Seeking a fresh approach for upcoming jazz session

[Brad McGowan]

I was going to put the bass in an iso room so maybe the 77DX will work well. Which pattern did you end up selecting? Figure 8?

Brad

[henryrobinett]

It's just fig 8, isn't it?

[nnajar]

I did a quartet record at Clinton studio B about 6 years ago and it came out great. easiest mix I ever did- it's just a gorilla, static fader mix with light limiting on the 2mix. I don't play electric guitar though- I play a classical guitar. I was light on budget, and back then they were charging quite a bit extra for PT and an operator, so I just did 8 track to Da88 (internal converters too!) because I used to have a Da78 here so i could easily dump it into my computer.

the drummer went in the booth. it was one of those big plywood drum enclosure things you see in a lot of NY studios. It had a plexiglass top half and a roof. drums got a c24 on top, 421 on snare and re20 on the bass drum. This was submixed to 2 tracks.

c24 on the vibes. m49 on the bass and schoeps mk41 on the guitar. the vibes, me (guitar) and bass player set up in a little circle. good headphone mix and hit record. we had 10 tunes in a few hours.

it's called "swinging with the nate najar quartet". it's out of print but available on itunes.

[Brad McGowan]

Originally Posted by henryrobinett

It's just fig 8, isn't it?

Nope, the 77DX can do anything between omni and figure-8. And it has three low cut positions as well. It's a pretty awesome mic.

RCA Type 77-DX

Brad

[nnajar]

Originally Posted by Brad McGowan

Nope, the 77DX can do anything between omni and figure-8. And it has three low cut positions as well. It's a pretty awesome mic.

RCA Type 77-DX

Brad

if you use the rca 77 on the bass, I'd keep it away from the f hole. I like it as close as you can get it to the strings without interfering with the player, halfway between the bridge and the fingerboard. so that's usually 8-12 inches out. if he's in iso, try omni. but fig 8 is great too.

N

[Sean Sullivan]

I like figure 8 for the 77, around the bridge, usually a few inches above it and out 6 to 12 inches, depending on the bass. Some move more air than others!

If you want to get fancy, place a condenser a little above the players picking fingers to get that snap from their calluses. That will help it cut through the mix, but can sometimes be a little noisy.

[scott petito]

on Mainieri's Vibes We tend to like them about 2 to 3 feet above the instrument.. the issue is if we get too high with a spaced pair we need more distance between them for phase so play with that... I usually use LDC like 67's or last time Gefell um70's which I really liked but small caps can work too

he has a rather involved KK pickup system which I do take but usually only add a tiny bit in .... on the electric tracks

if you are interested in how this sound look for Limage on itunes.. its a group with Tony Levin, Mike Mainieri, Steve Gadd, Warren Bernhardt and David Spinozza the first album we did is out the one we just did I'm mixing now...

cheers
Scott

for jazz use the 67 on the Bass

[Brad McGowan]

Hey guys,

Yesterday we tracked 11 songs. I have some pics and some video I shot with my iPhone. I'll try to get it uploaded to the thread sometime in the next day or so.

Here's what I ended up doing...

Drums - pair of modded ACM1200's in Glyn Johns --> True PT2's
Kick - EV RE38 --> True P-Solo "dynamic" prototype
Snare - CAD M179 (hypercardioid, lo-cut, pad) --> modded D&R Vision
Bass - UM70S (cardioid) --> modded D&R Vision --> 10:1 compression (1 dB max)
Guitar - R121 --> 10dB pad --> Pacifica
Vibes - MC012 (hypercardioid) --> modded D&R Vision

Drums, guitar, and vibes were placed in the live room with no gobos. There was lots of bleed. The vibe mics pretty much picked up everything, but it didn't matter since it all sounded good. We started with the cardioid caps on the Oktavas and then switched to the hypercardioids to minimize bleed. The bass went in my iso booth. We put absorber panels on the wall directly behind the mic. Due to the room dimensions there was a little boominess in the low end, but the bassist didn't seem to mind. I definitely found that having the mic closer to the bass sounded best (~12 in.). I initially tried the 77DX, but the tone was a little too vintage and rounded for the player's taste. When we switched to the UM70 and he heard playback, he was pretty ecstatic. That's usually a good sign you've chosen the right mic. Since we were tracking to tape I decided after listening back to few takes to add a little high shelf EQ at 8-10k on the drum overhead mics to enhance the sparkle a little bit. I think that was the only EQ I used on anything. The M179 I had on snare was surprisingly good. I placed it in my usual spot at rim height peaking across the head of the snare, but pulled it back to about 4 inches off the rim to capture more shell tone. That mic picked up lots of brush detail as well as snare rattle. When blended with the overhead mics it added just the right focus needed.

As I mentioned earlier in the thread I was planning to track to both Radar and tape, which I did. At this point, I'm not sure what I'm going to mix from. The two mediums gave very different impressions of the recorded event. The Radar sounded great--the clarity and extension/air on the top end gave the whole recording a nice polish. Everything was all there and could easily be heard. While listening to the Radar playback at the end of the day, I thought "this is a nice studio recording". The tape however, was much thicker in the low end, and had a silky smoothness in the top end that was especially evident on the cymbals (hence my desire to add some EQ boost). There was a better impression of depth and space around the instruments, and I could hear into the room better. I felt like the energy and rawness of the performance was better represented by the tape recording. Instead of listening to a studio recording of live band that I felt I was watching through the glass, I felt like I was reliving the live performance with the band in the same room. It felt a little more uncontrolled for lack of a better description. It made the Radar reproduction seem "tame" in comparison. The bass, drums, and guitar definitely sounded more musical to me in terms of impact and tone. The only thing I didn't like from the tape was the hiss, and the lack of high end transient detail compared to the Radar playback.

When I return to the studio later this afternoon I may have to do a mix from each medium and see what the band likes more. At this point I'm thinking that if I mix from the tape multitrack then I will likely mix to Radar. Conversely if I decide to mix from Radar, then I will mix down to the Studer.

Stay tuned,
Brad

p.s. This is the first time I have used transformerless console preamps to make a recording in ages. To be completely honest, I didn't feel like I was missing much by not using all my API-style preamps with tranformers. I actually said to my friend "if I sold off all of my outboard preamps but a Pacifica, life would be just fine."

[Brad McGowan]

Some pics from the control room....

[Brad McGowan]

I learned yesterday that you need to turn the iPhone4 sideways to capture the correct aspect ratio. Doh!

Can someone please tell me how to get the videos embedded into the post? I can't figure it out. Here are the URLs:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPhBIs6Wnbk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BbGoFyUvhI


thanks,
Brad

[Brad McGowan]

The album is mastered and available on Band Camp if anyone is interested in hearing the results.

Park St. Trio

Thanks for everyone's help. It was a fun project.

Brad

[hughbob]

how about one omni LDC mic in a prime spot in the room then adjust the position of the musicians around it. i recorded an unamplified acoustic band in a cave that way and it came out nicely.

[hughbob]

or how about one mic in figure 8?

[bee]

Originally Posted by Brad McGowan

The album is mastered and available on Band Camp if anyone is interested in hearing the results.

Park St. Trio

Thanks for everyone's help. It was a fun project.

Brad

Sweet! Thanks for sharing!

[Remoteness]

Originally Posted by henryrobinett

Absolutely. Listen to a lot of the great CURRENT jazz recordings. Kinda Blue was fantastic, but that was 1958.
Plus sorry to say engineers, the reason that recording was great was not just Rudy Van Gelder, but mainly because of Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderly, Bill Evans, Paul Chambers and Jimmy Cobb, and let's not forget Wynton Kelly!

But most of the great CURRENT jazz recording do use some close micing techniques. Steve Remote AWAYS close mic's everything if I remember correctly. Even live. You don't have to use them al. But most of the current recordings just sound great. Definition.

I choose to use my (virtual gobo) close mic'ing techniques, but the mics aren't always as close as you may think, especially on the drum kit and such.

And, during the final mix stage, I tend to blend the room mics into the mix at about 30% to 40%.