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Author Topic: Stereo Keys, is it just me?  (Read 7311 times)

Steve Garris

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Re: Stereo Keys, is it just me?
« Reply #30 on: July 13, 2019, 06:41:23 PM »

Thank you!  And those after you as well.  They're pan knobs, not switches.  Why do so many sounds guys do that?  Well, technically they're virtual these days, but the idea still stands.

Possibly because a lot of small digital mixers have an option to combine 2 channels to one, and when used, it hard pans left & right.
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William Schnake

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Re: Stereo Keys, is it just me?
« Reply #31 on: July 13, 2019, 06:46:05 PM »

Possibly because a lot of small digital mixers have an option to combine 2 channels to one, and when used, it hard pans left & right.

I know this to be true by by default on the X32/M32 series, however it is easy to pan them to whatever you want in stereo channel mode.  I use the Midas Pro Series most of the time and pan 10:00 and 2:00 on most stereo keys.  It gives me a little space in the mix, but you can still hear everything regardless of listening position.

Bill
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Scott Olewiler

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Re: Stereo Keys, is it just me?
« Reply #32 on: July 14, 2019, 10:29:45 AM »

Possibly because a lot of small digital mixers have an option to combine 2 channels to one, and when used, it hard pans left & right.

The dl1608 comes to mind. Once linked, no pan control is available, always hard L/R
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Matthias McCready

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Re: Stereo Keys, is it just me?
« Reply #33 on: July 14, 2019, 01:04:19 PM »

With keyboards it comes down to more than just the keyboard but the patch that is being used, some sound great in mono and some do not. A lot of keyboardist I know design their own patches in Omnisphere (pick your favorite program). Like others have said sometimes things do not sum well to mono. As far as things go with mixing in stereo, the majority of systems I have worked on in the last year have been stereo. Wider venues have been repeated left right stacks.

To the point as long as one knows the disadvantages of using stereo, I think one can go about things prudently. Something I do for lead electric often is to run it in stereo (one mic for each side of the PA), and I delay one side a few milliseconds. For those in the middle this opens up the stereo space (granted localization changes some). For those hard to one side or another they still hear electric guitar, as there is no level change.




His dilemma was that his fancy prerecorded audio-visual presentation, recorded in glorious stereo, got completely squashed/trashed when fed into the big dog convention center sound system.   

I advised him about mono compatibility for future mixes, but probably didn't even need to tell him that. Life already gave him that lesson, after giving him the test.

JR

More than just mono capability things need to be mixed for a larger system. Even with professionally made videos they do not usually translate well to a large sound system. For example I was mixing a large political event, and one of the candidates video had some impactful bass hits, however that same video also had a narrator where the mixer had really gone for the friendly radio low end rumble vibe. With this you can't simply EQ or multi band it. You can manually change the EQ during the video; or console and time permitting automate the process, but some things needs to be mixed at the source.

More often than not I find that even with a well tuned system videos can sound harsh, or become boomy, and end up needing a lot of EQ work. While I am happy to make it sound as best I can with the tools I have, it would be nicer to have greater control for some videos.
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John Roberts {JR}

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Re: Stereo Keys, is it just me?
« Reply #34 on: July 14, 2019, 01:20:32 PM »



More than just mono capability things need to be mixed for a larger system. Even with professionally made videos they do not usually translate well to a large sound system. For example I was mixing a large political event, and one of the candidates video had some impactful bass hits, however that same video also had a narrator where the mixer had really gone for the friendly radio low end rumble vibe. With this you can't simply EQ or multi band it. You can manually change the EQ during the video; or console and time permitting automate the process, but some things needs to be mixed at the source.

More often than not I find that even with a well tuned system videos can sound harsh, or become boomy, and end up needing a lot of EQ work. While I am happy to make it sound as best I can with the tools I have, it would be nicer to have greater control for some videos.
When that incident first happened I contacted a sound man I knew from my decades in the industry who lived in the same state/region. He shared that he had also heard anecdotes about really bad A/V support in that exact venue.

I trust my friend's mix, and he wouldn't have contacted me in a panic if it was a minor sound quality issue. Likewise feeding the PA one legged wouldn't have fixed that.

Sorry about the veer

JR
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Steve Garris

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Re: Stereo Keys, is it just me?
« Reply #35 on: July 14, 2019, 03:00:50 PM »

The dl1608 comes to mind. Once linked, no pan control is available, always hard L/R

And the solution is to simply put the 2 channels on a VCA, but my comment was just trying to answer the "why".
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Roland Clarke

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Re: Stereo Keys, is it just me?
« Reply #36 on: July 14, 2019, 04:57:16 PM »

I’ve read through the thread and find it interesting all the varying point of view.  Personally I will always take a stereo feed.  In large scale systems we end up having to mono almost everything.  If you listen to a system run in stereo there is something in it for a large percentage of the audience and less for those either close to one stack or the other or to one side or another, though even this lessens as you get further back.  Obviously hard panning guitar parts is likely a problem, but the sense of space from panning kit overheads to L & R and even very slight panning of guitars.  Things like stereo keys often contain samples and as has been pointed out the image can collapse/phase/loose depth if they are purely mono.  Reverb returns, though artificially stereo, give a sense of size on a large system.

The only potential benefit is if we really think mixing purely in mono is a good/the best idea, we could potentially use a single centre cluster and rid ourselves of all the issues of power alley and the comb from mono signals arriving at differing times from a left right rig.
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duane massey

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Re: Stereo Keys, is it just me?
« Reply #37 on: July 14, 2019, 08:45:21 PM »

I always "assume" that the FOH person knows their rig and/or the venue, but the majority of "shows" I play at involve less-than-the-best systems and engineers. IF an engineer had enough open channels (min 4-6 for keys if stereo, plus 1 for trumpet and 1 for vocals), had stereo DI's available, and asked for it I'd do it, but that has not happened more than twice in the past 30 years. Sadly most of the situations I am in seem to be more about not enough mics/inputs for the horn(s), not enough mixes for the keyboards to be separate, etc. As a side note, none of my patches have any stereo-heavy effects.
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Michael Lascuola

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Re: Stereo Keys, is it just me?
« Reply #38 on: July 15, 2019, 08:53:33 PM »

Agreed, Xiang
I was mono only for many years.  Nowadays, I record almost all shows, and having the stereo keys keeps the keyboardist happy when they pay for recordings as well.
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Sean Chen

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Re: Stereo Keys, is it just me?
« Reply #39 on: July 16, 2019, 12:23:37 AM »

... and some keyboards that have L/mono and R outputs, the L/mono port actually does not sum the L and R channel, and you only get the L channel, resulting in incomplete signal if only the L port is connected to the system. Yamaha S90-XS has this issue.
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Re: Stereo Keys, is it just me?
« Reply #39 on: July 16, 2019, 12:23:37 AM »


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