There are 2 schools of thought when it comes to vocals in a mix. I’m speaking specifically about music at a live church worship service. This is not about the recording studio, CD recordings, ‘concerts’ at church, or anything else. At the last church I did a training seminar for, I heard arguments for both thoughts. The first is that the vocals are the most important part because they deliver the words of the song, and therefore need to be louder than everything else and the singer should be understandable to the congregation. Another thought is that the vocalists should not be ‘performing’ as if a concert at church, and their microphones should be buried in the mix a bit. The most common opinion I’ve heard is… the first. The singer is leading, and thus should be heard clearly by the congregation. I tend to agree.

The idea of just making the vocals twice as loud as the band can make them stick out too much, sound over-exposed, and mostly awkward to the congregation. If you listen to any rock and roll records (good ones anyway), you’ll notice that there seems to be a pocket that the vocal sits in. The lead vocal is not much louder than anything else, however, it seems unobstructed and clear. The goal for you needs to be somewhere in between.

You should try to get the vocals out in front, but still sounding like part of the whole. To accomplish this, let’s look at 4 aspects: pan, compression, volume, and fx. The pan is only an option if you have a stereo house. I don’t recommend panning inputs hard left or right, but 50-75% for overhead mics, auxiliary inputs, and rhythm instruments will allow the vocal to sit better right in the middle.

Compression is a tricky topic. A good compressor is working when you can’t hear it. All it allows you to do is turn down the loudest moments, so that you can turn up the microphone overall. In other words, it reduces the difference between the loudest and softest moments. Set the threshold (when it starts compressing) at 0, then move it backwards until the compressor wants to engage just as the singer gets louder than normal. A safe ratio is 3:1, meaning for every 3 dB over the threshold the singer’s volume is, the compressor only lets 1 dB out.

The 2 aspects mentioned above allow you to set the vocal right on top of the rest of the mix, without getting out of control. Use FX or a delay to set the vocal back into the mix a little and get it out of peoples’ faces. A 2 second reverb or less won’t sound too obnoxious. If you have access to a delay, start with 200 milliseconds and a 20% feedback- that’ll make it sound like the old John Lennon records where his vocal is ‘slapping back’ as he sings. The 200 ms, will repeat the vocal every 1/5 of a second (200 ms), and the feedback controls how many slaps you hear. It feeds a percentage of the signal back through the delay again, producing multiple echos.

The part that is out of your control, is how well your singer actually sings. If they don’t open their mouths, or have trouble hitting the pitch, then you are out of luck. You can’t work miracles, and a vocalist should offer a quality input to begin with, just like a drummer should play with precision and a guitar player should change dead strings. Hope these tips help, and I’d love your feedback!