EQ on a bluegrass song

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banjo71

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Radio tuners can increase the treble quite a lot, and I don't want my level of high end on my master to ruin a recording by allowing the listener to put too much treble on the finished product. Where's a good drawing line for acoustic bluegrass? What is a good roll off - 8K? 10K? or higher? Or maybe I shouldn't be worried about how the listener is going to preset his/her radio eq in the car?

I attached a song written by Norman Blake. A bunch of buddies are pickin' this one, with me on banjo. I want some opinions on the treble end of this song... too much?View attachment Randall Collins.mp3
 
Instead of rolling off the whole mix, just roll off the high end on each individual instrument. Guitars don't have much useful above 7k. Mandolin around 10k. Bass, maybe 5k, and that's just the finger/slap noise. Drums need the high end for the cymbals. Vocals need the high end. If you roll off the whole mix, you're going to lose valuable high end on some things. Just cut what you don't need up there.

Your mix sounds fine to me. I don't hear anything really harsh that needs to be cut. Mandolin is a tough one. I find myself using tonelux tilt eq on mando to tame the ice pick to the ear feeling that mando can sometimes give you.
 
Thanks for the great ideas. I never thought about doing the roll off for each instrument! duh
 
Sounds great! Definitely does sound a lot more balanced through my monitors than through my built-in laptop speakers.
 
Sounds really good on my droidx speaker and on headphones . Mandolin is the only thing that the highs may sound a little harsh under the circumstances you described. What mic did you record it with? An inexpensive ribbon mic is a great thing to have around.
 
wretchasketch said:
Sounds really good on my droidx speaker and on headphones . Mandolin is the only thing that the highs may sound a little harsh under the circumstances you described. What mic did you record it with? An inexpensive ribbon mic is a great thing to have around.
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Yep, I record mando with a ribbon as well. The high end roll off helps with the harshness. I still find myself cutting more highs though.
 
I'm just gonna have to get me a ribbon mic!! I agree it's just a tad too high endy.
 
nice

The playing is excellent, I really like it.
Over these ear buds it sounds almost hard / harsh with not much low end.
I'd have to listen at home over my speakers to have a good reference.
A ribbon is a good choice for mando and banjo, as an alternate a Kel HM-1 works excellent as well and is actually my preference.
It is a darker mid sized condensor.
Your stuff is good, I wish I had players to record that were that good.
 
banjo71 said:
I'm just gonna have to get me a ribbon mic!! I agree it's just a tad too high endy.
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I didn't have much time after my first listen to respond, but I also wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed the playing and singing on that recording. It was also well recorded and mixed. Now, about the mandolin, it is not too harsh...but like you said, played over a certain trebly sounding system it could be.

Over these ear buds it sounds almost hard / harsh with not much low end.
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My experience with ear buds and acoustic bass is that is always the case. There is no lack of low end on this recording. I can't listen to music with ear buds. I prefer decent smallish phones...like the ones that used to come with a cassette Walkman.

I have an Oktavamod Apex 205 that I like a lot. I feel like I have to handle it with kid gloves so the ribbon doesn't get damaged. I don't like that part of it. I also have to crank my preamp all the way to get the level I want. Thank goodness it is a quiet pre. If I had to lose the ribbon, I could work with a dynamic mic...SM7b (midrange switch to flat), RE 15, or the SM57 I removed the resonator disc from the grille.

Anyways, I was very much impressed with the track, and it was a great song choice. I'd love to hear how you recorded it, if you feel like doing that much typing.
 
Hey Wretchasketch,
This song took a few years to record, but when I started with the vocal and guitar (Mark Mathewson), I used an AKG C3000B for vocal and guitar, and bass (Jill Stargardt). The mandolin player, Mark Stoffel, used his own mic at his place (I don't know what he used), and then Casey Driessen on fiddle probably used a very nice mic in Nashville. I finished up on banjo on an Equation F.20. The thing about this recording is that I accidentally clipped the vocal a bit. That's not hard to do with high energy songs. I'd like to invest in a pre-amp strip with compressor sometime, but for now I'll just have to be more careful.

I TRULY appreciate all the feedback. This song got some airplay on "Into the Blue" by Terry Herd about 1-1/2 yrs ago, so it got played on WSM once. I was very proud of my friends who played on it. But it was my first attempt to mix and master anything for something important.
 
I "self limit", too...meaning I holler into the mic and turn the gain down on the preamp until it stops clipping. I really enjoyed the bluesy straight ahead banjo playing, and I hope I can hear more...but sooner than a few years!
 
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