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Solo Acoustic Singer-Songwriter Calls for Dynamic, Hands-On Live Mix
To the general public, artists like Ed Sheeran can seem to appear out of nowhere. A hit song appears, or an opening spot on a big tour, and suddenly the media is talking. That's the myth. The truth is, there are years of hard work behind any overnight sensation.
Sheeran learned guitar at a young age, his songwriting began in high school, and he was accepted at the National Youth Music Theatre as a teenager. His first independent EP was released in 2005, to be followed by several others between 2009 and 2011. All that time he played hundreds and hundreds of club gigs, drawing the attention of such notables as Jamie Foxx and Elton John and an ever-growing fan base. He has won several Brit Awards, co-writing hits with One Direction and Taylor Swift in 2012, and opening for Swift on her sold-out 2013 tour. Sheeran's second studio album, X, was recorded with producer Rick Rubin and includes the singles "Tenerife Sea" and "Sing," featuring Pharrell Williams. The song "Don't" entered the Billboard Hot 100 at Number 10, his highest U.S. charting single.
Mix caught up with singer-songwriter and multi instrumentalist at the SAP Center arena in San Jose, Calif., on the U.S. leg of his current tour before he heads back to England, then onto 13 dates in Australia in 2015.
Front-of-house engineer Chris Marsh started mixing Sheeran years back on a DiGiCo SDn, making use of the onboard FX and doubling up by mixing monitors from it as well. He then moved on to an SD10 and now mixes from an SD7, where he feels most at home. "Although fundamentally we are using only nine inputs, it is what we do with the nine inputs that requires...