How do you run live sound?

Just wanted to see how everyone else approaches running sound for a large scale production such as a play or musical? How do you handle people going on and off the stage with an analog board? Are you the kind of guy who pulls the faders down and puts them up or do you use the mute buttons?
 
Step 1 read the script
step 2 read and mark the script who is talking/singing when so which mic is on when
step 3 read the script see if you missed anything
step 4 is the band miced is the stage miced what mics do you have and needed to get
step 5 read the script and talk with the dierector about what they want
knowing page to page which mics are need on and which are off
I like to have the faders up and run mutes, i find that pulling fades up and down can take too long
 
In 20 plus years I've always had an assistant sitting beside or slightly behind me and have them que me in to character movement. A few rehearsals and we've got it down.

Now that I've gone digital (A&H Qu32), I'm playing with scenes to see how well it works for me. I can see this being more efficient.
 
Agree with coldnorth57.
On analog I use mute, on digital sound craft SI expresion 3 I run cue list. This mutes, un-mutes, or moves faders automaticly.
 
Just wanted to see how everyone else approaches running sound for a large scale production such as a play or musical? How do you handle people going on and off the stage with an analog board? Are you the kind of guy who pulls the faders down and puts them up or do you use the mute buttons?
Old analogue guy here. I also adjust channel input gains to put all of my faders in a nominal range; 1, to get them at a physical level where I've room to work subtly when I choose and 2, to get into a range where I can easily reset them close to their correct levels if / when necessary. Digital? Not yet and, as I'm now close to blind, not likely. Paraphrasing one of our other posters, I can already suck bad enough in analogue without moving on to digital.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard.
 
I'll throw in the A1 and A2 working side by side too. If possible, I usually have one tech who is board op and is off intercom so they can hear with both ears and not be distracted. I'll put another tech in the booth with them who is on com and on book, but also runs whatever media we're using for the show. We have a digital so if there is time to program scenes we'll do that, but making notes in the script and using DCA/VCA's can be almost as good with an astute student. Depending on the number of channels it may not even be worth the time to program scenes.

Faders vs. muting depends on how that channel is routed. If you're using aux outputs pre-fader and you don't mute, that mic will deliver signal to whatever is patched in to your aux even if the fader is pulled down. We've done shows where that's necessary and otherwise, but that's something to consider (e.g. your mix includes a pre-out aux monitor feed to the pit orchestra). Personally if it's a mic that comes in and out frequently I prefer to pull it down so it's not jarring if I miss the first word bringing it back up and can do a quick "oops" fade-in.

Getting some discipline with your actors is helpful too. Making sure they understand that they could inadvertently broadcast to everyone if they aren't quiet backstage sometimes helps, but don't trust them to be 100% quiet during a run. Everybody makes mistakes. I can recall one instance of an f-bomb being sent to the house during a dress tech.
 

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