Recording live shows? How do you do it?

[BobSchwenkler]

I have never done any recording of live shows with quality sound as my first goal. More just quick and easy recordings more for fun than anything else.

I have thought about what I would do when recording a show to try to get the best sound, but all I can think about is how compromised everything would be if just using splits of the dynamic mics usually found at venues.

How do you all work? Do you bring your own condensers and set them up along side the house mics? Set up condensers and split those to the house and to your rig? Just use splits of the house mics? Combinations of these things? I am curious to hear what people do to get the best recording they can in such situations.

[henryrobinett]

I'm no pro. But I record my jazz groups and others when the mood gets me. I bring my ondensors and even ribbons. I have a small crew to help so I can actually play.

I bring a powerbook, two Metric Halo boxes - one 2882 and a ULN-2. I have a motu 2408mkII that I get extra channels via adat optical. With the metric halo boxes I can split the signal, so the mic come to me and I send them to FOH. Obviously it's a guy I work with who knows it works well this way. I also bring in the Millenia pres - 13 channels of them. It helps!

But the quality is great. Up to 18 mics/channels.

[twotracker]

Here's how I did my last one which had the best results.

Stereo pair of gefell 940s on front stage to pick up an image of the band and some (but not too much) audience.

Spot: lead vocal taken from a submix of the soundboard, if I couldn't do that then I would have set a Schoeps close just behind the vocal mic. I'd rather stay independent of the soundboard, but I also want a good clean vocal.

Spot: lead guitar amp mic'd with an RE-20


The gefells use a Pendulum Pre (i need that low cut to tame the bass) and Zaolla cable then they all go through an API 3124MB+ mixed to Reel to Reel.

I'm trying to avoid the house mix and get a stereo image of the band.
Getting a good vocal seems key to me.


I also had good results with just a Schoeps M/S behind the lead vocal mic, although the singer's acoustic would sometimes bump the mic bar, not fun.


These bands aren't earplug loud RnR.

I doubt if this is the best way, just something I'm playing with.

[BobSchwenkler]

Twotracker,

Did the amp you had the RE20 on also have a separate house mic on it?

I guess one thing I am wondering is if it is common for anyone to set up a whole separate set of their mics in addition to the house mics? Especially if the house mics are all just SM58s or something?

[Jim vanBergen]

I take an isolated split of EVERY mic, AND put up my own wherever possible, in addition to room or audience mics.

[twotracker]

Originally Posted by BobSchwenkler

Twotracker,

Did the amp you had the RE20 on also have a separate house mic on it?

I guess one thing I am wondering is if it is common for anyone to set up a whole separate set of their mics in addition to the house mics? Especially if the house mics are all just SM58s or something?

It did have a house mic on it too. I don't know how common it is to mic everything separate, I'd rather trust my own mics and cables. And I don't set up that much, only 4 channels.

I'm going to record the lead singer this weekend who's playing solo without the drums and bass. But I'm still going to set up 4 mics and maybe bring a 4-track R2R this time.

[audioez]

Originally Posted by BobSchwenkler

I guess one thing I am wondering is if it is common for anyone to set up a whole separate set of their mics in addition to the house mics?

Unless you have your own snake, cables and mics; you'll need to play nice with the house engineers. I'd say it's very uncommon, due to how quick things move in the remote world. If you have the skills to communicate your needs, anything is possible, this is very true!!!

dynamic mics are your friends; the FOH mic pre's are not. I'd look into finding other ways to get acces to the mics. Even if you're taking the directs O/P from the FOH board. A one channel splitter for the vocal mic would make a big dif. especially if you have a neve pre to use.

On a side note I mix a lot of music that never gets multi tracked, just live to air. I found that having a couple of different mic pre amps for the drums, bass, and main vocals makes all the difference, more so than having your condenser of choice on stage.

[stertz]

Has preamps and all - and if you only need stereo in you're all set.
I use mine for rehearsals and small room gigs. Kind of ghetto but really cut and dried.