Micing acoustic guitar players/singers?

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drummerboy_04AP

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What is your approach to micing the singer/songwriter type who insist on playing and singing simultaneously?
 
I would track the singer with the best dynamic I could find (MD 421 for example) and track the guitar with a good LDC and an sm 57 combination trying to get "close" mic's sounding as clear as possible...

...or I would try to do a stereo mic technique with my best carioids... hopefully 414's (if I could get a good pair) or U87's

... or, why not, try just a good omni

... or... look at what mic's and preams I have access to and try to come up with a few alternatives and try them to see what works.

Good luck, cause recording a dude with his guitar is not the easiest task!
 
Good luck, cause recording a dude with his guitar is not the easiest task!
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Got that right.

I'm one of them singer/songwriter types and would not record myself in this way.

Unfortunately, there is no one answer suits all players/singers becuase they are so different from each other. Does she stand/sit, play/sing loudly or softly, lots of breath noise / string squeeks, strum / finger/flat-pick??????

So many variable will influence your micing strategy. You'll need to experiment, I'm afraid.

Having said that, I would start of with a LDC for the voice and an SDC for the guitar, pointing to the neck/body joint. Both mics close to source to minimize bleed (There Will Be Bleed) and give you options for mixing.

Good luck.:)

Dave
Original Fingerstyle Acoustic Guitar Songs
"Interim Reports" at CDBaby!
 
It's not that hard to stick a mic near a dude's mouth, and another at his guitar.

If it is, then you might be over-thinking things just a bit. :D
 
My best luck, so far, has been to put a fig.8 on the guitar with the null facing the singer and a fig.8 on the singer with the null facing the guitar. You can also use a dynamic on the voice. You'll still get some bleed but you'll maintain enough isolation to control the relative levels(not very easy with cardoid condensers). Or you could relinquish control and record him with one well placed mono microphone. That might be fun.
 
When you've got a mic less than a foot away from a sound source, whether or not it's pointing directly at it ... it isn't bleed.

It's just the mic doing it's job; doing what you bought it to do. Pick up sounds that are close by. If suddenly the mic just shut off because you were pointing it somewhat off-axis or because the sound source wasn't "RIGHT UP" on the mic ... then there would be a lot of situations where you'd get pretty pissed. :D And rightfully so, because you'd essentially have a defective mic.

You can't look at it in terms of isolating the voice and/or isolating the guitar. You can't even look at it in terms of "mostly" isolating anything. You have to approach it from the perspective that you've got two tracks; one of which will give you a little more voice than guitar, and the other will give you a little more guitar than voice. But at the same time, if either mic takes away from the other -- i.e. if the vocal "bleed" (there goes that word again) sounds like muffled crap from the perspective of the "guitar" mic ... then it's not contributing positively to what the "vocal" mic is trying to do, and vice-versa.

Try approaching it from this perspective: You have a single sound source that is producing kind of a complex vocal / guitar combination. Basically, this "source" emanates one kind of sound from it's top half (more of a vocally-guitarish sound) and another from it's bottom hemisphere (more of a chimey / guitary and less vocalish sound). You need to mic this single source so that you get the best possible balance; but ultimately, it is a single source, and you can't look at anything in terms of "bleed."
 
Daisy said:
i.e. if the vocal "bleed" (there goes that word again) sounds like muffled crap from the perspective of the "guitar" mic ... then it's not contributing positively to what the "vocal" mic is trying to do, and vice-versa.


If it's less than a foot, it isn't "bleed".
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Two ideas with omnis

Hi,

This type of act does best live.

Record them live in a venue where the audience isn't too loud using spaced omnis.

Or in a studio I might

Record them in a room where they sound good using two omnis and a Jecklin Disc.

These are both techniques where you record the room in stereo. You can still control balance with mic placement. You just want to stay symmetrical.

Thanks,

Hairy Larry
 
What? Is this a singer/songwriter demo? Just vox and guit? Here's an idea: go to the room where you are going to record; set up the player and two mics (or one mic, whatever you have); determine (via switching and mic placement) which mic sounds best on vox and which sounds best on guit); don't worry about bleed; have him start playing; hit "Record;" pan both tracks down the middle or only slightly off center (where they should be panned anyway).
 
Daisy said:
..You can't look at it in terms of isolating the voice and/or isolating the guitar. You can't even look at it in terms of "mostly" isolating anything. You have to approach it from the perspective that you've got two tracks; one of which will give you a little more voice than guitar, and the other will give you a little more guitar than voice. ..
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Except that the cool thing about dual 8's is that it attenuates quite a lot of the cross feed and the phase holes between them. Still forces compromises as to mic position and angle but those nulls are amazingly focused.
 
mixsit said:
Except that the cool thing about dual 8's is that it attenuates quite a lot of the cross feed and the phase holes between them. Still forces compromises as to mic position and angle but those nulls are amazingly focused.
Click to expand...

If the goal is maximum isolation, that's the way to do it.

I just think that goal might be a bit over-rated in most instances. :D
 
I posted this around here somewhere but...

My bro is the same way. He sings and plays the best when he's doing both.

What I read and then tried was.....

Put your LDC up close (4-5 inches away) to the singers mouth and slightly angled up. Then put an SDC down at the bridge, also 4-5 inches away and angled toward the soundhole. (seems weird, I know)

Track it this way, pan the LDC straight up, the SDC hard panned and then flip the phase of the SDC.

Helps everything to sit pretty well.

Give it a shot. Just might be the ticket...:cool:
 
I've found that a combination of a white athletic sock inserted into the performers mouth, and then wrapped twice around the head with a quality duct tape keeps the sock in place sufficiently to isolate the vocal from the guitar track.

I use an AKG414 by the picking hand/sound hole and an SM57 on the neck.
 
I can't understand why anybody would want to do this unless they were performing live. ......but,...if you insist,...I'd try an acoustic / electric,...or a sound-hole pickup. Then at least ya wouldn't have to worry about the guitar,...you could concentrate on the vox.
 
For th record, I've had less issue with off axis coloration using dual 8's than any other method. The thing is, everything Chessrock says is true of any 2 mics you use. There will always be off axis coloration in the other mic. Every suggestion here can and has worked for people. Try them all and see what you like.

Also would like to add that playing and singing at the same time isn't an "unusual" way to record. Many peoples phrasing and timing are tied to their playing and if forced to multitrack they cannot sing the song the same way. What would be gained in sonics isn't worth loosing the naturalness of the performance. I'm glad Robert Johnson wasn't multitracked.
 
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