just tips with gear, although there are plenty of those, and also includes sections on things like politics and psychology of working with others on the crew and in the band.

-Crank It Up, by Clive Young. This is an interesting read, but I can't recommend it as highly as Jim's book. It's basically a compilation of a lot of Clive's articles for Pro Sound News, so if you've read the typical tour profile article, you know what you're getting. Lists of gear, and interviews with the engineers. There are certainly lots of bits of great advice buried within the interviews, but there's also just a lot of....I dunno...techie porn, almost, LOL. It's certainly worth reading, don't get me wrong, but if I had to pick only one of these two, Jim's would win hands down.


--A

*-Just to clarify, while I make my primary living doing theatrical mixing, I do have experience ranging from zydeco to klezmer, pop to classic rock, and I've done some one-off foh/system tech gigs for bands like Billy Ray Cyrus, Kansas, Kool and the Gang, Lifehouse, and mixing one-offs for Mitch Ryder, Gary US Bonds, Aaron Carter, The Capris, etc. So, while I'm not generally working as a concert guy, I'm not entirely speaking out of my butt here, either :-)