Hypothetical question

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leifbone

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Is it possible to use recording/mixing/mastering technique to make "great result" out of very good musicians/performance, with no high end equipment? Let us say two C-1000 mics, Audacity free frecording software, a cheap two channel mixer, Behringer. Piano and vocal. In a little but good sounding room. If I find a good placement for the mics and instruments.
 
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With a freakishly good sounding source and plenty of experience in a truly good sounding room (I mean a room that's actually properly balanced across the spectrum - Not a "wow, this is a nice sounding room" room), you should be able to get a decent recording.

C1000's... That part bugs me more than anything. But again, as long as the source gets along with the mics, you could do worse. I used to make quite decent full-scale orchestral recordings with relative crap -- But they were exceptionally good orchestras with exceptionally good sounding instruments in exceptionally well-balanced spaces.
 
You can do better than Audacity. Spend $40 and get Reaper, a real DAW suited to the purpose. Audacity has its uses but I wouldn't try to track in it seriously.

What massive says is completely correct, the thing you need to think about is, if you're a newbie as I'm assuming you are, do you know what any of it actually means on the ground?

And how are you planning on getting your signal into your PC? Behringer mixer to mic input on a PC won't cut it.

Save your pennies...
 
You'd be surprised at the results you can get with minimal gear and maximum knowledge.

the best thing that will help your recordings is know how... which is free (for the most part)..

I would lay down a few bucks tho.

For drums i'd want at least 4 inputs (and you deffinitely want an interface over a mixer unless your mixer has usb or firewire connectivity (most dont)... otherwise your mix will show up as 1 track instead of individual tracks per voice (instrument)

I'd say keep those 4100, get 2 Shure sm 57's and get this baby... PreSonus Audiobox 44VSL USB 2.0 Recording System: Shop Pro Audio & Other Musical Instruments | Musician's Friend

you'll have 4 inputs... and with most presonus interfaces you get their DAW "Studio One"... which actually is quite nice!!!

that way you can use your c1000's as overheads to your drum kit and mic the kick and snare with the 57's.

Not ideal obviously... but your results will skyrocket.

but if you cant spend anything... then because your going through a mixer into your onboard sound card, i think your results will suffer.

absolute barebones minimum... i'd get yourself at least a 2 channel interface.

PreSonus AudioBox USB 2X2 USB Recording System: Shop Pro Audio & Other Musical Instruments | Musician's Friend

**I swear by Presonus... never given me a problem and i loooove how solid they feel.. how stiff the nobs are... how good the preamps are**

Tyler
 
Massive Master said:
With a freakishly good sounding source and plenty of experience in a truly good sounding room (I mean a room that's actually properly balanced across the spectrum - Not a "wow, this is a nice sounding room" room), you should be able to get a decent recording.
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John is truthful...but he is also being very diplomatic with his answer. :)
Pay attention to his comments about "freakishly good", "plenty of experience" and "truly good sounding room".

Hey, we all started somewhere, so by all means push on, just don't get too disappointed if you have very high expectations and things don't work out for you right off. You just have to work at it and keep making improvements.

AFA the C1000 mics...meh, not my choice for anything...and while Audacity will let you record, it's NOT much of a "DAW" if you need some more serious DAW power/fucntionality....IMHO.
But you're talking piano and vocal...it's not too complicated, and you could get lucky and still end up with something pretty usable. Sound/recording can surprise you both good and bad, so if you already have that gear...try it out...it can't hurt.
You could always upgrade if needed.
 
Get a pro or semi-pro sound card / interface. And dont spend any more money on anything that says Behringer on it.

Spend the $60 bucks (it went up) to license Reaper. It's the best, most powerful and easy to use DAW software for the money anywhere on the planet. You will have to spend at least a few hundred on anything else to get that kind of power. If you are serious and this is a long term endeavour, get the Reaper Power book also.

If your space is tight and you cannot make it work with mic'ing a drummer, then save your money and invest in great drum software like EZD or Superior Drummer. It's drag and drop to build a drum track, you can do it on headphones, and the drummer won't eat your food and screw your girl and wreck your car.

The more basic your gear and set up, the better the musicians have to be. Great musicians can compensate - to a point - for mediocre gear, but great gear cannot possibly compensate for mediocre musicians. If you have great musicians, you can probably accomplish a LOT more and a LOT better results than you or John think you can. No dis to John, he knows his stuff pure and simple without a doubt. But don't feel dwarfed or set back by any suggestion that you have to graduate to top shelf everything before you can get impressive results. You'll get the most mileage for your average buck if you start with great players and great singers.
 
Just an echo of what they said. I've spent years studying, learning, reading etc and had my first serious session last saturday. Because I've spent so much time learning the theory, understaning what to look for with mic placement, phase, etc....I was actually able to get some really good sounds. Now, it took a lot of work and some creativity to work around my limited gear but you can do it.

Remember that if it sounds good at the source then you are ahead of most of the young "I want to record at home" crowd. Move your piano around the room (as best as you can) see where it sounds best. If you are recording an upright piano I highly reccomend reading the Sound on Sound article on how to do it effectively.

So in short: yes great recordings can be on crap gear...it just takes work. But also remember....honesty translates. If the musicians are tallented and passionate....a decent recording will sound better to most people than an exquisite recording of lack-luster performances.

Some final thoughts:
1. Keep your expectations realistic
2. PLAN!!! Know what mics/inputs/instruments will be used where and how.
3. Semper Gumbi (look it up)
4. Have fun!!! So many times we forget about this. Music is fun. Recording is fun. Don't stress. You are obviously not doing this as a profession yet, so enjoy it and learn from everything, especially your mistakes.
5. Take honest stock of the sounds you are getting. (I moved my piano mics from a spaced pair to an X/Y array....my low end turned to mush.....So I moved it back.) If somethings not working, no matter how cool you think it is, or what producer or engineer swears by the technique, move to something else.
6. Re-evaluate you plan (See #3)
7. Have fun

Let us know how thing turn out!
 
Lots of gear mentioned, but don't spend all your money on gear and neglect the most important point mentioned above: know-how. Buy some books and read them. You don't have to buy them all at once or in any particular order, but I recommend these three because they'll give you three different but equally valuable ways of looking at mixing.

Mixing Audio: Concepts, Practices and Tools by Roey Izhaki explains how the gear works and how to use it. This is what I consider the "hands-on guide" of the three.

The Mixing Engineer's Handbook by Bobby Owinski contains interviews with 20 pro engineers in which they describe their philosophy and methodology when approaching a job.

The Art of Mixing by David Gibson presents a pictorial framework that will help you "see" sound and visualize the mix as a 3-D soundscape.

Each of these books alone is great in itself. Taken together, they provide a fairly comprehensive course in creating good mixes.
 
Why are you asking? Last time you posted here you had 2 different mics, a Focusrite interface hooked up to Cubase and you were trying to record a trombone.

Hard times in Norway?
 
Get yourself a saxophone player and a trumpet player, and you'll have the horn section for a funk band! :cool:
 
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa We want the funk, gotta have that funk aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
 
I think as long as you have a good melody and a great performance, you can cobble together a hit record. Listen to Tuneyards. Merril Garbus (I think that's how she spells it) made her first album with a dictaphone and free online sequencers. It sounds rough in parts but that just adds to the atmosphere. Melody and arrangement is key.
 
sickfiction said:
I think as long as you have a good melody and a great performance, you can cobble together a hit record. Listen to Tuneyards. Merril Garbus (I think that's how she spells it) made her first album with a dictaphone and free online sequencers. It sounds rough in parts but that just adds to the atmosphere. Melody and arrangement is key.
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Yes I belive so. Very short this is the equipment I have at the music school I teach. The recording was OK. I did one change. I brought my Saffire 6 usb preamp. The sound from the behringer into the computer was very noisy. I also have ribbon mics at home but they stay there. I dont want to move them around. It was OK to listen, mostly because of good musicians.

Leif
 
Thanks for help all of you. I did two "take" with different placement for all. Both was OK, but different. Depends on the ears listening. My music school are interested in buying more equipment. The budget is low of course. Reaper is very good for the money. But what mics and interface could be OK for us? The focusrite I have at home is very good. But for a musicschool maybe we need some more inputs. I did a search and believe there is some lowend Acustica Condenser mics thats OK. Better than C-1000.

Leif
 
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