FOH engineer/tour manager Steve Lary has worked on several ofCharlie Hunter’s tours. Over time, Hunter has morphed his ensemble froma simple duo to a trio and back to the original quintet. For thecurrent tour, Lary and the crew are renting the majority of theirequipment. “My console can be a Mackie 12-channel all the way upto a Midas XL200,” Lary says.
“I’m fairly new to the jazz world,” he continues.“The first thing I learned is that the ambient drum kit sound iswhere it’s at. So the first thing I wanted was a couple oflarge-diaphragm overheads to get that sound. For the money, theAudio-Technica 40 Series was the way I wanted to go. I have a[Beyerdynamic] M88 on the kick, a Shure 57 on snare and the A-T 4033sfor overheads. Then, for guitar I use a [Sennheiser] MD 409, andeverything else is whatever the house provides.”
At each stop, Lary scours the available outboard processors for ahandful of essential elements. For effects, his choices included YamahaSPX-990s and selections from TC Electronic. “I run everythingvery dry,” Lary says. “Charlie rarely even uses a monitormix for himself. He’s got two amps that give him his sound, and theband sets up extremely close. The audience can hear the banter onstage.It gives it a very intimate feel.”
