Need EQ help at a musical

[simonsaysred]

I'm playing electric for a kids theater group. We're doing High School Musical 2 (the movie's pretty awful, but the show is a heck of a lot of fun to play). I've done this a few times, but I've never been satisfied with my tone in the mix.


There are some big considerations for this show:

- While the soloists will be mic'd, the rest of the kids will be heard through hanging stage mics. We're talking 50 kids total onstage, which you would think would put out a lot of sound.

- We'll have a sub.

- The room has a good sound, but it's small.

- The drummer is using an electric set, and I'm trying to persuade the electric guitarist to go direct (he gets this look on his face that says, "Is that even possible?").


My plan of attack (no pun intended):

- Go direct, use headphones for myself. We'll have floor monitors for the mix.


Yeah, umm, that's what I've got so far. My main questions are:

1. How do I sculpt my tone? I'm playing a Stingray through an SVT-4 PRO. Like a typical musical, I'm playing a number of styles: rock, samba, slap, uprightish jazz (via RH thumb technique), and synthy pop via an EHX microsynth. Basically, I need to have a solo (louder-treblier) tone to cut through the mix when I do synth and also just a standard pop tone.

2. Compression? Most notes above A (12th fret on the A string) can't puncture the mix, and the lower ones fade out fast because the volume is so low. I have a built-in compressor on the SVT. It doesn't sound super, but it gets the job done. Thoughts on yes/no or how much?


Thanks!

[jmarnett]

use a DI pedal effects/ tone shaping on it

[phxlbrmpf]

During the musical gig I just did, a somewhat trebly sound (bridge pickup only) worked wonders for me (we didn't have a guitar player, though, just drums, keys and bass). As the drummer wasn't allowed to dig in very much and our band leader on keys was using a piano patch with hardly any bass dialed in and was trying his best to stay away from the low notes, I cut through extremely well and the overall band sound was pretty balanced and rich. It was pretty evident that I didn't really need a lot of lows, otherwise I might've muddied the entire thing up. If your guitar player is going to use a lot of distortion, this isn't going to work, though, I guess. I did use quite a bit of compression, though. This may be entirely subjective but I always feel it gives my sound a bit of an edge live.