I had overlooked your comment about playing and mixing. I also realize that sometimes there's no choice.

No problem, it was somewhere way up in the beginning.

The desk you now have is pretty big. It's arguably too big, but then it's better to have it too big now than too small when you've four times the size. At least you can just not use the extra channels.

I agree, it's huge for what we need, but I have learned that the other channels are simply "not in use" and that's fine.

Thanks for explaining Equalization and Meter. That makes more sense. I know what a graphic equalizer is, I've seen them, there just isn't one on here.

The EQ in each channel lets you adjust the bass, mids and treble/highs individually. It's really just like the bass and treble controls on your stereo, except the bass adjust is lower, the treble is higher and there's one for the middle, too. It's also quite hard to quickly explain how to use them. See, this is another reason you need a "practice" session with someone up the front using the mikes so you can just fiddle and learn.

The mikes aren't really the problem issue, it's the music. The main organist plays too softly and on the lower tones, which makes us (the pianists), go bonkers. If there was a way to reduce her Bass and raise her Treble, I'd be all for it. When my mom plays organ with me on piano (once a week), I hear her fine, so I KNOW it's the settings the main organist uses.

Your description of your church music reminds me of a few incidents I've seen in churches like that over the decades. In short, you don't have a technology problem, you have a people problem. I hope your pastor is aware of this because unless it's sorted out, you will lose someone (probably the organist) suddenly and under a cloud.

Well, I don't think the main organist would ever leave. Throw a fit, yes, make her voice heard, yes, leave, nah. She is set there, and plans to stay till she's unable to play. However, she has had many health issues and we've covered for her many times, and she has a heart condition. So for the most part, the preacher and etc. cater to her some at this point.

Actually, I would probably be more prone to quit before she ever would. I'm mostly there because I'm playing with my mom again, which is something I should have treasured in the years we had in other churches together, but instead, I fought and wrestled with the parental power issues and we didn't enjoy all that time we had. So now I'm making the best of it and cherishing it for what it's worth, as time spent sharing music with my mother again.

But I agree, the church is very unstable right now. We got the new preacher last November/December, after having an interim preacher for 2 years or so. So it's still coming together, so to speak.

Anyway.... enough on that. I took mom up to teach her the board today. Not a problem, she got the hang of it fairly well. The problem then? NO LEFT CHANNEL SOUND. Nada. Nothing. Turns out, it probably was that way last week, and I didn't notice. The reason I didn't notice, is because I sound tested only the right speaker when testing the mikes, because it's closer to the mike, and I could hold the mike and lean to the speaker. I didn't sound test the left one. I also didn't sound test the monitor by the piano, because mom told me she heard the organ fine. Well, yeah, I had given the organ more volume. But it was odd that the piano monitor didn't "crackle" as it always does when waking up. (it's not the best fit for the job). thus, it never worked last week, and I just didn't know it.

A close examination of things shows me that someone switched the Y cables around from the way my brother had had them, and now there are two cables coming out of the left speaker, and one cord going back to the snake, where previously it was the other way around. Everything I tried to do to get left channel sound, failed. I tried shifting PAN to left, on the keyboard, nothing. I turned down R channel Main and tried turning up L Main, nothing. It's dead Jim.

Preacher arrived while we were up there and we told him. He's gonna get his son to look at it. It's my suspicion that his son changed it in the first place. Ah well. I don't have to deal with it Sunday, THEY do. ;)

Any ideas why we would suddenly lose Left channel?

Brenda