I have been in sound reproduction for about 30 years and I agree with Chris that sometimes it is too loud, but it has been my experience that folkies generally are luddites and hate anything technical or modern. Usually the folk nazi police stand at the back of concerts and complain that "they are using an amplifier, thats a sin of the first degree". No venue is perfect and as such the sound in most venues is awful, it lacks depth and most venue lack various frequencies which creates dead spots. Add the fact that human bodies are great absorbers of sound and you have a nightmare. I have been to venues where the traditionalists will not have a PA and as such if you are not in the front row you cannot hear the performer. Classically trained voices will quite often overcome some of this and project their voices but we are talking about folkies, who usually will not have a bar of any sort of classical lessons. The point I am making is if a small but good quality PA is used in most venues and equalized using a 1/3 octave equalizer and Real Time Analyzer then the audience will most certainly hear the artists much better than without a PA, this goes for small venues as well. The PA does not have to be loud, but be there to reinforce the artist and to compensate for the poor acoustic qualities of the venue. In Australia we have a world famous Opera House, in most of the concert rooms Acoustic Rings have been installed to help with this. They also have PA.

A good quality PA will also allow the artists to have foldback, very essential, have you often wondered why people sing off key, it is because they are deaf or cannot hear themselves and thus cannot pitch their voices. Again it does not have to be loud. Ever noticed that folkies cup their hands to their ears, quite often in groups, this is because they cannot hear themselves. I particularly do not like it, it looks unprofessional, I have never seen Pavarotti do it.

When it comes down to it, if you are paying dollars and cannot hear an artist/artists because of a lack of PA, do you complain?. I refuse to go to certain folk festivals and concerts because there is no PA present, I will not pay good hard earned dollars when I cannot hear the sound and yes I have been told that I have a good ear for mixing when I do the PA, so I am fussy

Garry of Australia