If it was a group, I’d give you the usual out—“I’m too focused to sing”—but a duo, well, I’d refer to everyone else.
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Singing in tune with earplugs help
- Thread starter JES
- Start date
I find I can sing in tune better with earplugs, due to the bone conduction. Especially useful at gigs with bad monitors. Of course, I never get to hear the quality of my voice, just the pitches.
Sharp drop off at about 3000 Hz?(I really can't afford to lose any more of my high frequency hearing - already at the "catastrophic loss" stage.)
I'd have to find the chart, but yeah, if not even lower...
Edit: found it! 30db loss between 500 and 1k, relatively flat to 3K, then it absolutely plummets at 4K.
I think the first thing to try is to get a monitor as close to her as possible. My old drummer in a very large, very loud cumbia band had a small mixer and a floor monitor all behind the kit.
Update from today's practice:
--we got the monitor near her happening and killed all the reverb. Much more in tune singing, which I've just confirmed listening to recordings of 3 songs.
--she didn't like wearing drummer's earmuffs (my other drummer's were in the space so she could try them) so that's out.
So, while this will work for now, looking ahead to shows, we might want to consider in-ears, or an in-ear. Since she likes the fit of Etymotic's earplugs, I was thinking maybe they have a combined musician's earplug + IEM but it doesn't seem so. So, again, would love to hear IEM recommendations that also have some noise reduction, ideally that lets in a balanced frequency spectrum, like the ER-20XS's.
TIA.
--we got the monitor near her happening and killed all the reverb. Much more in tune singing, which I've just confirmed listening to recordings of 3 songs.
--she didn't like wearing drummer's earmuffs (my other drummer's were in the space so she could try them) so that's out.
So, while this will work for now, looking ahead to shows, we might want to consider in-ears, or an in-ear. Since she likes the fit of Etymotic's earplugs, I was thinking maybe they have a combined musician's earplug + IEM but it doesn't seem so. So, again, would love to hear IEM recommendations that also have some noise reduction, ideally that lets in a balanced frequency spectrum, like the ER-20XS's.
TIA.
Aaaaand, on some other advice, we ordered some Westone AM-30s. She wanted some ambient room sound and everyone who has these seems to love them.
...aaaaand just got back from practice. She LOVES them. Raved about them all the way home. And the singing was great and in tune. Any bum notes were just garden variety mistakes, not because she couldn't hear herself. I kept the reverb off the vocals for my monitor as well and I swear it sounded better.
Like a true gearhead, as we were driving home, she turned to me and asked, "so is a wireless setup really expensive?"
Thanks everyone!
Like a true gearhead, as we were driving home, she turned to me and asked, "so is a wireless setup really expensive?"
Thanks everyone!
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It's just she and I playing at the moment. I'm playing a touch guitar, which is sort of like bass and guitar all at once. She's playing the drums. So yes, she could hear everything and it was only her vocals coming through the Westones. I also use lots of effects and her voice coming through dry actually cuts through a lot more as well and sound great. It is my guess that the cheaper AM Westones work as well (like the ones with just one driver), but she wanted higher definition for when we actually do play live and it replaces a wedge monitor for her. I asked if she felt they provided as much protection as the ER-20XSes we were using, and she said she thought so. Her ears didn't ring after, and if she covered the little holes on the outside of the Westones with her fingers, it was very quiet in there except for her voice.
