Colbert & Fallon: Mixing Music for Late Night TV
Twenty Thousand Hertz - Dallas Taylor
This episode of Twenty Thousand Hertz explores the intricate world of music mixing for late-night television, featuring interviews with two legendary music
Key takeaways
- Late-night TV bands are often nervous on camera despite extensive experience, as television performances are rare compared to concerts or recordings.
Main topics
- Music mixing in live-to-tape late-night television
- Differences between broadcast, concert, and studio mixing
Notable quotes
"Even the most successful band in the world, maybe at the most will do three television shows in the course of a year."
Conclusion
The episode reveals how precision, experience, and adaptability define the unseen
Transcript preview
Speaker 6 (0:00) Hey, listeners. So the vast majority of the way that we pay our staff and our team and to make this podcast a reality is through advertising. We quite literally can't make 20,000 Hertz without strong advertising partners. So if we want nice things and we want 20,000 Hertz to exist, I need your help with that. I know many, many people in our audience who work for companies that make or does something relevant to the interests of this audience. It could be an audio manufacturer, an entertainment company, a clothing brand, a home goods store, meal delivery service, or some useful software. Our audience loves sound, music, and audio things, but really just anything in the design and wellness space is very relevant. And if any of this applies to you, then you or the company that you work for should really think about advertising on 20,000 Hertz. And I would even encourage you to zoom out a little bit. Not only is it advertising, but it's also being associated with good things in the world. The show has over 100,000 passionate listeners that you could be connecting with. And right now, I could be telling them all about the latest and greatest thing that you have to offer. For rates and availability, get in touch by emailing web at 20k.org. You can also use the contact form on our website, 20k.org. Speaker 6 (1:15) You're listening to 20,000 Hertz. The stories behind the world's most recognizable and interesting sounds. I'm Dallas Taylor. Speaker 6 (1:28) Ever since we launched our video series about a year ago, I've had some pretty amazing experiences, like going backstage at several late night shows to learn how they craft the audio in these super high pressure environments. Two of the shows that I went to were The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon at 30 Rock in Manhattan and The Late Show with Stephen Colbert over at the Ed Sullivan Theater on Broadway. I filmed Colbert's just a few weeks before that show ended. Between both shows, I interviewed a lot of people, including the music mixers, who mixed the in-house band as well as the visiting musical guests. Over on Colbert's show, the music mixer was Harvey Goldberg. Starting in the late 90s, Harvey worked on The Late Show with David Letterman and then stayed on when Colbert took over in 2015. Over on Jimmy Fallon, the music mixer is Lawrence Manchester, who's been with the show since the very beginning. Speaker 3 (2:23) It's a connection, sorry! Speaker 6 (2:28) After meeting both Harvey and Lawrence, I thought it'd be really cool to bring them together here on 20,000 Hertz to swap stories. Well, this is so exciting. I'm so glad that the stars align to where I could get the two of you together because I wanted to interview both of you kind of individually and I had an epiphany and I was like, what about together? So why don't we start with Harvey? So what is the band experience at one of these shows? What are they coming into? Like how many rehearsals, how many recordings and like what happens live versus not live? Speaker 1 (2:58) Yeah. One of the things that I learned pretty quickly is that even the most seasoned band that's made a lot of records and has done a lot of concerts, if you stop and think about it, the thing they've done the least is television. Speaker 6 (3:12) You Speaker 1 (3:13) know, even the most successful band in the world, maybe at the most will do. three television shows in the course of a year, and then they may not do another one for another three years. So they're always a little bit more nervous playing on television than they are in concert or making records. You know, they've done that on a regular basis. And it's also probably, I would assume, pretty hard to come out for one song and just hit it. Speaker 1 (3:45) We traditionally, both Letterman and The Late Show, we would do a line check in the morning and just make sure all of their equipment works and all of our equipment works. And we'd get whatever rough sounds we could with their tech crew. Sometimes members of the band would show up themselves, which would help. But then at the camera block... Meaning the on-camera rehearsal. I structured it that... The director knew that I would get two audio passes before cameras would join in. And in those two passes, I would hear the final players and get together a mix that was close to what it should be. And then cameras always wanted to look at it another two or three times. So I would say I get to hear the song performed live without an audience four to five times. Speaker 6 (4:38) And even with that, I suspect that those four or five times are still different when the audience is there, like energy wise, right? Yeah, Speaker 1 (4:47) well, the energy, you know, whatever levels I'm getting, I always assume they're going to play louder once there's an audience there. Speaker 5 (4:54) Oh, yeah. Speaker 1 (4:54) And the other thing that I'm sure Lawrence has run into is it's very hard for me to judge the amount of reverb when there's no audience, because once there's audience in the room, the room dries up. So almost without fail, whatever I thought was just the right amount of reverb on the vocal, I always have to go back and add a little bit more after the show because it's not as much reverb as I thought I had. Speaker 1 (5:23) Have you run into that also, Lawrence? Speaker 5 (5:25) I think the Ed Sullivan Theater is more ambient than ours is. And there's probably a more dramatic difference between there being an audience versus no audience. Ours is quite dry to begin with, and I find it doesn't change too much. We have a very live room. I envy you that you have a dry room. Yeah, it does help most of the time. That's true. Speaker 6 (5:46) So this is a great time for me to chime in because what's very cool is I've got to experience both of these rooms. And one of the things that I don't think I've ever heard anyone articulate, because when you're on TV, it's TV. It's still the same, you know, 16 by 9. It's still, you know, similar-ish camera shots. But these two rooms are so vastly different from each other. Jimmy Fallon's show is filmed in Studio 6B of 30 Rockefeller Plaza, also known as 30 Rock. That's the NBC skyscraper where they also shoot Saturday Night Live, Late Night with Seth Meyers, and various news programs. 6B feels like a large recording studio. The production mixer, Fred, took me around and was even showing me that all of the walls are perforated and dead quiet, like everything is sound-soaked everywhere. Meanwhile, Colbert's show was literally filmed on Broadway inside the historic Ed Sullivan Theater. Over at the Ed Sullivan, it is a like Broadway theater. Like it is for live performances. And it feels like the audience feels different. The size of the room feels different. So yeah, you both had very different rooms to work within. Speaker 1 (6:53) Yeah, they designed our space to be hostile to audio. Speaker 6 (7:01) Like Harvey, each morning Lawrence and his team work with the band's crew to get everything set up before the band arrives. In Speaker 5 (7:07) a lot of cases, these bands are on tour, so they have front of house mixer with them, they have a monitor mixer with them. Speaker 6 (7:13) The front of house mixer is traditionally the person who mixes what the audience hears at a band's concert. Meanwhile, the monitor mixer controls what the band hears through the onstage wedge speakers and their in-ear monitors. Speaker 5 (7:25) So we work with them ahead of time, and then by the time the band takes the stage, that's usually... 10, 45, 11 o'clock. And yes, we'll try to get a couple of audio runs in just for us. And it's for them, really, because they're trying to get their monitor mix dialed in a way that's comfortable and familiar with how they have it every night. And yet they're using our equipment and our people are doing the work. And there's some negotiating that has to take Speaker 6 (7:47) place. And the only way to do that is just in real time by running through the song a few times. And Speaker 5 (7:51) that's also my chance to hear it and hear what the levels are going to be and make a few, you know, I might call down to the stage and ask them to tune down the snare drum. Speaker 5 (8:01) There are a few things that I know are going to help me out and help with the mix. And then the band or the featured artist will usually take the stage and give us one more before camera block. And camera block is usually twice through. And we're done by lunch. And then Speaker 3 (8:15) they Speaker 5 (8:15) don't play the song again until showtime. At that point, it's, you know, 6, 6.15 in the evening when they take the stage to play the song. And they haven't played it in like six hours. And maybe they went to lunch and took a nap in between and have completely like... gone on with their day. So it's not advantageous, I do feel for them because they have to come back and hit it right out of the gate. And that's not easy to do. Speaker 6 (8:41) Now, since the band's front of house mixer and monitor mixer is already there, you might think that they would mix the artists when they play on a late night show. After all, they know all the songs, they know the band's gear, and they know what the artist wants. But I'd love to hear it, maybe starting with you, Lawrence. Why is that not a good idea? Sure. And Speaker 5 (9:02) I get it. I do understand why. And I've been on the other side of it, too, just wishing, like, man, I wish I could be hands-on, you know, and do what I just... would be able to do very quickly rather than have to coach and guide another mixer to do it. But it makes sense when you consider how complicated these TV shows are, how custom built the consoles are. They have to use our equipment because we have to work very quickly. It's all integrated. There's also a rhythm to the show that we have to maintain. We can't get behind schedule. You know, we can't let a rehearsal become too precious that we then... blow through lunch, and now we're behind schedule for the rest of the day. That's the kiss of death for a show that's as complicated as these are. And so for that reason, our people sort of have to be in charge in order to make sure that things get driven on time and on schedule. And Speaker 6 (9:47) we have really good people. And they're very adept at working with an artist's team and Speaker 5 (9:52) interpreting the information that's being given, interpreting the creative guidance that's being offered, and getting a result that's going to get the job done. We've never not got the show on the air, or I don't think anyone's ever left unhappy. Speaker