Microphone recommendation for my specific style of acoustic playing?

fujauroste

New member
Hi everyone, I'm looking for custom-fit microphone recommendation:

I have a Seagull cedar folk guitar
I play with D'Addario flat tops, for warm tone and less squeak
I typically fingerpick without using fingernails
When I do pick, I often enjoy using a Wedgie rubber pick.

I guess the takeaway is that I like soft, smooth, round, warm sound. I'm looking for a good microphone that will compliment these characteristics. I've been interested in ribbon mics, but still doing research. I'd like to spend $1000 or less. Thanks for any input that anyone has for me!
 
I would start a session recording someone like this with a Large Diaphragm FET condenser mic. Something that doesn't have a lot of dips and spikes in its frequency responses. Something that has a good clean output and handles dbs really well.

You're going to need a lot of clean gain with this to really capture the mellow-ness of what you describe.

Your preamp in this case is also going to be important. Again, clean gain without artifacts.

Unfortunately all these aspects puts you squarely in a bit pricier level. Fortunately the mic choices at the upper end of a grand will all retain their value over time. You probably will need to shop a good used mic.

I would look at AKG C-414 family. You might find a good condition 414B ULS which is a bonus. Also look at the Soundelux/Bock U195 mic.

A lot of ribbon mics will tend to be 'dark' sounding without a lot of detail in the topend. There's one I can recommend for your purpose that I know really well and thats a Cathedral Pipes Seville active ribbon.
 
Thank you, this response is super helpful.

You're going to need a lot of clean gain with this to really capture the mellow-ness of what you describe.

Your preamp in this case is also going to be important. Again, clean gain without artifacts.

I don't think I really understand gain, or why having more clean gain would affect the mellowness I'm going for and not just make the signal louder. I have the Behringer UMC404HD which I think is a pretty budget interface. Are there limitations in this interface that can't be overcome without getting a better one? Or could I put a preamp before it, or something like a cloudlifter...? I'm new at all this but have been doing a lot of research.

Thanks again for your help.
 
I think we mean that to capture detail from a naturally lacking it instrument means as clean a preamp as you can get. A bright guitar needs taming which can mask noise to a degree.luckily, there are few bad interfaces nowadays, so we are talking about teeny differences.

I wish we would stop talking about the need for extra preamps upstream and cloudlifters. I have never owned a preamp/interface that needed one. If you wish to record a whispering singer from a foot away, with a mic like an SM7, then you might not have enough gain, but don’t buy one of those mics. Problem solved. While accepting these mics are deaf by design, they are not bad mics, but I loaned mine to a friend six months ago when his new studio was complete, and he simply plugged it in and people sang into it. Not once has he come back to me and complained how much he has to push the gain. We get, I feel, carried away and start to promote cloudlifters and esoteric extra gain upstream preamps as somehow normal. They are not! They’re probably a poor choice for some jobs. If you have such a singer, then you can worry about it.
 
Thank you, this response is super helpful.



I don't think I really understand gain, or why having more clean gain would affect the mellowness I'm going for and not just make the signal louder. I have the Behringer UMC404HD which I think is a pretty budget interface. Are there limitations in this interface that can't be overcome without getting a better one? Or could I put a preamp before it, or something like a cloudlifter...? I'm new at all this but have been doing a lot of research.

Thanks again for your help.

Gain can be a misleading word when it comes to certain aspects of recording a source.

"Gain" to an electric guitar player and their amp is a bit different than the gain from turning up a mic preamp....but not much!! Really.

Volume should not be confused with Gain.

So when I say to you that you will need a mic preamp (your interface probably has mic pres) that will supply "clean gain" I'm talking about how much signal you can send from the mic to the software without any distortion or addition of harmonics or noise. This is how you can clearly reproduce the mellowness of the sound you describe.

As Rob said, "
"to capture detail from a naturally lacking it instrument means as clean a preamp as you can get."

Where we part in opinion is about the cloudlifter type of addition to a signal. While I don't use "Cloudlifter" brand, I do have a couple of Cathedral Pipes Durham line amps that are wonderful in certain situations. They do sound better than the Cloudlifter while being the same sort of thing. But thats me.

The Behringer interface you have is probably okay as far as having noiseless gain. When Uli bought Midas I figured he'd eventually put those preamps in most things. They are pretty good and have been for years.

A very good mic like the ones I described will do just fine in your interface. Of course YOU are the part that needs to understand about mic placement in order to achieve your goals for your recordings. Since you seem like a person who is willing to research things I suggest you study mic placement and the effect of patterns on sources. The thrree mics I described all have patterns.....you can consider ANY ribbon mic to be a figure of eight pattern with some tending towards omni with side leakage. The architecture of a ribbon will always have front and back with the quality of the build determining how much escapes at the sides.

Why is this important? When you capture a source that is emanating from an acoustic instrument, there are frequencies being projecting in all directions simultaneously but at different times of arrival at your mic. The trick will be to find the veritable sweetspot and put the mic there. With mics with patterns, it's also possible to use the environment you are in to enhance the capture of the instrument. Almost thinking like it's a tone control.

The better quality the mic and it's components the less electronic "smearing" you'll get from the gear and you'll have a purer representation of what you are hearing. The same thing goes for ANY component in the signal chain. And this is usually when folks will step up and talk about how good they get with their lower budget gear and they won't be wrong.

I just find its easier to suss things out when you can put up a Bock or a Neumann, or an AKG. The old engineers saying "Mic don't lie" is true.
 
Lastly, what is your recording space like - any acoustic treatment? Soft playing means more of the 'room sound' gets picked up by the mic too. What sounds good to your ears when playing may not sound as good to a mic.
 
Of course YOU are the part that needs to understand about mic placement in order to achieve your goals for your recordings.

Yes this seems like where the real work comes in haha. I really don't know the difference between a good sounding recording or not... I have a hard time even detecting whether there's reverb on a track sometimes.

Is there a good place to post audio clips for feedback? I see folks over on the acoustic guitar forum posting soundcloud links. Seems like this would be a great way to share what I'm making and get some feedback from people who could actually point out the flaws in my recordings.
 
Yes this seems like where the real work comes in haha. I really don't know the difference between a good sounding recording or not... I have a hard time even detecting whether there's reverb on a track sometimes.

Is there a good place to post audio clips for feedback? I see folks over on the acoustic guitar forum posting soundcloud links. Seems like this would be a great way to share what I'm making and get some feedback from people who could actually point out the flaws in my recordings.

Check out the 'MP3 Mixing Clinic' section of these forums.
 
From my experiments with recording an acoustic you will alter the captured tone dramatically even by twisting the mic angle . A decent ldc at around 300 dollar should get a true enough capture
 
I am going to stick my oar in here! NOT because I have anything like the experience of Rob or the other guys but because,..
1) I have had a 204HD and sent it to my son in France,
2) He is spending his time in lockdown recording his classical guitar, Bach mostly, using several microphones, the most expensive of which is an SM57!

And finally (4) I have posted a couple of his efforts here and people have been complimentary about his playing but, NOT a ONE has said "FFS tell him to get a decent microphone!" But first "gain".

I may not own a studio but I do have a smattering of electronics nouce...Gain is felkkin G.A.I.N! It is just the word we use to descibe that property of amplifiers that makes the signal bigger, usually the voltage but can be the current, always the power.
Does not matter whether you get it from a $3000 'booteek' pre amp or a $50 mixer, 40dB is 100 times. (noise and distortion are whole other colour of fish but leave us K.I.S.Sirs for now?) Yes, guitar amps have knobs labelled "gain" which technically tey are not but, triode, transistor or op amp, gain is just amplification.

So, son has recorded with a USB LDC and quite likes the result. He also has a £20 "BM-800" which works fine but the sound pleases him not. He has an SM57. Now, whilst the 204HD is fine with a 57 for signing at 25-35mm it is a but weak at 600mm for classical guitar and noise creeps in*. However he LIKES the sound the dynamic gives him and has tried it closer but then he loses his rather nice room and tends to knock the mic.

Finally he has had a Mackie EM-91C LDC for just a day or so and that seems to be the best choice so far, time will tell.

(BTW did anyone catch the BBC's Young Jazz Musician of 2020 last week? I watched and recorded it. The soloists were captutred on a single Coles 4038 but then they were playing saxes and a bull bass plus they had the benefit of BBC pre amps!)

*I have bought him a Fethead and have made just a couple of tests here that I have not worked out the results of yet.
 
Is there a good place to post audio clips for feedback? I see folks over on the acoustic guitar forum posting soundcloud links. Seems like this would be a great way to share what I'm making and get some feedback from people who could actually point out the flaws in my recordings.

Once you get a few more posts, you'll be able to include links to Dropbox or Soundcloud files. You can also embed an MP3 directly into your message. You have to GO ADVANCED below and manage attachments. Thats especially handy if you are using a service that modifies your postings heavily like Youtube.

My preferred way to record would be to get the instrument sounding the way I want, THEN try to get a neutral microphone setup to capture it. To me that is preferable to having a mic "voiced" to record something different.

An issue that I learned early on is that you don't hear a guitar the same way as the audience! You are above the guitar, with the soundhole face forward. If you can, have someone else come by and play for a bit and try to listen to the different sounds as your position changes. Some people have tried to record from up by the guitarist's head to simulate more what the player is hearing. Interesting concept but can create some problems if the player is making noise (breathing, etc).
 
My first real reel to reel recorder was a Ferrograph 722HD - ¼" mic inputs, and two 545 Shure dynamics and I don't think I ever ran out of gain - indeed, looking at the circuit for the unbalanced preamp online - it was really a very simple thing. It sounded, from memory, great. The thing hissed a bit, but at 15IPS, with the Dolby tricked to function in the 15IPS position (normally for licence reasons, no Dolby on the highest speed) hiss really wasn't something to worry about. Once we moved to digital it was a shock to SEE noise on a meter but be unable to hear it!

Maybe we're too harsh on low output mics, expecting miracles? Dave mentioned Coles on TV - the BBC still have old kit hidden away because modern doesn't mean excellent. If a mic has too low an output for a certain application, swap it out for something that can do the job.
 
Good points Rich and there is an underlying, unstated fact, we cannot know how true to the source we are being unless we have an at least reasonably accurate way of listening to the results, so many "help me" threads ask about microphones and interfaces, almost never about 'good' monitors (though that could be because the newb has looked at the price of even a tolerably good monitor, **** themselves and then tried to ignore the issue!)

People rarely listen to real acoustic instruments any more. That of course is hard for the lone guitar player but one step anyone can take toward better 'fidelity' is to reproduce recordings at realistic sound levels. A sound level meter can be had for as little as $20 and will give a good idea how loud the guitar is at the mic position and thus aid correct replay level.

"Back in the Day" in the 70s and 80s most people who got into semi pro recording, with tape of course, did so AFTER assembling a pretty stonking home hi fi system. Many of them attended live concerts and many indeed were gifted amateur musicians and played with others. Thus these people had an appreciation of what 'real' music sounded like.

Dave.
 
Hi everyone, I'm looking for custom-fit microphone recommendation:

I have a Seagull cedar folk guitar
I play with D'Addario flat tops, for warm tone and less squeak
I typically fingerpick without using fingernails
When I do pick, I often enjoy using a Wedgie rubber pick.

I guess the takeaway is that I like soft, smooth, round, warm sound. I'm looking for a good microphone that will compliment these characteristics. I've been interested in ribbon mics, but still doing research. I'd like to spend $1000 or less. Thanks for any input that anyone has for me!

I would choose the most transparent option in the range. DPA 2011C would be an excellent choice. Any colouration of one mic will leave a fotoprint on every track you record. And you don’t want that same footprint on every track!

There’s a Series of Microphone tutorials below, that I think you should watch before considering your choice;

Microphone Tutorials - Chapter One - Introduction - YouTube
 
Buying a mic is always a huge guess and fingers crossed. In fairness, the only mic I have ever had that recorded my acoustic guitars badly was an AKG C1000, and despite my EQ attempts it always sounded cutting, or with EQ, dull. Never in between. Every other mic has worked - some a little better, but I usually now use an AKG 414 as first choice, but for something a bit mellower, a Beyer 201 dynamic. Oddly, I have a couple of cheap Samson chunky sized side fire mics and they do a fine job too - just tiny differences, not major ones. The ribbon I have is less successful because frankly, it hears too much of the room, and the room is less good than I'd like. Figure-8 works well in nice rooms, making the sound of guitar AND the space work nicely.

I really think people should never jump into buying an expensive mic - say one over 200 Dollars/Pounds/euros without having at least two or three different cheaper ones. Then you can do sensible comparisons. You have cheap and bright, cheap and mellow, cheap and nasty so if you really like the mellow one, and want better but similar tone - you have a starting point for buying a better one. I wish I'd not bought my two expensive dynamic mics (SM7B and RE320) because they just don't offer anything the SM57/58 can't do really. The lack of proximity effect I find a bit unimportant. I'd lump them in with the Shure KSM-8 - which for me, again doesn't have a home - it's a really nice feel microphone and I do (or rather did, before Covid) use it on less disciplined singers - those who copy the stars and wave the mic around a lot, but without realising why they do it. Close or further away it sounds the same - a bit like a Beta 58 about an inch from the mouth, but it's not special. All the mics go into hire stock if I can't find a home for them in the studio, so none (bar the C1000) have ever been useless. They're just don't impress me much.
 
In fairness, the only mic I have ever had that recorded my acoustic guitars badly was an AKG C1000, and despite my EQ attempts it always sounded cutting, or with EQ, dull. Never in between.......none (bar the C1000) have ever been useless. They just don't impress me much
Ironically, I've just done a session with that mic ! Vocals, tambourine and shakers. I don't have many mics but of all the ones I do have, it's the weirdest and seems to impart a hard brittle sound although sometimes, I like that on the acoustic guitar {depending on the part it plays in the song}.
 
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