I discovered a new recording technique-new to me at least

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Walter Tore

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I recorded these today. They are solo on harp, solo on national steel, solo on acoustic guitar.
did you do something good today?
she's in the hospital again
Is your loved one sick tonight?
Iv'e been walking most of my life
I don't mean to hurt you little girl

I tried a new mic technique. I have no idea if it tried and true, or new, or rarely used....

I placed a AKG C414 B TLII on my vocals/harp, about 8 inches away from my mouth, another C414 B ULS, about 4 feet in front of me, at eye level(I sit), and lined up with the soundhole on the guitar, and a 3rrd mic, RODE NT1a, About 6 feet in fromt of me, lined up with my mouth, at eye level. I used this set up on all the songs. It seemed to eliminate all the boominess that I get, when I mic close, and added some "air" / live feel, to the sound. I did not do any eq'ing, and only added a tad of reverb to each channel. Any comments would be appreciated. Walter
http://www.soundclick.com/bands/pageartist.cfm?bandID=157137
 
She's in the Hospital Again....
Was expecting this to have lots and lots of air considering the distances the mics were away from the vocals/instrument.

But it still has lots of "closeness" or intimacy to it; man those mics are great.

Got a bit of air at the very end when you stopped playing but its not audible on phones when you're playing.

Interesting setup - you must have a very quiet room......with not a lot of reflections....

Great song man - I really felt the blues from that tune.....excellent sponto lyrics and performance.... :cool: :cool: :cool: :cool: :D :D :D :D
 
I think you got a nice sound, Walter. It still has a lot of depth, but does have a live sound. Seems to capture the performance well though. Nice and crisp.
 
thanks guys. If I ever hit it big, I am flying you both out first class. Thanks for all your support. I wish I can meet you in the flesh someday. I love the mics, and the Electro Harmonix 12AY7 mic preamps. They have taken it to a higher level. The sound on these songs reminded me of stuff that I have by Rev Gary Davis. It was high quality, but not in your face. I guess they must of have used a similar set up. I like it to sound live, like you were sitting in the room listening to it all acoustically. My studio is sort of 1/2 dead and 1/2 alive. Here is a picture of it. It is a a 10'x20' wood room, attached to our detached, 2 car garage, built all of redwood(the local wood around here at the time). Thanks again for being so kind and supportive. Walter

https://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y237/waltertore/IMG_0122_1_1.jpg
 
Walter,
A BIG sound witht a very live feel.
She's In... is too real.
Did You Do... the sort of cautionary tale we should all hear daily.
I've been walking... hear your foot tapping the walking Walter beat.
I Don't Mean To... I really like the sound on the guitar - strange panning though with the guitar appearing Centre and Left.
A good experiment man. Live recording of live perfromance with some real room vibes.
 
Thanks again all! I record myself so much, I can get kind of confused with the final sound. Joel Hamilton, turned me onto the Electro Harmonix 12AY7 mic preamp. It is a true tube driven pre, for only $190. He was given one to try,and did, figuring it would end up in the junk pile, but was amazed at how well it sounded. He told me it compares to many $1,000 a channel pre amps. He knows I am on a limited budget, and suggested I buy one. I did, and found it to be no better than my cheap 2 pre input ART TPS. I contacted him, pretty disapointed. It turned out there are 2 outputs on the EH pre, one a 1/4" and one XLR. I had been using the 1/4" out, because all I had was 1/4" cables. He told me that output is only for monitoring. You have to use the xlr to get to the meat of it. Well, I did, and now own 5. I share this here, in case anyone is looking for a great value on a preamp.

I listen to a lot of the old acoustic recordings of the 60's, like Rev Gary Davis, Lightning Hopkins, Sonny Terry/Brownie McGhee, MJH, etc. I think they must have been recorded using this type of mic set up. I was once recorded in the Austin State Hospital, playing acoustically, with no amplification, or PA. Jimmy Carl Black was on Drums, and Mark Rubenstien on piano. The guy who recorded me, had done a lot of work in NYC with African musicians. He came armed with 2 mics, and a reel to reel. He positioned the mics in the room(the state hospital was built in the late 1800's and the room was huge, brick, tall ceilings), and we ended up with a sound similar to what I got on this session, only with natural reverb.

Since I started learning how to record, I have been mic'ing everything real close, like 3" off the acoustic guitar. You get a real up front sound, but it lacks the air of those old recordings. I am sure what I did is nothing new, and probably very old, but to find it on my own, was a blast. This is how I play too. I have never tried to learn anything. I just let it come out in it's own time. Maybe that is why in 35 years, all I have learned is 3 chords

Walter

rayc: All the songs are current in my life. My wife had a hysterectomy 3 weeks ago, and had to have a second, emergency operation, for internal bleeding. Life gives us hundreds of songs a day. I just wish I could capture them all.
 
this is really good, i wish i had the focus to sit down and write songs like that every day!
 
treymonfauntre said:
this is really good, i wish i had the focus to sit down and write songs like that every day!
Click to expand...


Thanks, but I don't have the focus to write a song either. I just make them up as I go along. It is easier that way, and never repeating one, means I don't have to remember anything! Walter
 
Walter,
All the best to your wife. Mine, Kim, had similar about 4 years ago & it was a scarey thing for her & for me.
I have the box set of Rev Gary Davis. His actual recordings were amazing as were the songs & performances.
My fav "sound" is the Library of Congress stuff by Huddy Leadbetter. I even like the background noise. I actually restored the LP to burn to CD & removed a heap of the "noise" I dumped those clean ups they sounded soooo sterile. I burned the "unclean" stuff.
 
rayc said:
Walter,
All the best to your wife. Mine, Kim, had similar about 4 years ago & it was a scarey thing for her & for me.
I have the box set of Rev Gary Davis. His actual recordings were amazing as were the songs & performances.
My fav "sound" is the Library of Congress stuff by Huddy Leadbetter. I even like the background noise. I actually restored the LP to burn to CD & removed a heap of the "noise" I dumped those clean ups they sounded soooo sterile. I burned the "unclean" stuff.
Click to expand...

Thanks rayc! She is doing better today. I too love those old recording, dirty and hissy, and whatnot.

I did some more tonight-solo harp, and acoustic guitar. Walter

a fresh appl off the tree
that sound cures my pain
not gonna rush too much tonight
this world makes me dizzy



http://www.soundclick.com/bands/pageartist.cfm?bandID=157137
 
Nice tunes Walter.

I'm gonna be critical for ya to get you thinking and try to push things further ahead. Why settle for perfect? We get older anyway...

You're guitar and harp playing has dynamics and your vocals have dynamics but what sticks out to me is your room sound has no dynamics. It's like it is just always there in the background and never changes. Initially it sounds real good but after awhile you start to notice the reverb just hanging there. I'd try riding some of the room reverb while mixing to match the feel of your playing (if that makes any sense) just to break it up some. Try a/b ing the different mics to hear the comb filtering going on and mix it accordingly.

God willin it'll keep gettin better. Prayers to the misses.

Thanks,

Bob
 
NYMorningstar said:
Nice tunes Walter.

I'm gonna be critical for ya to get you thinking and try to push things further ahead. Why settle for perfect? We get older anyway...

You're guitar and harp playing has dynamics and your vocals have dynamics but what sticks out to me is your room sound has no dynamics. It's like it is just always there in the background and never changes. Initially it sounds real good but after awhile you start to notice the reverb just hanging there. I'd try riding some of the room reverb while mixing to match the feel of your playing (if that makes any sense) just to break it up some. Try a/b ing the different mics to hear the comb filtering going on and mix it accordingly.

God willin it'll keep gettin better. Prayers to the misses.

Thanks,

Bob
Click to expand...

Thanks Bob for that feedback and the prayers! She is doing a lot better today. I make about 5-7 full lenght cds a week, so my mixing time is short. I have templates and just tweak each song for a minute or two. I try to mix the next song, while the previous is loading onto soundclick( a minute or 2 with broadband). These songs had no eq'ing, just some reverb. Could you explain a bit more about what you are suggesting? I am always trying to improve the quality of my sound, with minimual time spent in the post production. I see my stuff as 21 century field recordings, that sound pretty good. Thanks again. Walter

Walter Tore's Spontobeat- spontaneously created words and music- over 1 million songs and growing.

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/pageartist.cfm?bandID=157137
 
I'm suggesting you play the mixer like it's another instrument.

As you've said, you have your mics set and mixed in a particular fashon to eliminate boominess and add air to your sound but you've done it statically to where it sounds the same the whole time aside from the volume changes in your singing and instruments. If you listen to your tracks individually, you'll find the close mic has a certain amount of in your face proximity effect and the other mics are picking up more of the room sound. Mixing them together is introducing delay and giving you a natural reverb sound.

What I'm suggesting is to use that delay to introduce a new dynamic by riding the volumes faders like you would use cross fading only you'd be doing it front to back as opposed to side to side. For example, during a story tune you may raise the volume of the distant mic while lowering the close mic and lead my mind further away as you tell the tale. As your song builds, you could do the reverse in a swifter manner to have the climax end in my face, so too speak :). Alternatively, you could do this using volume envelopes.

Anyhow, it would take extra time so it might not be something you want to experiment with. I was just thinking of more potential in your mixes by giving them more depth, impact and expression, with a bit more sound variety.

Whatever you do, keep pumping out that stuff, I just love it!
 
NYMorningstar said:
I'm suggesting you play the mixer like it's another instrument.

As you've said, you have your mics set and mixed in a particular fashon to eliminate boominess and add air to your sound but you've done it statically to where it sounds the same the whole time aside from the volume changes in your singing and instruments. If you listen to your tracks individually, you'll find the close mic has a certain amount of in your face proximity effect and the other mics are picking up more of the room sound. Mixing them together is introducing delay and giving you a natural reverb sound.

What I'm suggesting is to use that delay to introduce a new dynamic by riding the volumes faders like you would use cross fading only you'd be doing it front to back as opposed to side to side. For example, during a story tune you may raise the volume of the distant mic while lowering the close mic and lead my mind further away as you tell the tale. As your song builds, you could do the reverse in a swifter manner to have the climax end in my face, so too speak :). Alternatively, you could do this using volume envelopes.

Anyhow, it would take extra time so it might not be something you want to experiment with. I was just thinking of more potential in your mixes by giving them more depth, impact and expression, with a bit more sound variety.

Whatever you do, keep pumping out that stuff, I just love it!
Click to expand...

I got you! I would have to highlight the areas to be turned up and down, and then use my object editor (I use Samplitude Classic V8) to raise or lower. I guess I would have to fade in the intro and ending of each segment raised or lowered? What I did on these sessions is this- vocal mic 1 degree right, the mic a few feet in front of me, all the way left, and the furtherst mic, all the way right. I will have to mess around with your idea. I really appreciate this advice and your time. When I lived in austin, I had a bunch of friends that were very good engineers, but out here I am the only one, so any advice is gold to me. Walter
 
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