Mixing a three piece band @ outdoor festival

[Coleymusic]

Hello experts in mixology...
I've started planning and mapping a 90 minute set for my act at an outdoor venue (capacity 15-20,000, up a hill, backing onto a lake, laaaaarge stage). We're a three piece band. I'm trying to catch everything in pre-production to make sure it hits like a mule kicks.

I'm wondering about mixing a three piece act for an outdoor venue to make sure it sounds as full as possible, yet allows everything to cut and stay clear.

So I'm looking for any tips, recommendations about the mix/micing situation. Was planning on building a wall of sound on stage with guitars. Bass is usually DI'ed, dunno if in this case it would be worth going with a 4x10. Also, panning. Has anyone ever hard panned the bass and guitars, hoping they cut more through the mix, but sound full 200 feet away?

Any hints of help would be greatly appreciated. Gig will be at dusk, to a mostly absent crowd... (for a national holiday in a separatist state, looking at 1000 out of capacity if lucky).

Thanks!

[Sam Spoons]

Wow, that's a huge arena/crown, way bigger than anything I've done (my biggest have been around 5k punters) hope it turns out to be a great experience.

Are you running the PA? Or mixing on the supplied rig?

If not the engineer running the rig will probably be running in (dual) mono as this is the norm on big rigs (maybe with minimal panning of stereo sources only). If you pan individual instruments hard the audience on the left won't hear the instruments you've panned to the right and the balance will be wrong anywhere except down the middle of the audience.

If you are I presume you've specced/hired a big enough rig?

Good luck

[James Perrett]

Hire a decent PA rig with an engineer to mix it. Let them worry about the sound while you worry about the performance. The onstage sound will be completely different from the sound in a small venue but a good engineer will set up the monitors and make sure that you are happy on stage as well as looking after the front of house mix.

[Bob Bickerton]

As James says, this is a situation where you need to be focussed on the performance and let the engineer deal with sound issues.

Positive dialogue with the engineer prior to the performance would be useful to set expectations. Be clear about what you need in a technical rider and provide the engineer with a set list along with any production cues required.

Bob