Violin - At the advice of Tom Haines (prof. of the Multitrack class) we miked the violin with a stereo pair of Neumann 184s about 5 ft. above the violin. This mic placement gives a great directional sound from the violin and a great stereo image. The 5 ft. distance gives a small, but effective amount of room reflections especially on releases.
Keys -
The keys were a MicroKorg Synth. We took 1/4" cables from the stereo outputs and routed them through direct boxes. No picture for this one... It was getting late, my mind was other places.
Melodica - The melodica is a woodwind instrument with piano keys. Each key is connected to a reed which vibrates as you blow into the instrument. The melodica is a pretty flat sounding instrument with the sound holes opposite of the keys.
We miked it with an AKG 414 ULS aimed directly at the sound holes.
Acoustic Guitar - For the acoustic guitar tracks we used 2 Neumann 184s in an X-Y stereo pair. The stereo pair is set up vertically instead of horizontally and aimed at the 12th fret of the guitar. This is commonly referred to as the Nashville method. I suggested we try miking at the bottom of the fretboard, but the sound ended up having too much "woof" to be useful. At the 12th fret the sound from the guitar consists of clean highs with a subtle low end.
We double tracked the guitar to catch subtle differences in performances. Panning these left and right creates a more interesting stereo image than one performance. Peter knocked out each song in one take making our job very easy.
Currently I am the Teaching Assistant for E-Media's Multitrack Recording class @ CCM. The class learns about multitrack music recording through various readings, and hands on experiences. This week we are tracking 3 songs in our studio with local musician Peter Adams.
We started with the drums. I have been experimenting with drum miking a lot lately and this is by far some of the best drum sounds I've ever put to tape (it helps that the kit itself was easily the best sounding kit I've ever recorded.)
Let's start with the Kick Drum- We miked the Kick Drum with an AKG D112, our studio's go-to kick drum mic. The D112 is a large-diaphragm dynamic microphone that is engineered to favor low frequencies.
We placed the mic in the port on the front head of the kick drum (we couldn't fit it inside because the mic was bigger than the port). The front of the mic was aimed across the kick drum at the intersection of the head and shell. This gives a nice punch as well as the shell tone of the drum.
Next, the Snare Drum - We miked the snare drum with an AKG 414 ULS (Transformerless). We used the 414's cardioid polar pattern to pick up the snare, pointing more toward the front of the rim to get a crisp snap out of the drum. Rule of thumb - for snap aim at the rim, for tone aim at the middle of the head.
Also, we used a -20dB pad on the microphone because the snare drum is a high-velocity instrument. BE CAREFUL though, this mic is a condenser and fairly sensitive. Make sure the drummer has control over his sticks, otherwise goodbye microphone!
Toms - On the toms we used Shure SM57s, the standard drum mics. Snap and tone rules apply to toms, and are even more important.
As obvious as it may seem, the point of miking toms is to make them sound like they're from the same kit (harder than you may think). The Highest rack tom had a lot of tone, so we muted it with some tape and pointed the mic toward the rim.
In order to match the tone from the small tom we aimed the other tom mics more toward the center of the drum.
Overheads - For our overhead mics we used Neumann 184s in a split stereo set up. Essentially, one mic over each side of the kit.
The most important thing to consider in this mic setup is phasing. The easiest way to avoid phasing is to adhere to the 3 to 1 Rule. This rule states that if two microphones are picking up the same sound source the microphones must be 3x further apart than they are from the sound source. For example - if 2 mics are picking up the crash cymbal and the closest mic is 12 inches away, the second mic must be at least 36 inches away from the first mic. It sounds more confusing than it really is. For more info on Phasing, and comb-filtering check out Crown Audio's Mic Tips.
Room Mic - For the Room mics we used a Sennheiser MKH418S shotgun mic. You may be wondering, how is a shotgun mic a room mic? Well, the secret is that the MKH418S is a Mid-Side microphone, which means it has two diaphragms. The one at the tip of the microphone is a Super Cardiod, and the second is a Figure of 8 in the middle of the microphone shaft.
The Super Cardiod is essentially a second snare mic, but the figure of 8 gives a great big room sound (only in a good drum room though.) The trick to achieving a stereo sound from the Figure of 8 capsule is to route the signal to two channels (stereo pair), pan hard left and right and flip the phase of one of the channels.
I read about this technique somewhere 3 or so years ago and this is my second attempt. It's fair to say this is my favorite drum room sound... at least for this particular room.
Not only did the drum kit sound great, but the drummer was solid as well. He really knew his way around the kit, but stayed in the pocket until the time was right.
In 4 days classes start back up so I've been trying to crank out some of the Summer projects that took me way too long to finish.
Manute Bol's full length - Positiv-ly Sick is mixed, mastered and sent. The Bol is currrently working on Layout and packaging, expect a mid-fall release. I'd get your hands on this!
My big project - Line Level will be kicking off production on October 3rd. You can check out our Pilot Preview on Facebook.
Also, over the next few weeks my good friend Mitch and I will be recording some original material in my bedroom studio. I'll be posting about that as it happens.
After taking a healthy 2.5 month break to do school and the radio drama I finally finished mixing Manute Bol's Full-Length album. They are tearing it apart as we speak and after I make the changes they give me it's on to mastering!
Also this week is my first week at Wyoming Center for the Arts where I am engineering recording sessions for all of their rock n' roll camps. The first day was rough, but now that I'm used to the lab and the kids it's going really well!
After 3 days of touch ups and mixing the first Manute Bol e.p. - "Speed Freaks!" is finished. You can listen to/download the tracks here (explicit lyrics). This is a precursor to the full length - "Positiv-ly Sick!" which will be released later. I will be tightening up the mix and really getting deep with the full length so it will sound much better than Speed Freaks! but I am still pleased with the E.P. It has been a week to the hour since we started the whole process. We have 13 songs recorded, 12 of which will be released, and a mixed e.p. Not too bad for 168 hours.
The gang vocals could not sound better. Nine of us crammed into a bedroom shouting at the top of our lungs, heads pounding and bodies sweating... I haven't had so much fun in a long time. I'm so glad the band asked me to be part of the gang vocals. I did end up using the Octava mic with the omni capsule, and we all made a circle around it. We tracked each part twice and I split it hard left and right for now. Threw in some fairly heavy compression and a nice reverb and the rough mix sounds pretty good. At the end of it all we had a "CD Party" where we all cheered and yelled whatever came to our heads. If you have never heard a CD party grab a Catch-22 album, it's worth the listen. There are a couple gang vocals that sound especially good, but you'll have to wait for the CD to hear them!
At the advice of Tom Haines (prof. of the Multitrack class) we miked the violin with a stereo pair of Neumann 184s about 5 ft. above the violin. This mic placement gives a great directional sound from the violin and a great stereo image. The 5 ft. distance gives a small, but effective amount of room reflections especially on releases.
The melodica is a woodwind instrument with piano keys. Each key is connected to a reed which vibrates as you blow into the instrument. The melodica is a pretty flat sounding instrument with the sound holes opposite of the keys.
