OT: monitor speaker to enable hearing other players in a band

I was once in a attempt to have the world's biggest orchestra. We ended up with only about 2500 players, but the players were so far apart that there was up to a third of a second delay in the sound from one side to the other. We did have a large screen in front showing the conductor, so we simply ignored the sounds we could hear (especially the trumpets who always play as loud as they can) and follwed the conductor exactly. God knows what it sounded like from afar. What I would recommend in such attempts is to stand as close together as possible. Being string players we are used to sitting on chairs, but that takes too much space. The cellos however may have chairs.

Reply to
Matty F
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I really do not have the mental capacity this morning to work out how far sound will travel in 1/3 sec but that sounds big!

The large screen and conductor reminds me of a system that we out into a cathedral some years ago so that the organist could view the choir on a monitor, high tech version of the mirror that some use. The salesman specified a rather nice, very modern, all singing/dancing bit of kit, digital processing as this was the latest thing at the time. The only problem was a massive delay, 500mSec or more in the processing of the video. Totally screwed the organist! :-) it got swapped out for something more basic, but quicker.

Reply to
Bill

Roughly 1 for per millisecond, so 1/3 of a second is about 333'.

And a serious problem in television production with galleries making extensive use of flat panel displays these days, some times really big ones with quad or even 9 splits which adds even more delay.

Every production area should have a glass monitor for sync checking but one still has to be careful where one derives the pictures and sound from *and* what is between those points and the monitor/speakers.

Reply to
Dave Liquorice

Near enough to 300 metres/ second, so about 100 metres across.

This all reminds me of a recording I did in Rouen cathedral last year of an orchestra playing the Saint Saens symphony number 9, using the Grand Orgue. The organ was about 50 metres from the conductor, and it took them forever in rehearsal to get the timing right. When they did, though, it was excellent, as long as you weren't sitting too far away from the conductor. The multiple second reverb time helped a lot...

Reply to
John Williamson

1/18 of a mile appx. about 100 yards.

What that means is that 300ms is about the sort of slapback echo delay you get from a 50m long hall. Really annoying.

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

Depends on the source. When you rig vocal reinforcement - designed to keep a singist happy - it's common to to introduce a delay (and some reverb) to that feed. Makes the artist think they're in a large hall.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

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