Total separation on cymbals - piezos or what?

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okovoko

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Is it possible to get absolute separation on hihats?

I have tried contact mics, of course kills resonance if attached, and not a good signal beneath bell (of lower hihat).

There is Zildjian's Gen16 method - cymbal full of holes where a type of piezo can be attached through (but these are shrill tinny hats).

Are there any other ways known to get an absolutely clean cymbal sound? Without possible spill from other live instrumentation?
 
What are you trying to achieve by getting total isolation for the cymbals?
If it's a full live drum kit being played then the relative volumes of each cymbal and the dynamics of the playing are part of the drummers style - it seems a bit like asking if there is a way to isolate each string of a guitar...
 
As I once heard it described..."Track the skin, then track the tin".

I don't like doing it myself...I'm a hard hitter and I have to hit something with my right hand...usually that's my right leg...get's painful after about the third take.

But I had read about it somewhere and decided to try it myself...the results didn't justify the effort in my opinion.

Mechanically, it's not that tough to play. As mentioned, I was typically doing an eighth-note high-hat pattern with a light stick on my leg on the "skin" pass. For the "tin" pass, I'd do the snare hits on my left leg...light stick again...a piece of foam will let you do a "noiseless" bass drum on the floor.

Since you're not having to deal with using nulls to achieve isolation, you just turn the mics so you're nulling out the sound of hitting your leg.

But the key is to have the illusion of playing a full kit on both passes...it's tough to just sit there and do a hi-hat pattern and hit crashes without having the "body context" of playing a full kit.

I'm tired so I hope I explained that well enough...

But like I said, I really didn't find it worth the effort...
 
If it's that important to have total separation...use a drum sample app...like Slate Drums or Superior Drummer, etc.

Just create what you want. Make tracks with just the drums, then do the cymbals after wards...whatever...
...but I agree with everyone else, some bleed is what makes a kit, sound like a kit, be it recording a live drum set or using a drum sample app.
When you isolate each drum/cymbal...it would be like playing guitar chords, but recording each string by itself without any bleed form the other strings...then putting it together afterwards. Just ain't gonna be normal sounding.
 
Its for processing using Max/msp, in a live free jazz situation. The cymbal resonances are driving a processing chain.
 
okovoko said:
Are there any other ways known to get an absolutely clean cymbal sound? Without possible spill from other live instrumentation?
Click to expand...

Yeah it's very easy.
1) Use very good cymbals
2) Record the drummer separately in a very good room
3) Use the right mic placement
4) Use a drummer that can play
 
It is not like trying to separate each string. An electric guitar can plug in, that way it avoids picking up other instruments. That is what I am trying to achieve. And yes I have used electric drums, triggers, etc. The natural resonance of a cymbal played live is another matter altogether.
In the studio this is a non-issue of course. It is for live performance
 
You'd be much better off using drum triggers (either midi triggers attached to the drums, or using a gate to drive a trigger off the cymbals) and trigger what you need in MAX.
There is no readily available and technically ideal solution for this.

I'd close mic the cymbals, create a bandpass/highpass filter and expander sub-patch to create your trigger, pass the audio from the cymbal close mics through that then use it to run whatever you need.

If you're purely driving a processing chain and not doing anything else, than I think close mic+filter wouldnt be sufficient. If you're triggering or actually trying to get a listenable result then it's a different matter.

It normally helps to give context to a question when asking it, that way people don't get the wrong end of the stick.
 
dreib said:
Sample your cymbals , then trigger them?
Click to expand...

That's probably the best idea, quick switching between roundrobin sets for differing strength/length, using that to drive the processing. Thanks for it.

At least then the cymbals being played & the processing characteristics compare. Will see how it goes, preferable to a drilled cym.

May need to build an intelligent sample selection brain for msp, patch listens to the drummers playing characteristic and selects suitable matching sample.
 
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Jake_JW said:
If you're purely driving a processing chain and not doing anything else, than I think close mic+filter wouldnt be sufficient

It normally helps to give context to a question when asking it, that way people don't get the wrong end of the stick.
Click to expand...

1. You're right, it isn't.
2. I did, here https://homerecording.com/bbs/equipment-forums/microphones/advice-please-close-direct-cymbal-mic-379373/ and there was barely any response, either too much blurb or people struggle to think outside their boxes and go quiet, so I put it more succinctly. And found the responses useful, Greg_L and dreib basically summed up what I was thinking. But I had hoped there was something I hadnt thought or heard of.
 
Max is quite specialist - I don't see a lot of talk about it on this forum, but from memory the max forums focus on the coding side of things quite heavily rather than the practical applications.

Still, I wish you luck! I havent played with Max for a few years (stopped when they tied it to Live and got rid of the ability to compile as a vst) but it was always mega interesting!
 
Yes its a shame pluggo has gone, things get obsolete so fast in the software realm. But there's also much floating around on the web these days it seems easy to cobble something practical together out of bits of other patches then refine it.
Having picked it up again recently I've found max is more stable and easier on the cpu demand, its usually possible to run some useful things alongside a live rig, but perhaps not an ideal solution for the purists in sound+performance
 
okovoko said:
That's probably the best idea, quick switching between roundrobin sets for differing strength/length, using that to drive the processing. Thanks for it.

At least then the cymbals being played & the processing characteristics compare. Will see how it goes, preferable to a drilled cym.

May need to build an intelligent sample selection brain for msp, patch listens to the drummers playing characteristic and selects suitable matching sample.
Click to expand...

It might be a bit of faffing about but you should be able to rig up a piezo for velocity and some kind of pot or sensor for pedal position.
I don't know how much you're prepared to put into this or how feasible it is, but that'd allow you to sample a hihat with variable velocity and open/close position which isn't going to be as good as the real thing, but it should be responsive enough.

Max is sooo versatile it's unreal. If you can get the hardware side of it set up (two readings from 0-126) and you're struggling with the software to interpret that, I could probably help.
I'm rusty, but my brain always just 'clicked' with max.

The option to wrap into VST is long gone as you guys say, but you can build a standalone app with midi and audio IO.

You might not even need to use Max at all, if you have drum software that'll react to these midi triggers.
 
Thanks for detailing the piezo/pot rig, that sounds good yes, if can get the separation of a few mm into a blunt midi message. The whole thing is faffing but needs to be done. Thanks for all the ideas
 
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Someone in this thread asked, "why is this isolation needed in a live situation" and I did not see an answer. Please, what is the purpose for doing this?
 
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