I recently recorded a local youth orchestra and soprano (professional) plus other singers in a concert of light operas by Spanish composer Francisco Alonso.
Venue was an auditorium in my city.
We were allowed to use the house mics, a pair of Schoeps cardio, but were not allowed to move them in any way. They are a stereo pair owned by Spanish National Radio used for their transmissions.
We suplemmented the main pair whith various spot mics for voices on stage, woodwinds, harp, etc.
The problem is that, a really nasty vibration arround 10-15kHz in the soprano's voice, especially when she sings loud.
I thought maybe there was a problem in the main mics, but we had an AKG 414 on stage as spot for the singer and I can hear the same thing in this microphone. It really sounds awful to me, and it seems it is a vibration in the soprano's way of singing that's boosted by the mics. It doesn't sound natural anyhow.
Well, has anybody come around a problem like this and how do you deal with it?
I have recorded voices before (solo soprano, tenor and orchestra, amateur choirs) with Beyer 930s and have not encounterd such an effect.
My present solution is tu use Spectral Cleaning in Samplitude, and EQ...
The recording gear was:
Main mics: Schoeps cardio (can't specify which capsules) hung about 3.5m above conductor, 40cm and angled slightly outwards)
Voice spot: AKG 414TL-II.
A&H ZED R-16 and Samplitude 7 in 48k/32bits float.
Regards.
You can hear the effect in two short samples from:
Main microphone left (Schoeps cardio)
Vocal spot on stage mic (AKG 414TL-II)
I didn't listen.
I have had this experience.. some sopranos sound that way, and the mics pick it up. Stand in front of them while they are singing, and it will sound the same.
try a ribbon mic.
Yep, this is a known problem with young operatic sopranos. Totally freaked me out the first time I heard it; tried to chase the "distortion" down in every piece of my rig.
__________________
Douglas Tourtelot, CAS
Seattle, WA
"Recording sound is merely problem solving. Solve one problem and move on to the next"
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