Recording a choir- need advice!

[T Graham Chester]

Hey,
I'm recording a 50 person choir in the Sacramento area next week. Gear is limited, but I'm wondering if any of you guys can give me some help. We will have- Two Royer 121's
Two Shure KSM 32's
One Shure KSM 44
Only two good mic pre's (Averill 312's), six poorer quality mic pre's.

Any help would be greatly appreciated- this is my first time recording a choir, and something tells me it won't be quite the same as recording a rock band.

Tyler

[SoundsUnreal]

Main thing is to watch your monitor bleed. Try to give them just what they need to perform. The choir will be hearing the band in the house anyway..

[T Graham Chester]

It's not a live event, so the singers will have headphones, and the room should be quiet.

[Testing123]

50 pairs of headphones?

[T Graham Chester]

Ha... sounds ridiculous... but supposedly, yes, 50 pairs of headphones. The guy there said he could do it- I have my doubts.

Any help with Mic setup?

[Ken K]

How about Left, Center, Right with the KSM 44 in the center. Use the good pre on the left & right and what you've got left for the center. Doesn't sound like you have that many gear options.

[hughesmr]

Originally Posted by T Graham Chester

Ha... sounds ridiculous... but supposedly, yes, 50 pairs of headphones. The guy there said he could do it-

Doesn't mean he SHOULD. If this is a cappella, that is completely looney. tutt

[T Graham Chester]

Originally Posted by Ken K

How about Left, Center, Right with the KSM 44 in the center. Use the good pre on the left & right and what you've got left for the center. Doesn't sound like you have that many gear options.

Left, Right with the Royers?

Like I said, I don't think the headphone thing is realistic, so there will probably be a low volume monitor.

[plus6vu]

Originally Posted by hughesmr

Doesn't mean he SHOULD. If this is a cappella, that is completely looney. tutt

I agree, unless he's planning to do punch-ins. I prefer to just re-track and edit myself. However, if you are recording the choir to a background track, that makes sense. Fifty phones isn't tough with the right gear. I have done 90. Did it with a low output FM transmitter. Everyone brought a "walkman" type receiver and phones or earbuds. It worked great.

Psst... Anyone need to rent a transmitter? I've only used it once or twice.

Scott

[MBishopSFX]

The (2) Royer 121s should do just fine with such a small choir. They could be used X/Y, M/S or spaced pair as needed. The ribbons sound great for choir!

For band track playback to the choir, try small Fostex 6301B or similar speakers mounted on mic stands. Place the speakers at ear height and imbed them into the choir with a speaker for every 6 - 10 singers. Run the playback level as low as possible. The limited low-end and volume of the speakers helps with the spill into the mics. I've done this successfully with choirs up to 350 voices in overdubs to orchestra tracks. Headphones were provided for the chorus director only. NO CLICK TRACK into the speakers of course! You're asking for trouble with 50 sets of cans and probably more leakage than the little speakers would present.

[T Graham Chester]

Thanks Mike! That's very helpful.

[hughesmr]

Here are a couple of links to discussions in another forum (hope that's OK) with interesting solutions to the "bleed" problem..

MS / spaced omni and phase cancellation technique - Here's a quick demo of that session. Your demonstration recording of the cancellation is very impressive; all the problematic low frequencies (large wavelengths) are gone, leaving only some of the h

Choir Monitoring - The college I now work for is recording a choir of 20-25 people in its studio. The choir will be singing along to a backing track however, the studio does not have the monitoring outputs to provide separate headphone feeds for each

[mrsteaks]

I might add, acoustics permitting, a suggestion to use the Royers in Blumlein. Those ribbons do a wonderful job on choral, and using them in that array can give great results.

[T Graham Chester]

Wow, Gearslutz is awesome. Thanks guys- I've got some ideas to work with- it's like you are all collectively my Yoda.

[Ken K]

Originally Posted by T Graham Chester

Left, Right with the Royers?

Like I said, I don't think the headphone thing is realistic, so there will probably be a low volume monitor.

Sorry I didn't see you had a pair of Royers. I was thinking of the KSM 32's L&R with the KSM 44 center.

[hughesmr]

Originally Posted by T Graham Chester

Wow, Gearslutz is awesome. Thanks guys- I've got some ideas to work with- it's like you are all collectively my Yoda.

You make good a recording, mmm, and then you a lot of money make. Mmmm.

[Remoteness]

Right on - I'm with Michael on this one.
This approach makes the best sense.

Originally Posted by MBishopSFX

The (2) Royer 121s should do just fine with such a small choir. They could be used X/Y, M/S or spaced pair as needed. The ribbons sound great for choir!

For band track playback to the choir, try small Fostex 6301B or similar speakers mounted on mic stands. Place the speakers at ear height and imbed them into the choir with a speaker for every 6 - 10 singers. Run the playback level as low as possible. The limited low-end and volume of the speakers helps with the spill into the mics. I've done this successfully with choirs up to 350 voices in overdubs to orchestra tracks. Headphones were provided for the chorus director only. NO CLICK TRACK into the speakers of course! You're asking for trouble with 50 sets of cans and probably more leakage than the little speakers would present.