Recording bluegrass

[fiddlin'jon]

Does anyone have info on how the Del McCoury Band did their recent recordings? Or, does anyone know a good way to record a 4 piece bluegrass band in general?

We just picked up two nice large diaphragm mics (AT CAD's I think) and are thinking about doing the recording "ensemble style" since we perform that way.

 

[Track Rat]

Don't know how Del did it but I've recorded Bluegrass both tight mic'ed and with a single mic and do the "mix" by positioning players. I knid of like the single mic technique.

 

[BobO]

Just started doing this myself...have recently begun playing bass with a bluegrass combo. We're usually four (bass, mando, guitar and banjo), but sometimes we have two banjos.

We recorded a practice session a few weeks back using four mics through my Mackie 1202 board, with a stereo mix into my Boss BR-8 (I'm limited because the BR-8 can only record two tracks at a time). It came out good, but...

I think next time I'm going to try the one-mic technique, with the "position mix." The only thing I worry about with that is that the guitar won't cut through, especially on his "solos."

 

[Track Rat]

It'll take some experimentation to get it right but what I did was put tape on the floor to mark where players stand and another spot marked on the floor where soloists would step up to to do there solos.

 

[mikeh]

Recording Bluegrass

I only have limited experiance in recording Bluegrass, but I have discussed the topic with local engineers.

Although number of mics and placement varied, the overwelming consensus was a tight grouping around a single mic large diaphragm (basically a live recoring scenario). Some engineers liked to use 2 mics to achieve some stereo effect.

The best recorded sound (just tracking, no effects, etc.) I've heard was using one AT4033. Some argue the 4033 isn't a good vocal mic, but a bluegrass band isn't eating the mic - and the 4033 jsut seemed to pick up the stringed instruments very accurately.