John creates a lot of good discussions. Thanks John!

It's been a while since I posted one, so ... here 'tis!




Okay, I'll write something. I just got a really cool piece of equipment. I haven't gigged with it yet, but I believe it's going to work out quite well.

The BOSS EQ-20.

It's a programmable 10-band, graphic EQ.
It has 9 presets.
I have 8 accordions with internal mics.
Each preset is tweaked for each accordion.
Instrument cable in, sound out to the board. Sound guy just runs it flat and monitors the level.

and..."VIOLA!" (yeah, like the stringed instrument)

I've found a better solution than the Yamaha Magicstomp. Nothing wrong with the Magic Stomp -- there's just far more tweaking I can do with the EQ-20. I've finally found something that produces that Opelousas Creole box flavor.

R!CK

Would this take the place of a pre amp? I use a Tube pre amp just so I can tweak the output on the accordions, especially when I go from a single to a triple row. From the pictures of the Boss EQ-20 it looks like all you would have to do is hit one of the foot pedals and you would be already there. But would you still need a pre amp to boost the signal from the accordion mic and fatten it up or would the Boss eq do that too?

Holly craps,

Richard!!!!!!!!!!,

8 accordions?

Are they all Randys?

If so, that's 32 frames.

4 corners per frames = 128 individual corners.

Mittered!!!!!!!!.

All of them.

I'll sleep with them, "all" craddled around me, like little puppies.

Lucky DJ, you!!!!

C.

Man, you live in a world I can only dream of. How do you have the time? Very very cool stuff.

Aw shucks, man. Kinda wish I had the time to dream a lil' more! Sleep is so underrated.

Us Central TX guys need to have a throw-down sometime. I was supposed to jam with Ganey in Lake Charles over the Thanksgiving holiday, but family had me running and any calendar holiday amplifies the amount of family to visit with. I *did* slip out to see Travis Matte play in Eunice. You oughta see his new Falcon (Ab/B). The paint job is WAY cool. He let me take a run on it. Now I want me one a dem A-flats! Ha! Then I ended up with some nasty chestcold crud while I was down there.

I still want to meet Ganey, Rusty, and Chris M. That would be quite inspiring to me!

R!CK

Rick,
I bring 4 accordions to RedLine shows, and set up a line for each either through the house sound board or through my own small Behringer mixer with one send to the house system. Without a rigorous sound check, it's hard to wring out the feedback, especially on my C accordion and triple row. I love the idea of an EQ device with memory. Can you really set it for each accordion and forget it? Does it remember volume level or just eq settings? Do you know if the signal coming out of the Boss EQ-20 needs to be boosted through a preamp? What do you in the wired vs. wireless department? I thought about wireless but realized I'd have to plug and unplug every few songs as required by key changes, and I don't want to wear out my 1/4" jacks prematurely. Because each accordion has it's own line, I have (too) many linear feet of cable at my feet. What's your take on plugging/unplugging vs. a separate line for each instrument? While we're talking shop, do you use compression? I asked Santa for a pedal compressor. Accordions have notoriously uneven dynamics and I'm interested to see whether compression makes a difference live. It certainly makes a difference when mixing a recording.
Russ

In most cases, I only have my triple row, and one single row. They have quite different signal levels and EQ issues, so I almost always run them into two separate lines into the mixer.

I have toyed with the idea of a small mixer near me that I can control, plug both accordions into that, and then run just one line from that to the main board. But I haven't gotten around to trying it.

-David

That makes sense with 2 accordions, fuh shure.

-------------------

I made a mistake in my earlier post... the EQ-20 has 10 bands of eq and 9 memory patches.

The only drawback is it requires the finger to select [or advance through] the patches. I usually use the dirtiest finger I can find.

R!CK

I'll try to answer some of these great questions!

First of all, Claude -- the "8" accordions are:
Martin C
Falcon Bb
Falcon B/C (dk)
Falcon G/A (dk)
Falcon E/F (dk)

So technically it's really just 5. BUT, the dual-keys each play their own way, plus the keys themselves have their own resonance -- so sonically speaking, they each have their own EQ'ing -- that's 8 different accordions in my book. That's still enough to keep ya warm! Course the Martin is booty-jointed, right? But it's painted, so you can't see the faux pas!

The Boss EQ-20 seems like it's going to be the most useful device I have found thus far to deal with the different key vibrance and frequencies. I've only programmed in the EQ settings for each key, thus far, and haven't given them a run on stage yet.

Like I said before, I've been using a Yamaha Magic Stomp with some success, but it has a boatload of effects that I just simply don't use or would consider using like reverb and distortion -- stuff like that. I just prefer balanced, clean sound with certain frequencies EQ'ed for certain keys -- if that makes sense.

I hooked the EQ 20 to my Roland AC-60 amp (another incredible piece of equipment I highly recommend for us Cajun box players) and hooked each box, one at a time into the EQ 20. I spent hours being really picky with each key when setting up the EQ 20, and no two overall key settings/curves are the same, as it has turned out (for me). I had thought that they might be similar enough to use just one or two settings, but that hasn't been the case. I've also discovered that I can finally get that funky internal "sqwank-a-chank" nouveau zydeco quality that I've been searching for with the EQ-20 -- better than the Magic Stomp.

Each EQ setting can be adjusted volume-wise, too! There's a level slider on the far right-hand side. So, I'm assuming that would mean there's some form of pre-amp. I'm not a big gear-head, so my assumption might be making a monkey outta me. But I can notch-out the 9 bands of frequencies to however I want that particular key to sound -- bass heavy, mid heavy, treble heavy, or a mixture of those -- and set the level of "loudness" I want that setting to be -- then store that sucker! To me, that's remarkable.

The only drawbacks I see thus far is; every room has it's own acoustics. So some of the settings that sound good in the relatively dead room I created them in might prove to have a different color in a large room or rooms with a lot of bounce.

The other issue I see is I haven't figured out if the foot pedal scrolls through the settings? I think it requires a finger applied to the "Select" button. I'll take a deeper look at it tonight. The Magic Stomp makes it really easy to, well, "stomp" and click to a stored setting.

The last issue is remembering what [number] corresponds to what accordion. 1-8... I programmed them to 1 being the most used key to 8 being the key I use the least. The Magic Stomp allowed me to customize the name.

Other than that, I thought this device would be worth sharing info about here, especially for those of us with multiple accordions that are internally mic'ed. The benefits of having 9 channels of EQ and levels customized for each key simply outweighs the apparent workarounds necessary to use the EQ-20.

Apparently the EQ-20 is a little hard to get. I did a lot of research on it -- saw a lot of eBay'ers saying how it is not being produced anymore. So I inquired about it at the local Guitar Center stores here in DFW and they said they had to special order it from Roland. It was worth a shot, so I dropped the $200 for it as well as the $20 for the AC adapter. I think it's worth it thus far.

I looked at a lot of different options -- rack-mounted EQs, Pods, Fishman Aura... but they all included a ton of "guitar" effects that, again, I personally don't have a use for. I just want that elusive sqwank or that raucous dancehall shag sound, and I wasn't getting that from soundguys here in the DFW area. I knew that if I wanted to eliminate my frustration with guys running sound at gigs that have never heard a Cajun accordion, much less ever ran sound for one, that I had to take the responisibility for making the move towards the sound I prefer to hear. If I lived south of the chickory line, then the need for such an effect would be less, I think.

I also use a wireless system. I haven't hooked it up to the EQ 20 yet, but I don't predict any issues -- it worked great with my Magic Stomp.

As far as the 1/4" jack on the mic goes; those things have never failed me. I know they eventually go "bad", but I've not seen it yet -- they range in age from 2 years to 14 years and have had fairly heavy use.

Hope all this verbose schtuv helps answer some qwershtuns!

Happy Sqweezin'!

R!CK

At this stage I am purely acoustic, but it would kick big time to get a lesson on amplification tech. My box does have the bracket for an exterior mic. Are there any workshops on all this, whether formal or informal?

Techies are too cool. My wife used to run lighting for stage productions. She never did sound, though.

Rick,

Thanks for the insight about the Boss EQ-20. It's apparently no longer manufactured, but I found one on ebay, spent a couple hours setting up 4 eq memories for 3 single-rows and a triple-row and played out with it at a college dinner gig today. I also added a compressor (Rocktronic Big Crush is the unfortunate product name) to even out the levels between each button and between the left and right hands. I gotta say it's a big step forward for my zydeco sound. Every box sounds gutsy, and the lowest pull pitches, never clearly picked up by the internal mic compared to notes a couple octaves higher, now leap out of the accordion. Being able to pre=set eqs also eliminated monitor feedback problems. I don't see going back to my small mixer with 4 separate lines in for 4 separate accordions and only 3-band channel eq. I now have one cable and a 10-band eq for each accordion. Hard to dial in the compressor but worth it.

Thanks again,
Russ