Live Sound Basics (Volume 1)
Ric Wallace has been mixing live bands and making studio recordings for 30 plus years. Ric grew up in California in the 60's, playing piano and violin and had every indication of leading a simple lifestyle when, at the age of 8, he saw the Beatles first performance on the Ed Sullivan TV Show. His subsequent fascination with electric guitars and the concepts of distortion and reverb completely distracted him and led to a lifelong dedication to shaping sounds through audio recording and mixing live music. After attending college in the late 70's with any eye toward a creative writing career, Wallace abandoned that effort and instead worked in the early 80's to design a pro audio speaker system and form a sound company, Seismic Audio in the Seattle area. Mr. Wallace attained a high degree of respect early in his career as an audio engineer for achieving a consistent "big" sound, and an exceptionally clean mixing style. Mr. Wallace toured with bands such as the Butthole Surfers and Scatterbrain to name just a few, and travelled throughout the world as a sound engineer for over 15 years. He engineered and produced many albums, including the Butthole Surfers’ “Hairway to Steven” as well as their famous self-bootleg, “Double Live.”  Wallace moved to Athens Georgia in the early 90's where the vibrant music scene and small town vibe was irresistible to him. He eschewed the lucrative live sound touring industry for a more stable lifestyle and took a job at the University of Georgia, and at the same time, he became the Production Manager and head audio engineer at the world famous 40Watt club where he mixed thousands of live sets over the years. More recently Ric has done one-off gigs with artists like REM and the Athena Opera, and oversaw the rebuilding of the production systems for the Georgia Theater after a devastating fire there in 2009. He is currently the Production Director for Entertainment Design Group in Atlanta GA. Ric has created a production arts school in Athens called the Production Institute (http://www.productioninstitute.com) where the focus is “hands-on” live sound training. He teaches Live Sound Fundamentals at Athens Technical College and is a Learning Adviser for two classes at SAE OnLine (http://online.sae.edu/course/live-sound-engineering-foh).