I've got a trumpet and sax player coming over to lay tracks for me. I'm thinking Tower of Power meets Zappa's Hot Rats with Edgar Winter's Frankenstein sax thrown in for good measure.
No, I don't have a ribbon mic for the task, but which of these would y'all start with:
Nuemann U-89
2 X Crown CM-700
Shure Sm-57s, 58s
A bunch of Audix dynamic mics
I've got a nice room with high cathedral ceilings and acoustic treatment, a nice Demeter tube preamp going through a MOTU 896HD
And lastly, yes, I know technically speaking sax is a reed instrument.
Your thoughts among the above mics, and any application notes, would be appreciated.
I have been using SM57s one pointed toward the bell and one pointed at the middle of the soprano sax. Then to get a little more fullness I use an AT4040 about 4 foot back with an AT2020 as a room mic. Then I eq the 57s and mix them together.
It is the best I can do with what I have. I'm running the 57s threw the stock mic preamps of a Motu 828MKII hence the need for EQing. The AT's through preamps on a old Carvin console. I've tryed a couple different preamps, focusrites, Arts, VBT1,s the the old Carvin has excellents pres and lets me adjust to a perfect eq while tracking.
According to Neumann, the U-89 is a multi-purpose mic that would work well as a spot mic for wind instruments, strings and pianos. http://www.neumann.com/?lang=en&id=current_microphones&cid=u89_applications
Frequency response is relatively flat but gets a little hi-end boost when in the wide-cardioid or figure of 8 pattern.
If your room isnt too bad, I'd try it in either wide-cardioid or figure 8 to see if hi-end the boost in either mode isnt too bright and if not I'd go with the Neumann. (I'd probably use it in any case and eq a bit if necessary)
Just don't point the instruments directly at the mics and you should be okay with just about anything there.
As for what would be best... I don't know most of those mics. I'd probably lean away from the two Shure mics. Probably the U89 in figure-8 mode. It won't let in as much room bleed as an omni (and reflections can be torture for trumpet recordings) but won't give as much excessive presence and off-axis coloration as a cardioid. That's my gut, but having never used the U89 or any of the Audix mics, it's just a gut reaction, nothing more.
My advice... experiment. Try each mic for a couple of bars, then play them back and see what sounds best.
