On Thursday, October 10, 2013 9:03:56 AM UTC-7, Peter Larsen wrote:
Gary Eickmeier wrote:
https://www.hightail.com/dl?phi_acti... 7a05d925f2bf
Worked fine.
I think you need to listen more for the front to back musical balance in the
ensemble. On floor standing KEF Q50's the rear of the ensemble is too weak
and the bass-drum is "puny", in this small room it should be overwhelming.
Perhaps you need to elevate your mics somewhat more. Doing that also adds
more room.
I don't know which to blame for the "puny" bass drum, the room in which the
recording was made, the way it was being played, or Gary's unconventional
microphone technique. The weak rear ensemble is almost certainly the result
of the mikes being too close to the floor (I'm guessing, here but it's an educated
guess).
Spatiality is poor and confused, just as it was when I made quite similar
experiments in 1982.
That's down to the microphone arrangement, I believe. I told Gary this when he sent
me a CD with some of this rehearsal on it (I'm assuming it's the same session).
If I understand him correctly, he used three cardioids in close proximity to one
another arranged with the center one facing the ensemble (like for a mono
recording, and then two other cardioids a few inches to the right and left of
the center mike, with each aimed at the room's sidewalls (I.E., 90 degrees to
the forward-facing cardioid capsule), thus presenting the EDGE of the "side-
firing" capsules to the ensemble. I suspect that this arrangement would
probably provide for a very spacious sounding recording, but very poor stereo
from the standpoint of image specificity. When I heard the recording, I was
actually surprised at the amount of separation I heard. I noticed that when only
a couple of instruments were playing, they actually appeared on the right or the
left of the ensemble, but when a lot of instruments were playing, it just seemed
to be this phase-y, and confused swirl of sound. I suspect that the strong
directionality one hears when only a few instruments are playing is because
what one is actually hearing is the primary reflection off of the side walls of
the recording venue and as the instrumentation becomes more dense. reflections
from all over the room, mix with the direct mono sound from the center mike,
causing the confused spatiality that we both noticed. Of course, I wasn't
there, and don't know what the venue looked like, physically, so my diagnosis
could be all wet. But if that's the case, then I can not begin to tell you what is
actually at work here...
George Graves