"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Iain Churches wrote:

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
In article ,

In the "real world of broadcast", your plexi
screens around drummers, and lapel mics stuck
to the bridges of violins with BluTack, were
clearly not optimum solutions:-)

You never attend live music events, then?

Frequently. Often too as a player.

I play in both a classical ensemble and a big band.

I alaso mix FOH for a theatre musical group. So
probably altogether some thirty plus events a year,
and not a plexi screen or lump of BluTack in sight:-)

Odd. The very first time I saw personal mics clipped to violins was not on
TV, but the James Last band in a live performance. In the 1970s.

Both plexi and BluTack (or equivalent) were in
use in British TV well before that. I can remember
Phil Seaman (the finest British jazz drummer of
that era and a larger than life character with a
penchant for outrageous japes) commenting on
the poor sound from "sticky violins" in TV light
music broadcasts.
He gave a hilarious impression of an unsuspecting
player bowing frantically as the putty melted under
the set lights, and the mic slid into his/her lap.
He once took a rope ladder to a TV show with the
intent to scale the perspex wall around his drums while
the end credits were rolling :-) This would have
been about 1966.

Do you have a string section in your big band?

No, But saxophones double on woodwinds, and
flutes in particular, are just as vulnerable to leakage
as strings are. So the set up still needs great care.

In your 'theatre group'?

It's a theatre musical group.
Yes, we have strings quite often.


Iain