First Paying Gig-Recording a Choir (lots of questions)

Chip Hitchens

New member
Sorry for the extreme length of this, but I finally got my first paying recording gig! A coworker of mine is a semi-professional singer on the side, and her group has asked me to record an upcoming choral performance.

And now I'm all nervous because I generally operate from the "trust your ears" school of thinking, which is fine when you have relatively infinite time to move mics around and play with settings and retake what didn’t work, but it's tough when you're doing a live show. Plus, I usually record either awful rock/pop music or film sound, and I know nothing about recording a classical-style choir except from what I've learned by searching this forum and the web.

I was hoping that some of you who do this regularly could give me some starting points. I realize that my rig is far from ideal, but this is what I'm planning on using:

Stereo Pair of Oktava MK-012's > dbx 286A's > Yamaha AW16G

Questions:

- XY vs. ORTF. I've read just about every article on the web about these two setups, and no one can tell me which is a "safer" bet. I understand what's involved in each, but don't understand the relative advantages and disadvantages of one over the other. Personally, I'm leaning towards ORTF only because it's physically easier to set up my mics like that on my cheeseball stereo mount, but I'd be willing to do either if there was a good reason to do so. Transfer to mono is probably not a big concern (they are not planning on doing a commercial release) but I would like to get a nice stereo image and I don’t have the time or experience to mess around with AB pairing.

- Mic Position. I've heard that 8-10 ft. behind the conductor and 8-10 ft. up in the air is a good place to start. Does that sound reasonable? (not that I can get 10' out of my stand) Where do I point the mics, regarding their up/down attitude? I'm imagining that if I were looking at the whole arrangement from the side, the mics will be pointing towards the heads of the people on the middle risers, but I've also read that that can cause sibilance problems.

- While going through this in my head, I've occasionally had impulses to set up a spot mic for the soloists or a room mic pointed toward the audience so that I can ride their applause in mixdown. More often, however, I've considered that my mixing skills are not that well developed, and I'm worried about creating some sort of phase anomaly during mixdown. Any thoughts? I guess I can always just scrap the spots if I don’t want them.

- Should I track with compression? My instinct is to record dry, especially since it's classical music and they're not looking to impress their friends by blasting this recording in their lowriders, but I was thinking of recording the main pair to two other tracks with compression, in case the initial levels on my dry tracks are too hot and they start peaking out all over the place.

- Is it suicide to ride the faders while recording? I’m concerned because I have no idea how loud they’re going to be or where I should set my levels so that the loudest stuff is still under the peak. If my gear was immaculate, I wouldn’t be so scared, but having used lots of low end gear in the past, I find that the “dynamic hum” is more of a distraction than the steady hum. Maybe it won’t be such an issue since this gear is actually a big upgrade for me.

- Should I engage my highpass filters? I assume that the vocalists aren't going to get down to 80hz, but I don't know what the standard is.

- Should I use windscreens on the Oktavas? I'll have no control over the HVAC and I don't want any surprises (those Oktavas seem especially sensitive to a little wind) but I've also heard that I can loose highs.

Thanks for any help that you can offer. I've been very clear with the client that this will be something of an experiment for me, but I'd really like to do a good job and get a good recommendation from them.
 
Chip Hitchens said:
- Is it suicide to ride the faders while recording? I’m concerned because I have no idea how loud they’re going to be or where I should set my levels so that the loudest stuff is still under the peak. If my gear was immaculate, I wouldn’t be so scared, but having used lots of low end gear in the past, I find that the “dynamic hum” is more of a distraction than the steady hum. Maybe it won’t be such an issue since this gear is actually a big upgrade for me.

I got to watch a guy do a choir a few weeks ago. They should warm up at the beginning before the actual show, so you can hopefully get a sample level. Just remember when you set that level, drop it down a db or two, because when they're 'really' singing they'll be louder from more excitement and stuff.

Good luck, man. I'd be crapping my drawmers. :)
 
I cant offer any good advice. I've never done that kind of a gig before.

Just here to say good luck!

Later,..
Calwood
 
You'll like ORTF better than XY for that type of distant mic setup, especially so if the room is really good. ORTF will always contain just a tad more phase information and will give you a wider soundstage than any coincident pair can- sometimes, people even think it is too wide. But ultimately, it's down to personal preference, and I always end up going back to the ORTF pair above and behind the director. I've used this for groups from 20 to 150, and it works very well (if the room is good). It's the closest you can get to what the director hears, and he's done the vocal placement on the risers for a very good reason- so that it sounds best right there near his head.

I actually often snug the mics up to as close as 4-5' over the director's head, and 3-4' back for that reason (for the bigger groups). Set them up flat, and don't sweat the sibilants... the 012s really should not annoy you in that manner.

Tell the director not to sing along, by the way... (;-)

Extra mics: if you are recording to multitrack, sure! Having a spot mic for soloists can often be useful- but here you run into the excitement factor in a much greater way than with the chorus itself. I have a Drawmer DL241 in my road rack, and I'll often set it up as a save-my-ass limiter for a solo mic. The chorus will get maybe 6-8dB louder in performance than in the runthrough, which is easily manageable, but soloists can be depended on to go 12-16dB hotter. It's as regular as a clock can tick... If you're going live-to-2, trying to mix in your solo mic will be brutally hard (unless you have a place to monitor _with speakers_ so that you can mix on the fly). Don't worry about an audience mic for this first time out: you'll have a metric shitload of them in the pair anyway. If you can print the solo mic to a separate track and mix in the comfort of your own basement, you'll have a both a nicer experience and result.

Recording at 24 bit resolution (which I hope you're doing) gives you an enormous amount of dynamic range to work with, so I'll usually set up the pair to print at about -6dBFS at absolute tops, and the solo mic at -18dBFS (since I know they're going to honk like mad with bodies in the seats!). With a live crowd, and the room mics back almost to the first row, you'll need to look out for applause intervals crunching you- in which case, you might need to print the chorus mics down at maybe -12, or be ready with a fader move, or use a limiter. Print everything with no compression- you can't undo it. A little limiting just to save the take is fine, as long the goal is to never hit the limiter at all *during normal program material* and use it only as a safety measure. it ain't rock and roll- compression and limiting have no real place in acoustic music _as effects_, IMNSHO.

The joy of this work is that it *is* acoustic music, so there's no need to push right up to OdBFS: use that huge dynamic range to your benefit. Work on the rig before you put in for the show so that you have your noise floor pushed down as far as you possibly can: no ground loops, no signal integrity problems. That way, any hums or crap that show up in the room are known to be an issue with the room, and not your rig. Have your own power distribution setup debugged so that you have only one plug to plug in to house power, for example. This is an absolutely critical step...

I tend not to touch the faders while tracking unless I absolutely have to (excessive audience noise at applause intervals, basically). You can't undo a bad fader move in post- you'll always hear the artifacts. I'm a complete minimalist: I set up so that I have enough headroom to print everything cleanly, and sit back and enjoy the performance with only one eye on the meters. That's where your noise-floor-optimization work pays enormous dividends.

Skip the HPF unless you have ULF noise that gets up onto the meters (bumping up to -60 dBFS with the room empty means you have a problem, since your noise floor is now domiated by the ULF crud!), and skip the windscreens unless you do- the cardioid capsules on the 012s aren't nearly as bitchy about HVAC ULF noise as the omnis. Keep the windscreens handy in your toolbox, though- if you need them, you'll find it out as soon as they open the doors to the room...

I find minimalism to be the key to both sanity and survival in this environment. Get the rig tuned up before you show up, hang your mics, print everything at very conservative levels, and mostly _do no harm_: you just get one shot at this sort of performance. The more workload you give yourself in the room during the show, the greater the likelihood of a missed fader move, a crunch, or a fart that kills an otherwise perfect take. Minimalism rules the day, IMNSHO, but your mileage may vary...

Hope that helps!
 
Just get really drunk beforehand.

Chances are, they're all going to tell you it sounds like crap, because that's what musicians do. :D

So you might as well be good and schnookered while they chew you up a new ass.
 
Oh, come on- someone here has to have more experience than me in doing choral live recording. Come on- this is a very interesting recording problem, and I'm a long way from having the canonical right answer for this question... I'd like to learn more, as well! Who else has done this?

Postulate: there is no single right answer to this question.

What else have other folks done?
 
Hey Skippy, thanks for your detailed response, as well as your request for more points of view.

I'd also be interested in what others have to say, although I think I agree with most of what Skippy has already said.

Follow up questions: I am multitracking, and would like to try to put a mic on the soloist. What would you use? I guess I'll still have to use a SDC, since I don't want the off axis stuff to sound wildly different from what the stereo pair is going to be picking up, right? And when I'm mixing down, should the soloist be in the center or should I pan it to the side to approximate where she physically was in relation to the stereo pair. I guess I can just play with that and see where it sounds best, since I'll have time.

Thanks again.
 
I recently finished recording a choir on location. I used 2 A/T 3528's in a criss-cross behind the conductor and a pair of Samson CO1's at each end just in case, tracked to ADAT. Never used the CO1 tracks. No compression. Did end up with a ton of preamp hiss/room noise. Ran the track through Bias Sound Soap. Although the clients were happy with the end result, I'm trying to figure out why I had to have the gain so high to get a decent signal to tape. Thank God for the "Sound Soap". Good luck. On location, live, can give a major adrenielin rush!
 
Sometimes you just have to get the gain just high..of course not to where you are venturing into the clipping area. The rule of thumb (okay..well maybe my studio recording professors rule of thumb) is to record "above the noise", so basically have that gain up high enough above the noise, so you can get the best recordding, then work the volume down during the final mix. Of course, this was probably a "no duh" post, but hey, i like to feel important sometime ha
 
Do NOT ride the gain during a classical performance, unless you absolutely must to avoid getting totally distorted crap. Classical musicians play a great deal of attention to macro and micro dynamics, and changing the gain drives them nuts. Just set the levels lower. For the same reason, avoid compression, at least at the tracking stage, except as minimally necessary to avoid overloads.

Mic position for a choir performance depends a lot on the room. In a lot of halls, there's a point where the blend tunes in to focus, where you can hear the choir a single instrument, but still easily pick out parts. Frequently 1/4 to 1/2 back in the hall, but can be anywhere (or nowhere in a bad hall). This is often a nice place to set up if you're using cardioids. Might depend on how nice the hall sounds -- if its a rotten or dead hall, then you might be better off micing closer and using judicious articifical reverb, but that wouldn't be my first choice. Or if its a rude audience.

If you have the option, you can always set up TWO stereo pairs, one close and one in the hall and choose the best or mix them together later. My choir recording days were to two track open reel so I've not actually tried it, but I can't see how it would hurt to lay down extra tracks. I've done it with classical piano.

Bring a very tall stand if the choirs is on risers and/or on a stage and you're in the pit or the audience.
 
Up in the air is good if you can - angled properly, reduces crowd noise (*cough*), still gets your source full on.

My only experience is X-Y (MC-012 hypers) and parallel (AXS-4s). Both worked okay. X-Y, if done right, should minimize your phase problems. Wind screen shouldn't hurt on the 012s - but my ears are ruined from years of loud bar gigs, so what do I know? Heh heh.

Are there other instruments with the choir? Pipe Organ? Electronic Organ? Piano? Orchestra? I might handle placement differently depending on the answer - especially if the organ's in a choir loft and the choir's out front.

Seriously, here are two recordings - definitely not a controlled comparison - I'll give you the best descriptions I can:

1) "Sing a New Song" from Canter's Christmas Gloria, Lapeer Concert Choir, Dec. 2001.

parallel Shure AXS-4s on booms, 200-seat carpeted church, choir in front, organ in loft. Mics on battery, through imp converters to VS-840.

2) "Gloria Patri" from Vivaldi's Magnificat, Madonna University Chorale, Dec. 2002.
http://stceciliawashere.blogspot.com/images/
X-Y MC-012 hypers on stands (4-5 ft. elevation), 6-10 ft. behind conductor, 800-seat reverberant church, choir and pipe organ in front. Mics through AudioBuddy to VS-840.
 
I've recorded a college choir several times, and while I didn't get to pick my equipment (I was part of the "Recording Crew"....), we got the best results with about 10 feet from the choir and even with the head of the topmost person in the choir. A very important thing you want to find out beforehand is: will they be using risers? Sometimes choirs won't, and this throws your recording strategy off a little. Personally, I hate to keep messing with the levels during a performance. Being a classical musician myself, messing with levels in recording is destroying a major part of the music. Dynamic expression is a very important part of classical music, and modifying it at all is likely to raise the ire of the director and performers alike. All in all, good luck man!
 
With my choir experience, I would advise...
Keep the signal path as simple as possible. Even if it is just mic- tape. The less dynamic color you add, the better. Just position the mic from what you think is the best placement, and just stick with your intuition. Just leave it be and record. Chances are, it will sound perfect to the people who are buying the cd. My 2:) :)
 
Soloist mic. Hard question. Since it is a live performance with an audience in the room, that cuts down your options a bit- you can't fuck up the sight lines to put a big pop filter in place.... It depends upon how disciplined the solist is, basically.

You can use an 012 with a cardioid capsule, and a decently small windscreen, as long as the vocalist can be made to stay more than maybe 18" off the mic. I've had the best luck with 012s at about 2-3 feet for this, just for what it is worth.

If you need more acoustic separation and therefore have to work more close-mic'd, the AKG C535 is my all-time bang-for-the-buck favorite, especially with female vocalists. I keep 4 of them in the road case at all times: they also kill on Dixieland banjo, and hand bells at Christmas (if you ever have to deal with a bell choir, which I hope to _gawd_ you don't!).

The Neumann KMS150 would also rule in this sort of too-close-for-comfort, live-but-recording application- but it's too rich for my blood, and I have to borrow them to use them. Gotta buy one or two someday.

If you have a difficult male vocalist, maybe a Beyer ribbon: the 160, maybe? They are not too pop-phobic with a reasonably low-profile pop filter, and they aren't shrill or overly midrangey, and they are nice if you have enough clean gain with your preamp.... Shoot, who knows. Bring what you have in the locker!

If you have another 012, go to it first- but the 535 will never let you down, even handheld. And it sounds _remarkably_ good, even on male vocals, unless they are really nasal.... It's an underrated bargain, as long as you can handle the slightly bright top end.

One size definitely does not fit all. Best of luck!
 
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