If you have ever been to a live concert or watched your favourite musicians perform live on TV, you may have noticed them wearing earpieces. But what are they listening to through them? And why are they necessary? Well, last year I did a short video on in-ear monitors and loads of you wanted to find out more, so today I thought we’d take a bit more of an in-depth view
When you’re performing, it’s crucial to hear what you are playing or singing clearly. Traditionally, this was done with wedges. Wedges, as the name suggests, are wedge-shaped floor monitor loudspeakers. They’re placed on stage to face the performers and play the music back towards them so that the musicians can hear themselves better. Legend has it that the first floor monitors were used by The Beatles in the 60s because they found it impossible to hear themselves over their screaming fans in the height of Beatlemania. Their sound engineers decided to simply turn some of the speakers that would’ve been facing the crowd around to face the band instead.
For a long while, wedges were the only method of doing this effectively, but they also presented problems with hearing health, sound quality and mobility of the musicians. Another, smaller and more effective solution was needed; this came in the form of in-ear monitors, an evolution of the walkman earphone.
So, how did these come about? The first basic, homemade in-ears began surfacing in the early ’70s, which essentially were just standard earphones with a radio pack attached. These did not have excellent sound quality and were not accessible to the everyday musician. More effective in-ear monitors were made by Chris Lindop and used by Stevie Wonder in the 1980s; these allowed a better (although not perfect) sound to be fed back to Stevie’s ear directly. However, these weren’t made with hearing health in mind and didn’t protect the wearer from the loud sounds of the band or audience, and as they were still not for sale in the public forum, it would be more than a decade before any significant developments occurred.
Then, In 1995, a monitor engineer called Jerry Harvey, (who worked with artists such as Kiss, Morrissey, The Cult, Mötley Crüe, k.d. lang, Linkin Park) was working with Van Halen. The drummer, Alex Van Halen, felt the sound from the monitors was hurting his ears and made it difficult to communicate with the band, so he went to Jerry for a solution. After researching current in-ears, Jerry realised there was nothing that worked well enough to solve the issue - It wasn’t possible to get true sound isolation from external sounds. The sound quality was tinny and didn’t give the musician an accurate representation of the sounds being produced. Jerry decided to do something about it! He used his sound engineer expertise to create the first-ever dual speaker, custom in-ears which he moulded to impressions of Alex’s ears to isolate the sound he could hear and improve the spectrum of frequencies that the in-ears could relay.
Skid Row were touring with Van Halen at the time and were so impressed that their lead singer Sebastian Bach and the other four members of the band offered to pay $3000 each for a pair. The custom in-ear was born. Since then, the work of many sound engineers has continued to evolve and improve inears, and since the early 2000s, in-ears have become accessible to musicians at a reasonable price.
So let’s look at what modern-day in-ear monitors are and what makes them better than traditional wedge speakers...
Similar to your standard earbuds, in-ears sit in the structure of the ear - but unlike earbuds, they create a seal against the ear canal. Here are eight reasons why they work.
Superior Sound Quality - Because in-ears fit really tightly into the ear, the seal between the in-ears and the ear canal blocks out the outside noise. It also means that the sound coming through the monitors goes directly into the ear canal, enabling you to hear more detail but crucially with less volume - this leads us onto point two...
Hearing Health - It’s no surprise given they’re constantly in loud environments, but Musicians are four times more likely to deal with noise-induced hearing loss and 57% more likely to develop tinnitus. Listening to anything above 85 decibels for extended periods puts you at risk of hearing damage. In-ears block out the sound of the amplified instruments and acoustic instruments like drums, allowing you to have the mix at a lower level and protect your ears.
Individual Mixes - Because everyone is wearing their own in-ears, the sound is isolated to each performer rather than the entire stage so everyone can choose the mix of sound they want to hear. It means that if they want to, they can listen to themselves more prominently in the mix without having to up the volume. It also means that as a performer, you can add click tracks and audio cues that the audience can’t hear, for a more precise performance - this can also help singers specifically in number four...
Reduced Vocal Strain - Another great benefit of being able to set your own lower levels on your mix is that it can prevent vocal strain. When singers can’t hear themselves over the band, it is instinctual for them to push to compete with the sound. In-ears allow you to listen to yourself clearly and feel less need to strain, often singing more accurately as a result and without risking vocal damage even when doing many shows in a condensed period.
Elimination of Feedback and Clean Sound For The Audience - If you’ve got speakers on stage blasting sound back at you, some of this can be picked up by your mic and amplified causing feedback. Even without the full effect of feedback, low frequencies from the wedges on stage can bleed into the audience mix, muddying the sound. With the playback directly into the performer’s ears, the audience mix is clean and leaves the sound engineer to concentrate on making it the best possible experience for both audience and musicians.
Mobility - Stage monitors both take up a lot of space and have a lot of wires. They also have directional sound, so performers will only get their mix if they are in front of their wedge. This can be a problem when singers and musicians want to move around the stage as they have to stay in specific spots to be able to hear properly as well as avoid all the stage clutter. In-ears free the stage and allow you to an excellent quality mix - even when crowd surfing!
Portability and Personability - In ears are small and portable, unlike a 45-pound wedge. This means touring with them gave you a choice - either lug around a load of giant speakers and set them up each time or work with whatever the venue had but have to configure each setup differently. The portability of in-ears means that neither of these things are a problem!
Stereo Sound - In ears empower the singer to set their own mix, but also, if using stereo, adjust the balance of sounds so that one ear can have different sound levels than another. Working in stereo is a more natural way for the ears to hear, giving you the impression the instruments surround you.
I want some! - What are my options?
I won’t go into massive detail here, but there are still few things to think about if you want to get yourself a pair. I had some custom made to the exact shape of my ears, something that’s more expensive than the average on the market. There are pros and cons to this. Custom made monitors fit snugly into your ear, blocking out external noise incredibly effectively; giving you the best ability to hear precisely as well as likely the best durability and hearing protection.
Personally, though, I find my generic Sennheiser IE400’s work really well. This isn’t a sponsored video or anything, but I find them less fiddly to take in and out. This wouldn’t be an issue for most performers, but as a vocal coach, it’s important for me to both be aware of what the singer is hearing, and the audience mix which means taking them out and putting them back in fairly quickly. However, you do get a bit of sound bleed from the outside. If you’re gigging regularly in loud settings, I’d recommend paying a bit more for customs because that extra isolation means your ears will thank you in the long run!
Why wouldn’t a singer use them?
Although this all sounds good, you may have also noticed singers don’t always use them or have seen them take them out during performances. Why would this be?
Well, of course, sometimes things go wrong; there could be a problem with the mix or interference, and this could cause singers to take them out or not wear them at all.
In some smaller venues, there’s only one sound desk, and therefore there isn’t the option of having your own mix, which might make a musician opt to go without. The third and most common reason is that the isolated sound takes a little getting used to and as the singer can’t hear the audience, can make them feel a bit disconnected. Sometimes, during intimate gigs, the singer wants a direct connection with the audience, and there are fewer problems caused by using wedges. In bigger venues, sound engineers can get around the feeling of disconnect by setting up ambient microphones that pick up the sound of the crowd and feed it back to the singer. The singer can then choose how high they want the audience in the mix so they can still hear themselves and feel connected at the same time. Having said that, there will always be times where you just want that direct audience connection no matter how big the venue. In live music, most performers will tell you it’s all about the audience.
References
Hearing Loss - https://www.aarp.org/health/conditions-treatments/info-2018/musicians-hearing-loss.html
Shure - https://www.shure.com/en-US/performance-production/louder/
Empire Ears- https://empireears.com/blogs
Earrockers- https://earrockers.com/why-do-musicians-wear-earpieces-during-concerts/
The History of In-Ears - https://audiofly.com/blog/history-of-in-ear-monitors/
