Recording trumpet for beginners?

MushCreek

New member
I'm just getting into home recording and DAW. My main instrument is trumpet, so we'll start there. I bought an inexpensive Presonus bundle, but I know I'll need more/better equipment as I get into it. I'm going to have a friend lay down some piano accompaniments, then I'll try to add trumpet track(s). All it needs to do is sound better than our current method, which is a cell phone!

We tried to record some trumpet music for Easter. We recorded it in the sanctuary, which makes trumpet sound wonderful. It's like singing in the shower. For some reason, the camcorder wouldn't pick up the sound well, so they had me play into the small PA mike in the podium. It sounded awful. All of the room sound was GONE. It was about like playing in a small closet. Since no one there has any idea how to record or edit, we ran with it, but I want to do better- a lot better.

The bundle comes with a cheap, large diaphragm condenser mic. I know it's not ideal, but it has to be better than a smart phone. I've heard a matched pair of small diaphragm mics is better, and better for recording the piano, too. Thoughts? Bear in mind that I'm an old man with weak computer skills, and living on Social Security, so a $200 pair of mics is a major purchase for me. Any help would be most appreciated!
 
Two mics will let you record in stereo - but of course the trumpet is the classic point source - all the sound comes from the same place, so stereo techniques are really stereo room sound, and mono instrument. The snag in a nice sounding room, is capturing this sound, so this explains away the camcorder - it's mics are focussed in front of it, on the premise this is where it's most valuable - reducing input from the sides and back. This side and back contribution is the nice bit. Unless you can experiment and control things, you might be better off to stick one decent mic in front - a condenser with a pad is very important for brass as levels can be excruciating high close in and distortion can easily creep in. A modest condenser with a switchable pad, and then add room sound in the DAW - there are some very realistic artificial ones now.
 
The Pesonus bundle comes with the M7 electret LDC and that is specc'ed at 12mV/Pa. That is 'medium hot' for a capacitor mic in most situations but in front of a trumpet is likely to clip the mic amp of most budget AIs.
The mic itself is SAID to handle up to 136dB SPL and if that is to be believed should handle anything short of Semtex. I would therefore look for some 20dB XLR inline attenuators. People like Shure want a LOT of money for 3 resistors in a bit o tube but look around and they can be found for around $10. Maybe get a 20 and a 10dB?

https://cpc.farnell.com/pro-signal/...8hYn-M1LDBCt7_sBIasu0F-2cz37Lr0QaAjjHEALw_wcB

There ^ you go. Yup, that is Limeland but I sure they can be found cheaply at RadShak or similar?

Dave.
 
There are dozens of solutions of varying complexity that could accomplish your goal.

The simplest I would try is to use the podium mic you had before and your new condenser together.

Find a space in the room that sounds particularly good. Put the condenser mic there. Record both the condenser and the podium signals. Blend them together until it sounds the best it can.
Then, experiment with various other placements of the condenser mic (Maybe point it backwards or to the side so it's more room and less direct signal) and various blends of the two microphones.
 
I'll be doing this at home, since the church isn't available right now. The sound is similar in my barn, so I may try it out there. I'll see how the M7 does, and see if I need an attenuator. What I've read about is using a matched pair of small capsule condensers, like the Rode M5's, with one close up, and the other back a few feet to pick up more room sound and add a microscopic delay for a touch of depth. I'm strongly considering getting a pair, as they are supposed to be a good set-up for recording piano, too. I just got the equipment yesterday, so I'll check it out today and see where I'm at. Stay tuned for a lot of dumb questions!
 
Well, I finally figured out to record with this thing. Just sitting here on the couch, I played a song (trumpet) into it 'dry'. Not great, but not bad. Much better than the cell phone or camcorder. Then, I applied a little effects onto the track- Wow! You can set the kind of room, the size of the room, the shape of the room, probably even the paint color in the room. A little goes a long way, but I can see that it's easy to get that big room feel with a little electronic wizardry. At 18" or so away from the mic, in a fairly dead room, there wasn't any problem with clipping, although I didn't take it to the extreme.

So far, I'm a happy guy. It looks like I'll be able to produce acceptable songs that they can plug into the church service, and I don't have to worry about performance anxiety, which seems to plague me more and more as I get older. Flub a note? Just do another take. I believe I can actually go in there and fix flaws, too, but I'm not there yet.

Now, if I can just figure out what the other 99.9% of the controls do...
 
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