On location recording of classical music

O

oboe_prestini

New member
Good day from Belgium. I have been roaming the web for advice on the best way to record chamber music on location. This is not for professional activities, so I am on a limited budget. The classic combination of a mixer + direct stereo recording on DAT equipment seems out. Probably one could use direct recording onto CD (e.g. TASCAM 750), but I am not sure about the reliability of this method. Editing is limited to the two stereo tracks anyway. So I took a look at the DAW's that are geared towards pop & rock music. Most of these (at least the cheaper versions) have only 2 phantom powered XLR mic inputs. Probably I would stick to that initially (violin + piano, small chamber orchestra), but suppose I want to use four mics to record every member of a string quartet, then I need to look at DAW's with more than 2 XLR inputs. Choices, again in the budget line, are limited to BOSS BR1600, and KORG 1600MkII. The latter has 24bit recording, and is recommended. Again, I would not make much use of all built-in effects considering the type of music I would like to record. Post-record processing would be limited to balancing and reverb at the most. Any advice/experience is gratefully acknowledged. Regards.
 
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I would not tight mic the individual instruments of this type of music. Personally, I'd try a Jecklin Disc set up. That's two omni condenser mics with a baffle between them. It gives a very realistic recording of the group in the room.
 
listen to the RAT

I also believe that stereo is the only way to address this. DPA LINK HERE has a great tutorial, you need to follow the links to their "MIC UNIVERSITY" then click on "Stereo Techniques". I think you should keep everything as simple as possible. The Tascam CD is a great, but even better would be a Masterlink from Alesis. The most important thing will be the mic placement and the room. Welcome aboard.
 
I've successfully recorded many classical ensembles with an M-S stereo mic configuration into a DAT recorder. Very portable, very accurate, great sounding, no phase problems. If you've already got a single pattern LDC and a figure 8 pattern LDC and well appointed mixer, then creating the M-S matrix is no problem. If you're doing it on a budget, you might consider looking into the PAIA M-S mic kit or M-S matrix encoder kit :

http://www.paia.com/msmic.htm
 
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