BUTTE - Before all these great bands take the stage at the Montana Folk Festival in Butte, there’s another band that gets started early – it’s the sound crew, and that’s the band that helps all the other bands sound so great.
You must first hear this …
“Check one, of yeah, keep the gas coming, check one …,” said the singer.
Before you hear this:
“It’s a slow train through Arkansas …,” the Chuck Mead band sang.
More than a dozen crew members from Montana Pro Audio in Butte are busy all morning and throughout the day making sure the music sounds good.
“You got to have a lot of knowledge of the gear and just how sound works and how this tent is going to affect the sound, so we got to try to keep our artists happy so they can give a good performance,” said Ben Morris with Montana Pro Audio.
Each band gets a chance to run a sound check with the crew. No the most glamorous part of performing.
“Soundcheck at 10 a.m., that’s my favorite part,” said Martin Lynds.
Still, the performers say they’re happy with the sound crew.
“We did a show last night with them, this is the second one, they run a tight ship, I mean, the gear is great,” said Lynds.
At a festival that has bands from around the world, there’s sometimes a language barrier, but that doesn’t prevent them from getting the job done.
“Lucky, I guess music is a universal language so, a lot of it’s just pointing at things, that needs to be louder, that needs to be quieter,” said Morris.
In the end, the preparation pays off.
