By: John Mills

One day, last week, I found myself chatting with a colleague about what problems he had in his audio department. After a little head scratching, I expected something like, �My volunteers never understand how to cross-framinate the thinga-ma-whatsit, or some other high tech need. His response dumb founded me. �I just can't seem to get my guys to check that everything is working, BEFORE the service.�

I thought it was kind of funny, and asked, �Are you serious?� I mean, isn't that the most obvious thing we as technicians should be doing. How is our plane supposed to fly, if we forget to wind the rubber band?

Well as it turns out I'd end up asking. �Are you serious?� two more times that week. I called a couple more buddies who are in the trenches, so to speak, as fulltime church engineers. With absolutely no hints from my side, they said the same thing. Their biggest problem is getting their audio guys to double check, and triple check everything.

I guess the mentality of checking and re-checking comes natural to me, because back in the day when I first started, my Program Director would not take �oops� for an answer, and trust me, if there was an �oops,� I always heard about it later. (Thanks to Mark Wallace for always reminding me that it could be better.)

We were doing student ministry and producing high tech, high energy, programs for youth camps across the country. Mark ran a tight ship, he instilled in me that it was my job to make sure the performers' mics were ready, all the sound effects were cued up, fresh batteries were in everything, and that all the cables to ALL the mics were checked and re-checked. He'd say, �I know you plugged it in, but did you actually hear someone talk on that mic?�

I'll never forget the countless hours we'd spend rehearsing until everything was tight. There was never a dead space, if there was, we'd run it again. Things as simple as a small sound effect that I missed would require a conversation later, where he'd remind me of how to read ahead in the script to be ready for the next cue.

Mark instilled in me that to achieve excellence in our production department, each one of us had to do our job. It's easy for us sound guys to think all we have to do is mix. That is part of it, but as simply as I can put it, it is OUR RESPONSIBILITY to make sure there are no distractions.

So here is my checklist. After you make sure your plane has a rubber band proceed to the following.

Pre-Flight Check List:

Note: The technical crew should arrive before the platform folks to go through this list, not once, but EVERY time there is a program

Note 2: This list should be done, even if you haven't changed anything from last week. Who knows what little kid snuck in and unplugged monitor mix 2, or was playing under the pulpit, and completely ripped the mic cord out of the socket.

First things first:
•  Get an order of service.
•  Make notes on what is needed and where it will be needed.

Mains:
•  If your system has the capability it is always a good idea to check each speaker group. I start by playing a cd and muting every output on my system processor. Then I unmute each section one at a time. I listen to make sure each speaker group is working and reproducing the correct frequencies. For instance, Mute All, un-mute house left tops, sounds OK, mute house left tops, un-mute house left subs, sounds like subs on the left of the house are working, I think you get the point.

Monitors:
•  Check all the monitors by playing a cd through each mix individually.
•  Verify that each mix sounds correct and is going to the right place.

Wired microphones.
•  Have someone talk on each mic to verify that it is working and sounds correct
•  Wiggle the cord while talking on the mic. Obviously replace it if there seems to be a short.

Wireless microphones:
•  Put a fresh battery in EVERY mic. Why should a service be disrupted over a few dollars for a battery? If you are still paying $4.00 each for a 9-volt battery at Wal-mart, you need to check into �ProCell� batteries. They are literally a Duracell without all the marketing price attached. Just type �ProCell� into google and see what I mean.
•  If you are running multiple wireless mics, be sure to check every one.
•  Wiggle the little cable on the lapel mic to make sure there are no shorts.
•  Obviously, it's beyond the scope of this article, but be sure to check that all the mics are on their own frequency, and there is no interference.
•  Have one of the volunteers walk around on the platform with the mic, while talking, and listen for any dropouts.

Sound Cues:
•  Play all the way through any �special music� cd that someone brings in. I've had Cds skip at the very end of a song that was going great up to that point. That is very embarrassing for both the sound guy and the singer.
•  Check all sound effects. Make your sound effects fit into the background or foreground by making notes of the fader setting in the script. A cricket should be much quieter than a gunshot.
•  It's often a great idea to have the worship team end their morning rehearsals with the first song they will sing during the service. That way you should have a pretty good handle on how the volume of the band first comes across to the congregation.

One last rule of thumb:
• If it's plugged into the sound board, check it. I know we haven't used the flute mic in three months, but the day you forget to check it is the day the pastor will ask for a flute solo.

Ok now that everything has been checked, the biggest thing to remember is� PAY ATTENTION during the service. If you see someone out of the corner of your eye approaching the pulpit, maybe, just, maybe they are going to talk. Don't look down at your order of service, and say� that's not on the list, why not turn up the mic before they start talking. Chances are that no one in the congregation will notice that they spoke out of turn, but they will notice that their mic wasn't on.

If someone did sneak up and start talking on the wrong mic, remember, it's not the end of the world. Suck up your pride, stop worrying about that cue and focus on the next one coming up.

And if at the end of the day you are still worried about messing up, it is time to relax. Why don't you go to your local hobby store, find one of those old balsa-wood airplanes and wind up that rubber band? I remember playing with those till the sun went down, and it just seemed that nothing else in the world mattered at the time, especially my Program Director.