We are often asked by fellow musicians for a hand in setting up sequences to bring to live shows. This article was born out of that need, aiming to offer you an overview of the topic and give you some buying advice.
Coming out of a recording season, you prepare for live shows by trying to offer a sound as close as possible to the released tracks. During the creation of our songs in the studio, it happens that we add extra sounds not necessarily played by the band members, or we hire session players to perform specific instrument parts. These sounds are represented, for example, by: Samples, VST string sections, harmonized choirs, vocal modulation effects, synths, etc…
This creates the need to produce sequences and set up a suitable playback system.
What are Sequences?
– Sequences are tracks that will be launched during the performance and will be part of it; they are additional sounds and rhythms that will be played by our PA system concurrently with the music played by the musicians.
– How to play sequences?
Sequences are played by a player which can be a PC or a dedicated hardware device.
– Who launches the sequences?
It will be crucial to identify the band member with the most room to act to take care of pressing the play button. Often the delegate is the drummer or the keyboardist, but clearly, there is no strict rule.
– How do I synchronize the sequences and play in time?
It is essential that these sequences are synchronized with a metronome and that the latter has a different audio BUS OUT from that of the tracks, thereby sending the two separate streams to the audio mixer. The sound engineer will be able to manage monitoring by sending the tempo beat and other band elements to the musicians, but will exclude the click channel from the master out (it wouldn’t be nice to have the metronome blaring at the audience!). The band (or certain members) can essentially have the metronome in their headphones and perform the song in sync with the sequences.
– Which player should I use? Do I need software?
As mentioned before, we have two possible players: a PC (or Mac) or a specific device.
If you decide to use a PC, you will need a multi-channel audio interface at your disposal, specifically one with multiple separate BUS OUTs. It is necessary to have sequencer software that can manage the various tracks and the relative outputs of the audio interface. There are a myriad of them, such as: Cubase, Pro Tools, Ableton, Studio One, Reaper, Qlab, etc…
In the second scenario, however, we will use a specific player; the market offers various possibilities, but even in this case, we will choose a device capable of managing multiple BUS OUTs and separately assigning the musical audio from that of our metronome.
Before giving you buying advice, we specify that playing live with a metronome strictly requires the use of in-ear headphones and an in-ear monitor system.
The sequences will need to be “prepared“; in fact, it is essential to contact your studio to request the extraction and optimization of the audio material. You will find yourself having to choose whether to use a multitrack system or have a proper stereo mix. We will address this topic in a moment as it requires further discussion.
With the necessary premises and explanations out of the way, we point out some multi-channel audio interfaces suitable for sending Sequences. As usual, we provide links to our reference website: strumentimsicali.net.
Audio interfaces:
- BEHRINGER UMC404HD: One of the most affordable multi-channel interfaces on the market.
- FOCUSRITE Scarlett 4i4 : A mid/low-end interface with good value for money.
- STEINBERG UR44: A good quality interface, particularly useful for its integrated DSP which allows input and output control through a dedicated software mixer.
As mentioned previously, the audio peripheral combined with software will allow you to assign sequences to one BUS OUT and the metronome to another. 
The most congenial solution for musicians is certainly the external player, this is because it avoids bringing a PC onto a stage. In this case too, there are several useful devices, but we recommend one above all, the CYMATIC AUDIO LP16.
Both proposed solutions will allow you to create your live setup for sequences; it will be sufficient to make the correct connections and relative programming. For the sake of brevity, we refer to other articles for the necessary in-depth information, while the need to build one of the two setups remains firm. We hope this first snippet of the “Dark Side of Sequences” has been useful to you; in the next articles, we will explain the connections and go into detail on how to perform the programming.
If you need FREE support on the subject, contact us, we will be at your disposal.
