How much do you worry about stereo when playing live?

First post.

I am soon about to dip my toe into play live electronic music with all hardware. I have all the components figured out, and I will be routing all pieces through a patch bay to make sending this synth through that effect, or that effect through this other effect, etc, much easier. While practicing with this set up I've noticed that worrying about things being stereo makes things twice as complicated as they need to be, maybe.

Do you think that stereo is important playing live, or is it fine just going mono? I don't think I've ever been in a situation where someones ping pong delay really hit me over the head or anything. Most the crowd is standing closer to one speaker or the other anyway, with a small percentage getting the sweet spot of any sort of stereo spectrum. Maybe only doing the reverbs stereo would be nice.

Thoughts?

If you have some effects that "fake" a stereo image from a mono signal (delays, reverbs) then put them last in the chain. Pan some percussive elements to the left and right.

depends on the venue imho and some clubs are in mono anyway

  On 3/11/2011 at 4:45 PM, psn said:

If you have some effects that "fake" a stereo image from a mono signal (delays, reverbs) then put them last in the chain. Pan some percussive elements to the left and right.

I'm not really asking how I should do it... I'm asking if I should bother.

Panning sounds so that they do not all sit in the center will reduce any clashing of frequencies in the spectrum and provide a greater potential for sonic clarity, something which is greatly needed in loud venues. So, yes, I would bother with stereo panning.

  On 3/11/2011 at 5:32 PM, nizzleone said:

  On 3/11/2011 at 4:45 PM, psn said:

If you have some effects that "fake" a stereo image from a mono signal (delays, reverbs) then put them last in the chain. Pan some percussive elements to the left and right.

 

I'm not really asking how I should do it... I'm asking if I should bother.

I'm telling you the degree to which I would bother.

I'm in the same boat. Went all hardware and now stereo comes at a high price because it eats up twice as many mixer channels. I think I might have to buy a second mixer just for drums and bounce them down to two channels on my main mixer. Sucks ass.

It's a source of frustration to me that club venues usually have mono sound. You sort of have to make do.

I think stereo could be considered a luxury mainly beneficial for those in the sweet spot in the middle of the speakers. (the sweet spot is a very exclusive location, especially at a show) Stereo separation is obviously very important but you can't really ever expect the majority crowd to all be at a desirable spot for the right perception of the stereo panning. It really doesn't seem worth it to me right now for a lot of reasons with my rig it's nearly impossible, my PA is mono when we throw shows etc.

It's funny that I'm sure a lot of people thought surround sound would become standard for consumers and professional venues long before now.

To be honest unless you're going to be playing super high profile gigs where stereo sound is a definite confirmation, I wouldn't bother worrying about it too much for live sets. I actually think it can be bad, especially if you don't account for the possibility of mono. If you don't set it up properly and flatten the stereo field in that case, you could lose half your track if you have lots of hard panning.

Here in Montreal at least, I'd say 1 out of 5 venues definitely don't have stereo sound, and 2 venues that I know of that have experimental electronic music etc only have mono for sure. Stereo is great though for reasons like what wallbird said but make sure you can manage with mono as well if you'll dabble in stereo. For albums and releases stereo is always a nice addition but really that won't make or break a track anyways imo.