I just uploaded some mp3's of a recording i did last night with my
trio. I would appreciate any constructive criticism. I'm primarily a
musician and although I know quite a bit more than most musicians about
recording, i'm on the low end of the totem pole! Anyway, I have a good
selection of mics these days and a good setup, so here's the deal.
Trio (classical guitar, upright bass, drums). yes we all recorded in
the same room- I need to direct the band, so now my objective is
controlling the bleed to my favor. I have tried blending a pickup
sound with the micrphones but i just hate that sound so much i can't
use it. so this recording is all mics. re20 on guitar (really gives me
a sound i like!). 414 uls hyper on the bass. single josephson c42 on
overhead, oktava mc012 with pad and omni on snare. sennheiser
something or another on kick. I tried to orient the band so that the
drums wouldn't overpower the other instruments in the spot mics. the
room is about 25 feet long by 15 wide. I put the drummer in the middle
lengthwise, facing the farthest corner. the bass player was against
the wall perpendicular to the drummer and I was against the back wall
facing the drummer's side/back. So we made a little triangle in half
the room and the drummer played to the other half of the room. I put
some foam panels around the drumkit to tame some of the cymbal sound in
my half of the room. still, most of the drum sound you hear in the
recording is coming from my guitar mic, but the oktava on the snare at
least gives a little definition. and the kick mic is useful. Very
little drum sound in the bass mic. guitar mic into RNP, the rest of
the mics into Macki onyx, then all through maudio fw1814 into pro
tools. Lexicon hardware reverb on a plate setting with a pretty long
predelay. a little compression on everything and just some mild eq.
That's about it. What am I doing wrong and what am I doing right?
here's the clips:

www.natenajar.com/mp3/opato.mp3
www.natenajar.com/mp3/jitterbug.mp3

thanks!

Nate

Nice playing!

I like the sound you get from everything, but I don't like the reverb... I'd
try getting rid of it completely. If you need it, then try a lot less, a
shorter reverb time and keep it out of the bass.

Not personally keen on the panning - since its a trio, it's kinda hard...
I'd try getting the spaciousness from the kit with the bass panned dead
centre, the guitar maybe slightly off centre, and the kit panned as a kit
appears to you (kick centre, snare slighly one side, hat slightly further to
one side, ride further the opposite direction. It sounds off balance the
way it is, and the lefty kick and right bass fight each other from time to
time.

Kinda learning myself...

Rich



"Nate Najar" wrote in message
oups.com...
I just uploaded some mp3's of a recording i did last night with my
trio. I would appreciate any constructive criticism. I'm primarily a
musician and although I know quite a bit more than most musicians about
recording, i'm on the low end of the totem pole! Anyway, I have a good
selection of mics these days and a good setup, so here's the deal.
Trio (classical guitar, upright bass, drums). yes we all recorded in
the same room- I need to direct the band, so now my objective is
controlling the bleed to my favor. I have tried blending a pickup
sound with the micrphones but i just hate that sound so much i can't
use it. so this recording is all mics. re20 on guitar (really gives me
a sound i like!). 414 uls hyper on the bass. single josephson c42 on
overhead, oktava mc012 with pad and omni on snare. sennheiser
something or another on kick. I tried to orient the band so that the
drums wouldn't overpower the other instruments in the spot mics. the
room is about 25 feet long by 15 wide. I put the drummer in the middle
lengthwise, facing the farthest corner. the bass player was against
the wall perpendicular to the drummer and I was against the back wall
facing the drummer's side/back. So we made a little triangle in half
the room and the drummer played to the other half of the room. I put
some foam panels around the drumkit to tame some of the cymbal sound in
my half of the room. still, most of the drum sound you hear in the
recording is coming from my guitar mic, but the oktava on the snare at
least gives a little definition. and the kick mic is useful. Very
little drum sound in the bass mic. guitar mic into RNP, the rest of
the mics into Macki onyx, then all through maudio fw1814 into pro
tools. Lexicon hardware reverb on a plate setting with a pretty long
predelay. a little compression on everything and just some mild eq.
That's about it. What am I doing wrong and what am I doing right?
here's the clips:

www.natenajar.com/mp3/opato.mp3
www.natenajar.com/mp3/jitterbug.mp3

thanks!

Nate

thanks! There is no reverb on the bass- or drums (but you hear a lot
of room with drums). I'm trying to use the reverb on the guitar to
hide the early reflections. As for the panning, my ideal panning is
guitar center and bass and drums opposite each other on left and right.
The problem here is that the drums get so much into the guitar mic
that I really get drums center too.

Nate

In article .com writes:

I just uploaded some mp3's of a recording i did last night with my
trio. I would appreciate any constructive criticism.

I listened to Jitterbug Waltz, not the other one. I liked the playing
a lot - you definitely have the Charlie Byrd spirit and a lot of the
sound. I thought the guitar was just a little crisp for my taste, but
then I haven't listened to Charlie since I was in college and that's
been a long time. I would have liked to hear what the drums sounded
like without the mic on the snare. The brushes seemed to be taking
over to the point where they were distracting. The cymbals were just
about right. I didn't notice the kick at all, but then I didn't expect
it to be very prominent.

The bass sounded nice on the Minimus 7 speakers that I have in the
computer room, but tended to be too full and "bloomy" when listening
on speakers that had some low end. I'd try to tighten that up some.

Pretty good job overall. I think you could fix it in the mix, and
maybe you have and the real thing sounds better than the MP3 through
my junky sound card. The overexaggerated snare is something that could
be an MP3 thing.


--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me he double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

I had another listen... yeah, okay, I was wrong about the reverb on the
bass... but there's something on it. It's not clean. Maybe the bass is
leaking into other mics.

Incidentally, I put opato into Sound Forge to relisten... I noticed that the
levels were really low. It was normalized, but there were only a couple of
peaks losing you a good 6dB or more. I know its not what you'd call a
"heavy track", but I struggled with the volume. I tried using Wave Hammer on
it - a volume maximizer. Set with a threshold of -7dB, I was able to boost
the overall level significantly without any noticeable artifacts of
compression. Jitterbug didn't need as much of a boost, but could use less
of the same...

Sounds even better on second listen by the way. Really like the composition
and the playing is exceptional.


R.

"Nate Najar" wrote in message
oups.com...
thanks! There is no reverb on the bass- or drums (but you hear a lot
of room with drums). I'm trying to use the reverb on the guitar to
hide the early reflections. As for the panning, my ideal panning is
guitar center and bass and drums opposite each other on left and right.
The problem here is that the drums get so much into the guitar mic
that I really get drums center too.

Nate

Nate Najar wrote:
snip

Well Nate, after listening to your tunes a couple of times, the first
thing that stands out is the musicianship. I think everyone here will
agree that the key to getting a good recording is starting with good
musicians and tone, and you've definately got that. So A+++!

Anyhow, as far as the technical aspects. I think you're pretty close.
Play with the EQ a little more, go easy on the panning and consider
using some drum OH's to pick up a good stereo field of the entire room,
so you don't have to fake one by hard-panning and reverbing close miced
instruments. I'd use your MK012's for this. If phase becomes a problem,
try moving the mics or the instruments around.

I think you're in a balancing act between an overproduced iso-booth
sound and a natural, room ambience jazz sound. If you can make the two
play together a little better I think you'll be there. I'm not sure what
type of room you're recording in or what type of sound you're going for,
but if it's a good sounding room, you might consider letting some of the
natural reverb through to bring everything together and make it sound
more cohesive and natural. Anyhow, just my 2 pennies.

Jonny Durango

Wow Nate, great job. Stan Getz fan? Your guitar sounds exactly like his
stuff. I think playing with the EQ on the bass sound is in order (maybe
attenuate the low). It seems inconsistent--I only listened to the first one
btw.

I love it though, you're doing lots more good than bad!

thanks- yeah it seems the bass is a little boomy so i'll try to tighten
that up. I'll see what I can do about the brushes on the drums too!
The problem is the majority of the drums you hear are coming from the
guitar mic!

Nate

In article . com writes:

thanks- yeah it seems the bass is a little boomy so i'll try to tighten
that up. I'll see what I can do about the brushes on the drums too!
The problem is the majority of the drums you hear are coming from the
guitar mic!

That's where the studio compromises come in. You just have to move
people around. Maybe a couple of gobos in front of the drummer or in
front of you would help.

You probably don't want to get the drummer so far away that he needs
headphones, but remember, if you can hear the drums, so can your mic.
Leakage is just one of those things that goes along with jazz
recording since the players don't usually like to be isolated. You
just have to make it tolerable, and then get to enjoy the ambience
that it creates.



--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me he double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Thanks for sharing with us Nate. I enjoyed listening very much

It sounds like you just need to get further away from the drums with your
guitar mic and take advantage of the unidirectional capability of your
mike ie.. make sure it is pointing away from the drums, but I'm sure you
know that already
Despite the technical troubles, as a listener the recordings are great.
Nice work!

--
Jafar Calley
Producer - http://moonlife-records.com
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