Advantages of using smaller amplifiers

Submitted by: Al Loya In the Jar Studios Stage volume has always a problem for musicians that play the local clubs. In my 20 years of playing music and 5 years of running sound, I have learned many things that I should and shouldn't do as a musician. In the following paragraphs I will discuss the advantages of using smaller amps. As a guitarist one of my concerns was not being able to hear myself on stage, even back many moons ago when I did use my half stack. I noticed that many of the guitarist in other more seasoned (veterans) bands were using combos and amps with single speakers. I got the nerve to ask one of them the reason that he used such a small amp. His answer astonished me, and here is what he said, "I use a small amp because I can over drive the speaker at lower levels allowing me to get the sound that I want with out blowing the heads of the people in the first few rows, it also gives the sound man the ability to increase the volume to the monitors, and I use an amp stand that tilts my amp towards my ears so I can monitor my playing regardless of what the sound guy does." This my fellow guitarist was and still is sage advice. I started researching this advice, I watched videos of my favorite players and notice a trend they were using smaller amps, and yet the sound was great. I mean guys like Paul McCartney, Robert Cray, Neal Young and many other artist were actually using smaller amps. One thing to remember is that you and the rest of the band have microphones in front of your amps or are going through at line out from the rear of your amp and the sound is in turn going through the P.A. where the crowd of your adoring fans are out listening to you. Your amp doesn't need to be huge to be able to be heard the microphone does a great job of reproducing the sound, and great result can be achieved. Another reason for using smaller amplifiers is that they are not as heavy as the larger counter parts. They can be carried by one person using usually one hand. Yet another reason is they don't take up as much space in your vehicle, and save space on stage as well. So there you have it, smaller amps can sound over driven at lower levels, they don't take up as much space in your vehicle and on stage, setup and specifically tear down is not a much work on your body when you have less weight to have to lug around. Just a few advantages of using smaller amplifiers.