MALIK ARSHAQ
MAN
BEHIND THE
CONSOLE
Having witnessed the proceedings of SulaFest 2018, it
would be safe to say that the festival was an absolute
success. While people poured in in large numbers to
catch the performances and indulge in all that the
vineyards had to offer, we managed to have a short
conversation with sound engineer, Fali Damania, about
the audio set-up for the festival, the equipment used
and what it takes to build a career as a sound engineer.
Could you give us a run-through of your P.A and mixer set-up for
the day?
The front of house (FOH) systems are L-ACOUSTICS K1
speakers while two Avid Venue S6L’s are used for the FOH
mix and the stage monitors’ mix which are run from the
same stage box with seamless gain-sharing capabilities.
The input signals are fed to the mixer through two Cat 6
cables, main and redundant, so we can switch in case there
is any trouble with the main one.
What about the monitors?
We have about 14 L-ACOUSTICS wedges for the whole fest,
you know, so we won't fall short on either stage and in-ear
monitors as well, Sennheisers and Shure PSM1000’s.
Are you doing sound for the whole SulaFest or just this stage?
I'm actually a freelance sound engineer, I've been the technical
head for SulaFest for a lot of years now. The audio rental
company is Sound & Light Professionals, they've been doing
the festival for the past eight years.
Can you name of the artists that you mix for?
I work with artists like Amit Trivedi, A.R. Rahman, Divine,
Pentagram...
Lastly, is there anything that you would like to say to younger
sound engineers about making money and building a career?
The important thing is to just start, just get into it and
don't waste any time. For the few years, it's really tough
in terms of money for all us, me included. But you have to
keep at it and get good at what you do. That's when people
begin noticing that your mixes sound good and you start
getting call-backs from other bands and other opportunities.
Each show should be your personal best, as far as the mix
goes, whether there's five hundred people in the audience
or five thousand.
The
Score Magazine
highonscore.com
21