I usually start off at about 7 a.m. - that's when the young fella wakes me up and I have to get him breakfast. I might not be needed anywhere until noon, but I'm up at seven. Depending on what I'm doing, I could actually be on site earlier for a larger gig - if it was something in The Point, for example, 7 a.m. is the sort of start-time you're talking about.
A big gig is usually the end result of a lot of planning. You attend a series of meetings beforehand which could run over a couple of months. There's the whole logistics of running a gig. You end up sitting there listening to conversations about toilets and where they'll be placed, stuff like that. It's 60 per cent office work before you get down to the nittygritty.
The actual gig should be relatively simple - if getting a sound is a problem for you, you're in the wrong business. One of the most important things with sound engineering is eliminating problems in a room; it's all down to frequency analysis and the best analysers in the world are not electronic, they're ears.
Doing a show in Vicar Street, one of the ESB Jazz series, I'll usually have an advance rider from the band, which lays out what they want on stage and what their sound requirements are, so I can order things in advance. Then it's down to the venue. In a place like Vicar Street where the have a very good sound system and a terrific crew, it's relatively simple.
I'll get there after noon and work towards an 8 p.m. start, finishing around 11 p.m. I get there and I meet the house crew. Between us we set up a stage as per the band's spec. Then there will be a session of tuning the sound system. If it's a very loud act, I would equalise the system differently to a very quiet act.
I often end up working with very acoustic acts which are not going to be very loud, so I would tune the system to have it sounding as natural as possible. You have to be very careful because these people actually produce the sound and my job is to translate that unmutilated for the audience. So there's a bit a time spent tuning the system in the band's absence.
If it's a jazz piano trio, I know I'll have a grand piano on stage, so my task is to make the piano sound bigger - not different, just bigger. You'll have drums then and they obviously can be very loud, so you've go to try to balance everything so it's all heard clearly without colouring the sound. By looking at a band's line-up, you'll know what they should sound like.
Then the band comes in. Bands are on the road for much of the time and they want to spend as little time as possible getting their sound together. That can cause problems, so that's why I use a certain amount of guesswork to get the tuning done beforehand so that there's already a basic sound established.
Quite a bit of time is taken up trying to explain to a band why certain equipment should be in a particular place. I'd like to see them three hours before the gig, but often it's just one. Hopefully after that we'll have something to eat, but on occasions I might stay behind because I'll have spotted a few problems and might spend the remaining time until the door open sorting them out.
Then the band walk out on stage and suddenly the empty room you had when you were sound checking is full and the sound has changed. You do allow for that, but in an unknown room that can be very tricky and you have to work very fast at the sound desk at the start of the show to get it back to where you were during the sound check.
The gig time is spent monitoring and adjusting levels so everything remains balanced throughout the performance. At the interval, you usually talk to the band to make sure they're all happy on stage.
When you get to the end of the gig, you have to take the stage down. The glamour is over. If you do the thing right, musicians do befriend you and see you very much as an ally. That is an unusual thing, particularly in the jazz world, so that's your accolade.
The next concert in the ESB Jazz Series is at Vicar Street next Sunday evening, featuring Charlie Haden.
In conversation with Olivia Kelly
