yesterday: lecture with Jim Anderson

[PlugHead]

Last night, a few folks and I had the pleasure of attending a lecture by AES president, and renowned recording engineer, Jim Anderson.

Jim talked a lot about various sessions in a couple of the 'major' studios in NYC (Clinton/Avatar) and had extensive notes and screen shots of tracksheets/room blueprints/musician layout/gear choices/etc. from many notable jazz sessions with players/sessions such as J.J. Johnson, Marvin 'Smitty' Smith, Patricia Barber, Joe Henderson and many others.

A few things that stand out, and that I'd never thought of till Jim mentioned: recording kick drum and acoustic bass in stereo. Although the lecture room was an inadequate monitoring environment, he played a bunch of examples, and I was totally intrigued. IIRC, most of the stereo kick was miced with the Sanken CMS-2, but 'Smitty' Smith's was done with the Beyer Opus Boundary mics on either side, with an M88 in front/centre. Bass (most often) was done X/Y stereo with a USM69 (and a DI signal).

Has anyone else experimented with stereo micing of kick and/or esp. of bass? When dealing with kick in stereo, and esp. without having it blanketed/baffled, how would this affect the overhead sound, esp. regarding phase/comb filtering, and would you want to flip phase between stereo on the bottom mics facing up towards the kit, and the overhead mics facing down?

thx,

[PlugHead]

bump...

No one here EVER record kick or bass in stereo?

I only know of one other person (that being Bruce Swedien) for tracking 'everything' in stereo.

hello? anybody?

[springer]

Man - I would think you REALLY have to have your act together (a la Jim Anderson) to even try placing stereo bass into the spectrum of a group scheme.
I do all location stuff so I am down to most every instrument in mono and getting better sounds all the time with FEWER mics. I did mono drums the other night (single OH) and it sounds much more cohesive than the 2 OHs and kick I had been using.
I still do stereo piano but I spread that wide L-R. I cannot imagine how I would do stereo bass... might be a hoot tho! I think I will try it - definitely XY.

[PlugHead]

Originally Posted by springer

Man - I would think you REALLY have to have your act together (a la Jim Anderson) to even try placing stereo bass into the spectrum of a group scheme.
I do all location stuff so I am down to most every instrument in mono and getting better sounds all the time with FEWER mics. I did mono drums the other night (single OH) and it sounds much more cohesive than the 2 OHs and kick I had been using.
I still do stereo piano but I spread that wide L-R. I cannot imagine how I would do stereo bass... might be a hoot tho! I think I will try it - definitely XY.

This echoes my experiences too: IME, well placed (panned) mono signals tend to leave space in a mix, where things thrown out to the far fringes of L & R often paint the picture as washy and unfocussed.

However, Jim also alluded to placing stereo tracks in a well balanced array/position - i.e. piano panned low (L) to high (R) with vibes panned opposite, elec. guitar recorded stereo, but panned about 50/50 so as not to be thrown too far, kit recorded from players perspective (R is high to low on L) - this way, in his feeling/explanation, there is not a lot of freq. overlap between the instruments and where they are placed in the stereo field...

However, I did not get to ask him about phase problems with a stereo kick (I did get him to answer that he does NOT baffle the kick/kick tunnel etc.) in relation to overheads - I'd think that to be a nightmare with phase BS, yet - for bass, I can totally see X/Y being plausible, moreso if we are talking "jazz" or chamber style - where there is enough room, and not the need for full onslaught/zero dynamic/full scale audio from start to finish.

[ajfarber]

Originally Posted by springer

I still do stereo piano but I spread that wide L-R. .

Why would yo do this?

[springer]

Spreading the piano simply sounds better to me. Surprisingly I still hear the source on the left as it lay in the original field even tho it is panned so widely.
I have tried many degrees of pan and this is just what sounds good to my ears...
On the other hand it drives me POSTAL to hear wide panned drums. Go figure...

[PlugHead]

Another point of interest: there were a couple of sessions done 16 or 24 track/2" tape, and others done w PT - absolute NIGHT and DAY difference in sound - even listening on the crappy ref. monitors in the lecture room. Somehow tape just suits the jazz genre - it automatically sounds 'period'. There's no stridency in the high end, and the bass is almost never too boomy and out of control. Drums just sound 'right' and piano sounds authentic, not 'plastic'. I could go on and on about how horns sound, but suffice to say, tape rules!

I wish I had 16 GOOD channels of tape: I have to suffice with 4, and with that little, it's never worth the hassle. In my prev. place, we mixed to 1/2" (ATR-102), and even tho a lot of people poo-poo the advantages, I can always hear the difference...

[Remoteness]

Originally Posted by PlugHead

bump...

No one here EVER record kick or bass in stereo?

I only know of one other person (that being Bruce Swedien) for tracking 'everything' in stereo.

hello? anybody?

This sounds inviting.

Originally Posted by springer

Spreading the piano simply sounds better to me. Surprisingly I still hear the source on the left as it lay in the original field even tho it is panned so widely.
I have tried many degrees of pan and this is just what sounds good to my ears...
On the other hand it drives me POSTAL to hear wide panned drums. Go figure...

I've noticed that some pianos don't have the best mono compatibility when panned hard left/right.

[PlugHead]

Originally Posted by Remoteness

This sounds inviting.

What?

I'm asking - does anybody have experience recording kick and/or acoustic bass in stereo?

Days go by and no one responds - it was my way of bumping the thread - does it offend you Steve?

If so, sorry - just trying to get some responses is like pulling teeth around here...

[Remoteness]

What are you talking about Jay?
The is the "Remote Possibilities..." forum; we do our best to play nice around here.

The concept of recording an upright bass or bass drum in stereo sounds inviting to me.
That means, I would like to try it some day.

I'm sorry if my statement offended you!

Originally Posted by PlugHead

What?

I'm asking - does anybody have experience recording kick and/or acoustic bass in stereo?

Days go by and no one responds - it was my way of bumping the thread - does it offend you Steve?

If so, sorry - just trying to get some responses is like pulling teeth around here...

[PlugHead]

Originally Posted by Remoteness

What are you talking about Jay?
The is the "Remote Possibilities..." forum; we do our best to play nice around here.

The concept of recording an upright bass or bass drum in stereo sounds inviting to me.
That means, I would like to try it some day.

I'm sorry if my statement offended you!

Politeness abounds in this forum - works for me!

Thanks for your sincerity Steve! thumbsup

Now - back to the topic!!!

I've been wanting to track upright bass is stereo since this lecture with Jim, but no sessions with it for another week +...

My biggest concern with stereo recording any player is their inherent nature to move around, and thus disturb the stereo image. With kick being static placement, I wouldn't hesitate to try it, tho mostly would concern myself about phase coherency WRT overhead mics. I also worry that any image created by the stereo kick might be eaten by wanting overhead image to be as important mix-wise, and how is the phase with downward facing capsules, and upward facing capsules - but - this is speculation without putting it to the test...

Time to get out the mics and do a drum test - luckily, I think I have a guinea pig for that...

[Mike Derrick]

Originally Posted by PlugHead

What?

I'm asking - does anybody have experience recording kick and/or acoustic bass in stereo?

Days go by and no one responds - it was my way of bumping the thread - does it offend you Steve?

If so, sorry - just trying to get some responses is like pulling teeth around here...

I think you might be reacting outta context. It might feel like pulling teeth but I'd wager the amount of folks here at GS that happen upon the Remote Poss Forum that might be stereo micing a bass drum are slim to none,...so the fact that you even got responses should be a bonus not a drag, imho.

Interesting idea, glad ya posted it, I might have to give it a whirl, but personally I don't get a lot of situations to have time to mess around with stereo micing a bass drum in recording sessions, nevermind live/remote. I'd assume most folks are in a similar situation as me.

[grrrayson]

I just randomly came upon this thread–I got to hit record on the last two Patricia Barber records assisting Jim. It was a pleasure and a great learning experience.

I've maybe recorded stereo room mics on an upright bass or a tympani or a concert bass drum. If I had a stereo mic such as a Neumann SM69 I'd certainly mic bass instruments in stereo more often. Two main thoughts come to mind here:

1. The mics we use for these things often don't come in stereo. What's the likelyhood of having a spare matching Fet47? Or even a third, since I'd probably want to use the second one on bass rather than kick?

2. If someone were going to use something like a D112, would they even want to use that sound in "stereo"? (I generally don't like D112s anyway, but that's a different topic...)


Another consideration is that when you mic the kick drum in stereo, it usually works best with a very purist image of the entire drumkit that places the snare realistically a bit to the (drummer's) left. That works excellently for an acoustic/audiophile type of thing, but in some kinds of music or in some stereo panoramas that placement for the snare drum in the stereo field might be less desirable.


I have to say this aspect of working with Jim was really epiphanic. I'm reminded of my thoughts in response to the trend of people using increasingly smaller bass drums and then wanting their drums to sound big: get a bigger drum. Similarly, if you want your bass sound to sound bigger in a stereo mix–record it in stereo. It makes a lot of sense. I'd love to be able to do it more often.


Be well.

Grayson


P.S. One of my favorite moments from the sessions: In addition to the X/Y stereo Sanken mic, Jim said, "Go ahead and throw a 57 on the bass."

Me, slightly confused: "An SM57?"

"Yes."

"A Shure SM57?"

"Yeah."

Audiophile indeed!

That's actually one of my favorite upright sounds ever–it's particularly featured in a really bare way on Patricia Barber's track "Morpheus", where there are no drums and the bass is just playing half notes on the 2 and 4 throughout almost the entire song.

[PlugHead]

Originally Posted by grrrayson

I just randomly came upon this thread–I got to hit record on the last two Patricia Barber records assisting Jim. It was a pleasure and a great learning experience.

I've maybe recorded stereo room mics on an upright bass or a tympani or a concert bass drum. If I had a stereo mic such as a Neumann SM69 I'd certainly mic bass instruments in stereo more often. Two main thoughts come to mind here:

1. The mics we use for these things often don't come in stereo. What's the likelyhood of having a spare matching Fet47? Or even a third, since I'd probably want to use the second one on bass rather than kick?

2. If someone were going to use something like a D112, would they even want to use that sound in "stereo"? (I generally don't like D112s anyway, but that's a different topic...)


Another consideration is that when you mic the kick drum in stereo, it usually works best with a very purist image of the entire drumkit that places the snare realistically a bit to the (drummer's) left. That works excellently for an acoustic/audiophile type of thing, but in some kinds of music or in some stereo panoramas that placement for the snare drum in the stereo field might be less desirable.


I have to say this aspect of working with Jim was really epiphanic. I'm reminded of my thoughts in response to the trend of people using increasingly smaller bass drums and then wanting their drums to sound big: get a bigger drum. Similarly, if you want your bass sound to sound bigger in a stereo mix–record it in stereo. It makes a lot of sense. I'd love to be able to do it more often.


Be well.

Grayson


P.S. One of my favorite moments from the sessions: In addition to the X/Y stereo Sanken mic, Jim said, "Go ahead and throw a 57 on the bass."

Me, slightly confused: "An SM57?"

"Yes."

"A Shure SM57?"

"Yeah."

Audiophile indeed!

That's actually one of my favorite upright sounds ever–it's particularly featured in a really bare way on Patricia Barber's track "Morpheus", where there are no drums and the bass is just playing half notes on the 2 and 4 throughout almost the entire song.

Thanks so much for chiming in Grayson: I would imagine it to be a delight to be there with Jim on a project.

I've had very little time to experiment with stereo kick, but have tried it with bass (SM69) and I do like it! In X/Y, placement is crucial to getting the sound/stereo spread one might want.

I recall the master, Bruce Swedien, writing about his technique he calls the Acusonic Recording Process:
Acusonic Recording Process - Bruce Swedien

I gather this is a concentrated effort to achieve the same effect as Jim had alluded to in his lecture, just using this stereo technique for EVERYTHING! Man, what a track count they must've racked up!

BTW - I recall Jim mentioning the SM57 on the bass (Ron Carter) and I was floored as well - 3 mics on a bass, and a line-out too. As well he mentioned the 'home-made chamber' in the stairwell of the studio there in Chicago during the Patricia Barber recording.

Again, thx for your anecdotes! thumbsup

[PlugHead]

Originally Posted by Mike Derrick

I think you might be reacting outta context. It might feel like pulling teeth but I'd wager the amount of folks here at GS that happen upon the Remote Poss Forum that might be stereo micing a bass drum are slim to none,...so the fact that you even got responses should be a bonus not a drag, imho.

Interesting idea, glad ya posted it, I might have to give it a whirl, but personally I don't get a lot of situations to have time to mess around with stereo micing a bass drum in recording sessions, nevermind live/remote. I'd assume most folks are in a similar situation as me.

Yep, I understand that Mike - just canvassing the troops to see if Jim was alone in this quest. WRT to anyone actually doing this, a simple 'no' could suffice for an answer too!
Experimenting on the client's dime during a session is pretty much non-existent IME, but - there are SOME folks who have a bit more flex where clients aren't watching the clock every minute of the session - I'd like to find out more re: this technique, and if people are using it...

cheers,

[big country]

I was once in search of the perfect acoustic shadow
after building a couple different styles of binaural
I quickly learned there is more that needs to be discovered

mostly micing from a distance in reverberant spaces
ultimate acoustic game of pool
without pretty dots on the rail bumbers

some times it sounds better for sound to grow then capture it

inside decca is great tool for this

[Dave Ferris]

For jazz piano recording, solo or trio, you can't do much better than Jim Anderson. What I wouldn't give to have someone like him or Mike Marciano at Systems Two in Brooklyn record my next record. These guys just know the music, they know what the stuff supposed to sound like.