Micing an upright bass is difficult, I’ve been recording many acoustic (jazz)bands and the upright can be a pain in the ass. I do have a 12 m2 vocal booth and if you can manage the bassplayer to play separated from the rest of the band, all you have to do is put a nice mic with a wide cardioid pattern in front of the instrument and you’re done.
But people hate that and prefer to play with the band in one room. Do you know Norah Jones’ first album ‘Come away with me’? The third song begins with an upright bass and that’s the sound I like, as if the man is standing there in front of you.
Lately I’ve been recording with an acoustic band, guitars, flutes, violin, percussion, bagpipes (loud!!) and upright, a female and very stubbern player. I’ve put a Neumann M149 in fig of 8 in front of the bass and put a couple of gobo’s around her. Asked her to keep a distance of one foot, which she thinks is a yard or so. I’ve asked her five or six times and that must be enough I think.
Yesterday she came and booked a new session with another (klezmer) band and I was thinking about how to record her this time. A mic wrapped in foam seems to be the only way to avoid the bleed of the other instruments to go excessive.
A friend of mine comes to rehearse every now and then with his dixieland band and he’s the upright bassplayer, so I went to the studio and experimented with a number of mics wrapped in foam in the bridge of the bass. All mics were wrapped in foam and pointing upwards. Here are the results:
Beyer M88, very balanced sound, nice low end, much detail and a reasonable amount of bleed from the horns, banjo, and drums. And this bleed is sounding nice so that can’t be a big problem
Beyer M69, this prooves that the M88 is a much better mic, this mic doesn’t sound as good in this application.
Beyer M201, not good, a great mic but not in this application, bleed doesn’t sound nice and so does the upright.
Beyer M260 ribbon, a nice and balanced sound, less low end and the bleed sounds a little nasal, but a very usable sound.
Shure SM57, in one word: ugly.
Sennheiser MD421, boomy sound with lots of peaks and lots of bleed, unusable.
Sennheiser MD441, a great mic, but sucks on this application, even worse than the 421.
AKG D90S, el cheapo dynamic mic, but not bad at all, even better than the Beyer M69.
Audio Technica AT 832, one of the cheapest dynamic mics from the eighties, $25 mic and this mic beats the MD421 and 441. A decent sound, pretty balanced, lots of lows and a reasonable amount of bleed. Funny that the cheapest mic sounds better than the most expensive dynamic.
MXL V77S, a side adressed mic which is a huge benefit, fits very good in the foam. I pointed the front in an angle towards the F-hole on the G string side. A very good and balanced sound, lots of low end so you beter use a high pass filter. Bleed sounds wonderful, so this is the mic I’m going to use for the lady upright player.
MXL V69M, a very good sound too, but the bleed sounds more colored than the 77 and this mic can get quite warm so I presume that wrapped in foam it will get hot.
I have forgotten to try a SP B1 but I’ll do that next week.
The Neumann M149 is too big, so it doesn’t fit in the bridge.
Cheers, Han
But people hate that and prefer to play with the band in one room. Do you know Norah Jones’ first album ‘Come away with me’? The third song begins with an upright bass and that’s the sound I like, as if the man is standing there in front of you.
Lately I’ve been recording with an acoustic band, guitars, flutes, violin, percussion, bagpipes (loud!!) and upright, a female and very stubbern player. I’ve put a Neumann M149 in fig of 8 in front of the bass and put a couple of gobo’s around her. Asked her to keep a distance of one foot, which she thinks is a yard or so. I’ve asked her five or six times and that must be enough I think.
Yesterday she came and booked a new session with another (klezmer) band and I was thinking about how to record her this time. A mic wrapped in foam seems to be the only way to avoid the bleed of the other instruments to go excessive.
A friend of mine comes to rehearse every now and then with his dixieland band and he’s the upright bassplayer, so I went to the studio and experimented with a number of mics wrapped in foam in the bridge of the bass. All mics were wrapped in foam and pointing upwards. Here are the results:
Beyer M88, very balanced sound, nice low end, much detail and a reasonable amount of bleed from the horns, banjo, and drums. And this bleed is sounding nice so that can’t be a big problem
Beyer M69, this prooves that the M88 is a much better mic, this mic doesn’t sound as good in this application.
Beyer M201, not good, a great mic but not in this application, bleed doesn’t sound nice and so does the upright.
Beyer M260 ribbon, a nice and balanced sound, less low end and the bleed sounds a little nasal, but a very usable sound.
Shure SM57, in one word: ugly.
Sennheiser MD421, boomy sound with lots of peaks and lots of bleed, unusable.
Sennheiser MD441, a great mic, but sucks on this application, even worse than the 421.
AKG D90S, el cheapo dynamic mic, but not bad at all, even better than the Beyer M69.
Audio Technica AT 832, one of the cheapest dynamic mics from the eighties, $25 mic and this mic beats the MD421 and 441. A decent sound, pretty balanced, lots of lows and a reasonable amount of bleed. Funny that the cheapest mic sounds better than the most expensive dynamic.
MXL V77S, a side adressed mic which is a huge benefit, fits very good in the foam. I pointed the front in an angle towards the F-hole on the G string side. A very good and balanced sound, lots of low end so you beter use a high pass filter. Bleed sounds wonderful, so this is the mic I’m going to use for the lady upright player.
MXL V69M, a very good sound too, but the bleed sounds more colored than the 77 and this mic can get quite warm so I presume that wrapped in foam it will get hot.
I have forgotten to try a SP B1 but I’ll do that next week.
The Neumann M149 is too big, so it doesn’t fit in the bridge.
Cheers, Han
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