I’ve been lucky enough to assemble a decent home studio centred on Logic Pro and now have ambitions to play live locally as a one-man show running keys and guitars with backing tracks. The occasional gig may have an additional keys player and/or vocalist depending on the set list.
The goal is to act as a non-profit and, after expenses, donate profits from gigs to local charities.
I’m now taking elements of my home studio and putting them together into a live rig and my questions are (1) Did I miss anything? and (2) anything I need to be careful about when buying / upgrading kit (e.g. MIDI pedals to run NI Guitar Rig 7, Motu 6).
The budget is not unlimited and the aim is to raise money and have fun.
All comments and suggestions are much appreciated.
This should work. I personally prefer to have the audio interface alone on a separate PC USB port to be sure anything interferes with it. But maybe I’m a bit psychotic
Only piece of advice I would give is - try and keep the setup as simple as possible, whilst still meeting your requirements. The more you bring, and have to set up, the more that can detract from the fun of it all. (That’s my view but of course not everyone’s.)
I have recently reduced my setup down from two keyboard to one, and three footswitches (sustain, expression, and patch changer) to just an expression pedal. I’m also now using a Kindle Scribe instead of my 12.9" iPad Pro. All of that helps to avoid backache, and reduces the theft concerns I have in some of the venues I play in.
But above all, good luck and hope you can post a video of the final product!
Stephen
You’ve inserted a d.i. box between the output and the PA system. Maybe, if your equipment and the PA use the same protective earth (you use the same mains distribution point), it might not be needed. You should use line inputs of the PA however in that case. If you must use a d.i. box for separation of the protective earths and the PA has line inputs, you could also use a transformer: it’s a bit of a shame to attenuate the signal to 50mv and then in the PA crank it back up to 775mv.
That sounds like helpful advice Stephen, thanks. Two keyboards are to provide enough real estate for sounds but I’ll have another think about that. I haven’t come across the Kindle Scribe but will go look. The video will be forthcoming once it’s all set up. Paul
It’s taken a while to get the time (and the funds) to be able to bring the original plan to life. However, I’m thrilled that now the final pieces have arrived and been connected, this version of the rig is working beautifully.
The M1 has 64GB RAM and is a refurbished one from Hoxton Macs in the UK. The Kronos isn’t part of the rig but does sit as the main keyboard for my recording set up. I went for an Arturia Keylab Essentials 88 which does the job well even though the keys are not fully weighted. I originally went with the Airstep pedal but found it tricky to make work so sold it and bought the Blackstar Logic Live USB MIDI pedal which works fine out of the box. The MOTU M6 became an M4 and has all the ins and outs needed for the job and with Gig Performer at the heart of it all it’s ready to be programmed.
The only kit missing now is the IEMs and an upgrade of the 2 tier stand to a K&M set up with a laptop tray and iPad holder. These will arrive by the beginning of Spring so that leaves me time to get hands on with programming songs.
In 1983 I was a teenager and performed in a school band using a Siel Cruise Mono/Poly synth and a Jen SX1000 at our local YMCA doing rock covers and some originals. In some ways much has changed since then and in others, it hasn’t. Plus ça change, plus c’est le même chose as a certain Canadian rock band once sang.
Thanks for the advice given and for indulging my excitement at having this become a real thing.
It looks like a well designed and thought out setup, and I hope it works well for you in action! I did want to comment on using a DI box as an option for your outputs to the house PA. I believe if you gig everyone should have a DI box or two handy just in case the need rises. However, I think there are some misconceptions about DI boxes and want to make sure you are using the right tool for the job.
A DI box can do multiple things but its primary purpose is converting an unbalanced high impedance signal (Hi-Z - instrument level) to a balanced low impedance signal (Lo-Z - line level) and/or vice versa. Many DI boxes can also help eliminate ground loops, but if that is all you want you will also be modifying the signal of your main mix to the PA quite a bit by converting it to Hi-Z. A good modern mixer would likely be able to compensate for that, but you are potentially creating a headache where you don’t need one, and potentially making the most important signal - your main mix - sound worse unnecessarily. As someone mentioned earlier there are other ways to deal with ground loops if that is you main objective with the DI box.
The M4 has balanced TRS line level outputs. If the house PA system only accepts unbalanced line level outputs and all you want to do is convert a balanced signal to an unbalanced signal then the DI box is the wrong tool for that. I went down a little rabbit hole looking this up, but the M4 can safely output unbalanced line level outputs, BUT since the jacks are not cross-coupled, MOTU says to use modified TRS cables with the ring cable unsoldered and left unconnected or ‘floating’ (very strange!). Using a TS cable might cause distortion (specific to the MOTU M4).
I recently stumbled across something when I needed to convert an unbalanced line signal to a balanced line signal that was going to a PA system. ART has the CleanboxPro which just converts balanced to unbalanced line level Lo-Z signal or vice versa. I got one and it works great.
Pre-Edit: Right before I was about to post this, I realized the M4 has unbalanced RCA outputs. It would be fairly simple to convert RCA to unbalanced TS which might be your best option in situations where you need unbalanced TS line outs. The ART CleanboxPro would allow you to run a balanced signal to the PA and convert to unbalanced near the PA however if you need a long cable run.
Wishing you all the best. Donating your time and musicianship to charitable causes is amazing and admirable, and I hope you have fun doing it!
@Benjamin_Blystone About the DI box. I’m a full-time keyboard player in Spain, touring all year round and I have to say, with my Presonus 1824c, I don’t and never have used a DI box. Never once has any FOH engineer said anything about not using one. I’m not sure what the consequences could be not using one but I have been touring for donkeys years without any mishaps. With the balanced outs on the MOTU, you shouldn’t NEED a DI box but it sure doesn’t do it any harm I suppose
Actually, there is another great reason to use a DI box that a FOH person won’t mention and that’s to protect YOUR expensive audio interface when there an electrical issue or short circuit at the mixer end and a nasty electric charge makes it way back to your gear.
That is a very good reason although I’ve never had such an experience. We all have our own stabilized power unit and the foh all runs through a stabilized UPS also… The only thing that worries me is if he “accidentally” sends phantom to me. That could definitely burn the audio interface.
