Microphones Mics for youth musical theatre

[Rod Reilly]

OK Time to add my 2 bobs worth (or 2cents worth for those of us in the US)

Lyle I am an Aussie who has been in the US since 1997 - used to own the largest share in "The PA People" We were doing theatre in Sydney as far back as 1972. Now I own and run Bodymics which specializes in wireless microphones and audio for school, church and community theatre. (Joel - thanks for the shout out).

I am with the majority in recommending lavs in the hair - hate halos - they are never where you put them for more than a minute or two and when they move the sound changes and your successful room ring-out turns into a total waste of time. Our BLF4 lav is listed on most sites at $59.99, but we offer a 15% discount to Schools, churches, community theatres, performing arts centers and pro audio operators.

We use and sell wig clips.

 

[Rod Reilly]

Our biggest seller though are single ear worn mics - necessary to get enough gain before feedback in most of the spaces my clients work in which usually have less than optimum sound system installs - most with a pair of 15" 2 way boxes slapped on a wall. The E6 style can be manipulated to minimize the "wobble" - Countryman and Bodymics both have you-tube videos to show how to do this. We differ in that we prefer the head of the mic to be putting a little pressure on the cheek rather than floating in free space and creating a massive distraction in the eyes of your audience. This does "change" the sound of the mic a little (most always fixable with a little EQ tweeking) but because it doesn't move in space it maintains the same sound rather than changing as it moves closer and away from the jawbone. Another EQ nightmare.

We introduced a mic with a soft silicon ear-hook that automatically adjusts to the wearer's ear, and in almost all cases is instantly stable behind the ear. Other advantages are the boom is length adjustable and super flexible (thus virtually unbreakable. Model BE4V (or BED4V with field replaceable cable).

 

[Rod Reilly]

Not sure how that last post was uploaded multiple times - sorry.

On the question of time! In my experience this is usually of most consequence when actors are forced to trade mics during the play. Have extra mics and make sure everyone is fitted with their mic before the show starts, then just swap packs - putting transmitter packs in transmitter belts also facilitates this process and severely reduces the number of dropped packs.

My recommendation is to have a full kit of mics - lavs/hairlines, earsets and headsets (those that go around both ears) plus if you do little kids a set of headsets with cardioid capsules (all this to maximize your gain before feedback when chasing those tiny voices.

 

[Rod Reilly]

Australia will probably sell of more spectrum in the future - talk to one of the major brand distributors (Jands for Shure, RH Cunningham (i think) for Sennheiser as they will know more.) We are a Shure rental house, but sell Shure, AudioTechnica and Sennheiser., plus our own Creative Audio products - in rental we are slowly changing out all our Shure analog UHF systems to thier digital over UHF offerings. NEVER use 2.4GHz if you need more than 3-4 channels. Nightmares ensue. We stopped selling Audio-Technica because they have change to a proprietory mini 4 pin connector that - at least in the S - is very hard to get - AT will not sell me more than 10 per month and charge me around $30 a piece. How do I take a mic that I sell for $50 with no connector and put on a $30 connector and keep the price reasonable?

 

[Radio]

What styles of mics to people favour for youth musical theatre? I've started building out my wireless (now 14 channels, including gear that's in the mail) but my mic fleet is all over the place.

At the moment I have a mix of tie-clip lavalier, twin-earworn, single earworn, and "fitness instructor" style mics.

Kids seem to fit the "fitness instructor" mics most easily. But they are very conspicuous.

Tie-clip lavs have some costume noise.

Twin earworn seem to get tangled in big hair, but they stay in place.

Single earworn (E6-style) seem to be the pro-choice, but we have trouble getting them to stay put. Maybe we just need better fitting technique. Or more tape.

We're always going to be using dirt cheap mics, because I need to be able to break them without crying. (If you are recommending countryman or DPA, please also recommend next week's lottery numbers.)

What style of mics should I focus on ?

For Microphones, check out the Point Source Audio website. Generally good cheaper alternatives to many of the major brands.

 

[Lyle Williams]

Hi Rod, greetings from down under. I'm in Canberra, not far from your old stomping grounds.

I'll try out some hair lavs, but for the moment I don't think they will fit with our reality. There is an expectation that a whole cast can don or doff their mics in about 2 minutes. The focus is on the educational outcomes, not the production values at this stage. Production values need to be high enough for the events to succeed, but not necessarily higher than that.

TV transmitters were moved out of 700MHz relatively recently here, with many in bigger cities being put heavily into 600MHz. Locally, 600MHz is pretty free - our TV transmitters ending up in VHF on the whole. So 600MHz is safe in the current published spectrum plan, but free-to-air TV is becoming less relevant each year isn't it?

I was a 2.4GHz skeptic, but this gear worked really well for us. I have a realistic view of wireless performance; it's not a tool to allow me to mix from 50m away and not run a snake. I'll be under 10m to stageside receivers.

Price is always a factor too. For the price of 16ch of used Senn G1 I could get 8ch of used Senn G3, or Line-6 HD-V75. Buying new I would get 3.5 ch of Senn G4 or 1.5ch of Shure ULXD or half a channel of Axient!

 

[medrolet]

You might find interesting this tutorial from Shure - Lavalier Mic Techniques for Theater -

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[Rod Reilly]

Lyle - I concur re costs - I started my rental flet with no-name stuff, then converted to USED Shure SLX (got up to 200 of those blighters at one time) then I added ULX and then swapped out a lot of the SLX for QLXD - was getting more and more requests for big (24+ systems), and in some locations in the US I could not reliably get that many to play niuce together. Just recently started replacing the ULX and some of the SLX with Shure's new SLXD. For more premium stuff I have about 10 ULXD4Q based systems - usually for Performing Arts Centers and major Community Theatres. - current inventory runs around 500 channels.

We make our own (Creative Audio Technology) system with performance that ranks up there with Senn G3 or Shure SLX for RF and audio performance - the CA.81 is an 8ch receiver in a 1u box ...US $1699.99 for 8 bodypacks and the CA.81R receiver - available in 2 bands 480-530MHz and 530-580MHz. (guess that means the first one is no good down under - think you are limited to 520-694MHz.

We are about to release a 2ch version (due Nov) - CA.21

and in Q1 2021 a 4 channel version - CA.41

- all in the same basic case (these new ones are mains powered 110-240vAC - so no more wall warts. We also have a number of innovative antenna distribution products - the ADU.24 (RFdevices) is a dual 24 way antenna divider with a pair of 10A 12.9vDC power supplies that can power 24 receivers, and whats more they power the Sennies via the B antenna BNC. Coming in the next month or so is a standard issue dual 4 way with cascade distro (CA.D25)

- AC powered, same face plate as the CA.21/41/81 receivers - target price US$449, then early next year we will have our CA.D29 dual 8 way with Cascade - target is under US$1k - in the same case - only real diff is that there will be 4 Ant A and 4 Ant B on each side to make cabling easier and tidier - something like this:

Anyway enough of my braggin' .... check our my web pages sometime www.bodymics.com and bodymics.rentals

 

[Ben Stiegler]

What styles of mics to people favour for youth musical theatre? I've started building out my wireless (now 14 channels, including gear that's in the mail) but my mic fleet is all over the place.

At the moment I have a mix of tie-clip lavalier, twin-earworn, single earworn, and "fitness instructor" style mics.

Kids seem to fit the "fitness instructor" mics most easily. But they are very conspicuous.

Tie-clip lavs have some costume noise.

Twin earworn seem to get tangled in big hair, but they stay in place.

Single earworn (E6-style) seem to be the pro-choice, but we have trouble getting them to stay put. Maybe we just need better fitting technique. Or more tape.

We're always going to be using dirt cheap mics, because I need to be able to break them without crying. (If you are recommending countryman or DPA, please also recommend next week's lottery numbers.)

What style of mics should I focus on ?

more peanut butter also works ...

 

[Lyle Williams]

... can't have peanuts in schools!

 

[TimMc]

... can't have peanuts in schools!

Sure you can, that's how they pay teachers.

 

[Lyle Williams]

Sure you can, that's how they pay teachers.

TimMc wins the internet today.

 

[TimMc]

Wee bit of side-track, with curmudgeonly rant...

We don't know exactly what it is we expect out of teachers, we don't really define the level or quality of thinking our students should be capable of, and everything is measured with the Standardized Testing from Hell, to which then much teaching time will be devoted. The metric has been established.

As George Carlin reflected, "In 30 years we've gone from Head Start to No Child Left Behind. What happened?"

So we expect teachers to train our youth but be evaluated by student results on standardized tests, pay them peanuts, treat their profession with disrespect, and ask them to address a growing list of societal ills and expectations? That's some big damn balls...

/side track, curmudgeonly rant

 

[Lyle Williams]

Standardisation is about achieving adequacy at the required scale. It is a very different thing from excellence.

"The organisational machine" uses the term "quality" to mean something very different from "excellence".

"Quality" means a well documented and followed set of procedures that can reliably deliver adequacy, even in the absence of workforce excellence.

I'm not knocking adequacy. "Adequacy everywhere" is a high goal.

It can be demoralising for someone committed to excellence to be a cog in a quality (adequacy) machine. Sometimes seeing the difference can help us strive for both the quality and excellence outcomes.

 

[TimMc]

I'm old enough to remember when students were taught critical thinking skills early in education and teachers hoped to see students have those "a-ha!" moments of genuine understanding, rather than having to be content for a certain percentage of students circling the correct answer on a test.

My degree, had I bothered to complete it (and I should have, just to finish it), would have made me a performing arts educator in high schools. After a semester of practicums I determined that teaching school wrecked my inner fung shui. Education and myself are better off for the pursuit of a different career.

 

[AlexanderJersem]

Single earworn mics like the E6-style are the pros' choice for a reason. They deliver great sound quality, but you're right; getting them to stay put can be a challenge. Maybe some better fitting techniques or a little extra tape can do the trick.