whispered voice live

[mattianlaseppia]

hello

i need to find a good setting and good tools to make a whispered voice very present, detailed, without getting feedbacks.

most of our songs have a whispered voice and usually live.. is a problem.

every suggestions are appreciated!

thanks

[M4-10]

Some general tips about compressing live here. Basically, compress the FOH but not the monitors. The amount of compression needed to bring out a whisper will probably make the FOH feed back though. Even if it doesn't you'll have a lot of compressed bleed from other sources. A hyper-cardioid mic will help.

If the vocalist needs compressed monitors to hear the whispered vocal then you'll need in-ear monitors.

Have you considered pre-recording and lip-syncing?

[24-96 Mastering]

Originally Posted by mattianlaseppia

hello

i need to find a good setting and good tools to make a whispered voice very present, detailed, without getting feedbacks.

most of our songs have a whispered voice and usually live.. is a problem.

every suggestions are appreciated!

thanks

good tips in the previous post, also try to:

1. whisper closer to the mike
2. stand further away from th monitors / FOH system while whispering
2. learn to whisper louder
3. employ a good monitor sound engineer

[mattianlaseppia]

any other suggestion?

breathing louder seems very difficult..
i know "you need lessons" but in the recording the result is great, while live not.

so any tech tip is really appreciated..

[stw]

please don't shoot me, but I'm gonna quote wiki on this one:

"Feedback can be reduced manually by "ringing out" a microphone. The sound engineer can increase the level of a microphone or guitar pickup until feedback occurs. The engineer can then turn down frequency on a band equalizer preventing feedback at that pitch but allowing maximum volume. Professional sound engineers can "ring out" microphones and pick-ups by ear but most use a real time analyzer connected to a microphone to show the ringing frequency. To avoid feedback, automatic anti-feedback devices can be used. (In the marketplace these go by the name "feedback destroyer" or "feedback eliminator".) Some of these work by shifting the frequency slightly, resulting in a "chirp"-sound instead of a howling sound due to the upshifting the frequency of the feedback. Other devices use sharp notch-filters to filter out offending frequencies. Adaptive filters can be used to tune these notch filters."

[mattianlaseppia]

ok, but this is right for a resident sound engineer, but i'm trying to achieve a "sort of preset" that makes my life easier.

because here sound engineer do nothing, so i have to find a way myself to solve this problem, because the whispered voice is needed in our music and is very difficult to get it in a live situation.

if i give a heavy compressed sound to the sound engineer.. he'll say "turn off that comp!!!" but, you know.. compression is needed for that kind of voice.

[funkymunk]

Maybe a pedal that increases the volume of your voice during quieter passages. I don't know of any myself but I've seen a few vocalists bring effects units and they may have that function. The only problem is increasing volume can cause feedback, doesn't matter whether you're whispering or even not talking at all, the signal may also run hot causing clipping of the amps. Make sure you tell your sound guy about it so he can ride the gain pot otherwise you will get feedback from the sudden jump in volume being picked up by your mic.

[M4-10]

Originally Posted by mattianlaseppia

if i give a heavy compressed sound to the sound engineer.. he'll say "turn off that comp!!!" but, you know.. compression is needed for that kind of voice.

If I were him I would just mute you the second time you fed back.

Compression really can't happen in channels that are being fed to monitors. Have the engineer put your vocals in a subgroup and have a compressor on the subgroup. Brief him before on your style. Or just get in-ear monitors.

[Johnny Favorite]

And as obvious as this seems, make the band work a lot on dynamics. Tell everybody to play quieter on the whispered passages.

[niceboy]

Originally Posted by Johnny Favorite

And as obvious as this seems, make the band work a lot on dynamics. Tell everybody to play quieter on the whispered passages.

We have one more thread about the same thing What gear or tricks should I use live for a whispering vocal?

[mixedupsteve]

Keep the compression out of the monitors
Whisper really close to the mic.
Whisper loud, I know that sounds strange but I've heard it done more than once.
Keep stage volume down (amps,monitors, etc)


There is no preset. Every location will be different. The sound person should have no problem notching out problem areas for you.

[Remoteness]

Yes, whisper loud and shout softly and you'll be just fine!

[ears2thesky]

I always insert a compressor on the vocal subgroup. I run the subgroup parallel to the main out (running through both busses). I compress the hell out of the subgroup but not the channel itself (so the compression doesn't affect the monitor mix).
If I need more level during a quiet passage I crank up the compressed subgroup to bring out more of the subtleties without compromising the dynamics of the vocal.

[mixedupsteve]

Originally Posted by Remoteness

Yes, whisper loud and shout softly and you'll be just fine!

NOOO
If you shout soft well be right back where we started from!! That would be like Emo Screamo

[niceboy]

Originally Posted by mixedupsteve

NOOO
If you shout soft well be right back where we started from!! That would be like Emo Screamo

But I just sended one attached file with very easy to do Negative feedback to M-Audio with just a few plugs only using theire M-Audio Audiophile 2496 and maybe some old plugins like DFPFX -direct-x f.ex They seems to be very interested because the people here obviosly dont know how to do negative feedback