Topic: New to live recording, looking for advice !

[Honkey Kong]

Hello, this is my first post here at Tapers

I recently ran into an old acquaintence at a local rock show and he was there with a nice little portable rig and a pair of mics recording the bands.  After we talked a bit I had to ask a few questions about his equipment and methods and he told me to come here, because it was the best place he's found for great advice and gear information (way to suck up, eh?)!

My situation:

I've been asked to travel with and record my wife's choir on a 2 week trip to Scandinavia next summer.  The choir is all a capella and will be performing many times during the time period, so a little trial and error is possible to get the best sound from the recordings (thank god!).  I plan to record every performance and try to get a great sound from at least a few of them so that the choir director can pick and choose his favorite takes to put on a live cd for commercial sale. 

My "problems":
1) All of the recording I have done has been voice recording and editing for very simple software (Educational lessons done in Flash5), very simple audio environment, all computer/desktop equipment and Cool Edit editing.  Aside from that I've done very low quality recordings of garage bands on 4-track recorders (or much worse) with minimal equipment available in the way of microphones etc.  Basically, I am pretty newbish when it comes to coming up with a good mic setup and recording techniques for live recordings, especially for recording with the intent of capturing as much of the subtle nuances and overtones of an a capella voice group. 

2) Part of my "duty" will be to determine exactly what the organization should purchase for the trip.  My budget will be pretty limited, but enough to hopefully find a decent portable setup...  But I have very little knowledge of what I should be looking at for this.  Some of the specs I need to consider: A) The equipment must be rather portable, and relatively easy to set up.  I'll have to carry it through the airports to multiple countries,  B) The sound achieved should be CD quality if possible, C) I may be limited to about $1500 for the equipment, I'm not sure of an exact figure however, so if it can't be done for that amount I could still use any helpful suggestions possible!

The friend of mine I mentioned earlier (can't remember what he said his board name was here!) was using a portable MP3/Wav recorder that had a 40 gig hard drive onboard (it was pretty small too!) And suggested the same for what I'd be doing, mostly due to the possible budget limitations I might be under-  But it's true that most of his recording that he does is of rock bands in bars or other live venues and he doesn't need to try to pick up 'delicate' sounds.  Any suggestions here?

I guess the most helpful advice would be:

~What recording equipment should I buy?  Any specific reason why?

~What type of Microphones should I use? My bud suggested getting a good pair of omnis and experiment with setting them in different parts of the room (mostly will be recording in large churches etc.) to see what sounds good.  That sounds viable, but I'd still need advice on what type/brand of mics to get!  Plus having a strategy beforehand from people that record this type of thing often would be better than trial & error from the start!

~Is there a reason why I SHOULDN'T use digital recording like my friend does?  Will that mess with the type of sound I end up with after all is said and done?  One of the big benefits with the digital recording is that I could pop it directly into CoolEdit and trsck it out with no digital/analog transfers.. that was a huge plus to me!

I'd like to thank in advance anyone who wants to give this newb some advice!  I was excited to hear of a cool place that recording professionals (and amatures) go to talk about recording... and I'm looking forward to hearing what the experts have to say!

*squirms in anticipation like a true nerd* 
hehe

[Tim]

$1500 isn't too bad at all, you can do pretty well with that budget. Might I suggest going taking some time to go through the FAQ on this board.

I was wondering, is this just an acapella choir? Will they be using some kind of reinforcement system, like a pa?

I'll start with the mics.

1. Will you need to be very discrete? If not I'll suggest a pair of the ADK A51tl's, they are large diaphragm microphones so they are not very discrete http://www.cascademedia.net/products.asp?catid=193&prodid=1440
They are under $800 for the pair brand new I believe, but they can also be found used here on occasion. These mics offer a very nice sound, I have 10 or so recordings of unamplified baroque recordings from Moke on this board done with these very mics that are very, very nice sounding. These mics have 5 polar patterns which are selectable by a switch on the mic. This makes them very versatile, you will be able to adapt to any room situation. These may be more microphone than what you need or want to take the time to learn how to utilize.

2. If you're looking for something smaller I'll recommend a stereo pair of either Neumann km184's or Microtech Gefell m300's. Both are very fine microphones made by two of the world's finest microphone manufacturer's. Both mics are cardioid pattern mics. Cardoid would probably be your pattern of choice for most of these recordings anyway. The MG's can be had for around $600/pr used while the Neumann's are a bit more (~$850 used I think). I think you would be happy with either pair.

fwiw -  the adk's come with shockmounts and windscreens, if you buy the mg's or the neumann's you will need to buy mounts ($60-80/pair used) and windscreens (~$40/pair used)
Next you will need a preamp and an analog to digital converter (again check the faq as alot of the technical terms are explained very well. In your position, with your budget I would suggest the Edirol UA5, specifically one modified by the Oade Brothers see the links on this page
http://www.oade.com/cgi-bin/miva?Merchant2/merchant.mv
All of their modifications are nice but the TMOD is the newest one. Someone more familiar with the subtle sonic characteristics of each mod should be able to really break them down for you. I've heard tapes from all of them and have had the chance to run a TMOD on one occasision and really, for the money, this is the best deal in taping right now. Very portable, easily powered, sounds great. They go for about $530.

Okay, the recorder your friend has is a NOMAD JB3... I think it's your best bet for a recorder. It's small and easily powerable, it will easily connect to your other recording equipment as well as your computer for later. You can find refurbished ones on ebay and used one's show up here occasionaly as well. You will be sending the recorder a digital signal so don't worry about picking up "delicate sounds", that will all be handled by your mics, preamp and analog/digital converter. You're looking at about ~$150 on ebay

Now you need all of the accesories

Mic stand, there are suggested models in the faq I believe but offhand the Bogen 3333 would work well for you. Stands will be ~$100.

You will need a tbar to mount two mics to one stand, I suggest the AKG KM235, should be available at any of our retailers.

You will also need mic cables, someone on this board should be able to build you a nice pair for a good price.

You will need an optical cable to run between the ua5 and the jb3, there are some preferred cable types so I'll wait for the jb3 users to chime in.

This is coming close to your budget but I think you will be quite pleased with the quality of the recordings that this rig can produce.

Good luck, hopefully this gives you a start...

[admkrk]

one thing about the jb3 --- 40gigs, right?  if he's on the road, what does he do when the hd's full?

granted, a cappela, choir won't use that much space, but, what do you do when you run out of disc space 1/2 way though the tour?  if 2 weeks = 14 days  and  3 hrs = 1 night  that's 42hrs.   probly not that heavy a schedule, but something to think about just the same.

[Tim]

bring a laptop with you
bring a 2nd jb3
put an 80gig HD in

with a budget that low I was trying to eliminate the cost of blank media, also the jb3 is significantly cheaper than a used dat deck.

[bagtagsell]

you can find cheap bogen stand knock-offs on ebay.  I got an amvona (sp?) for 12.  Air cushioned, 12 ft, small foot print

[admkrk]

bring a laptop with you
bring a 2nd jb3
put an 80gig HD in

with a budget that low I was trying to eliminate the cost of blank media, also the jb3 is significantly cheaper than a used dat deck.

yeah, and my example was probly overkill, but, at one time i was a boy scout   

[Tim]

bring a laptop with you
bring a 2nd jb3
put an 80gig HD in

with a budget that low I was trying to eliminate the cost of blank media, also the jb3 is significantly cheaper than a used dat deck.

yeah, and my example was probly overkill, but, at one time i was a boy scout   

no it was a good question for sure, I could have explained better the first time. +T

[tibbsa]

one thing about the jb3 --- 40gigs, right?  if he's on the road, what does he do when the hd's full?

granted, a cappela, choir won't use that much space, but, what do you do when you run out of disc space 1/2 way though the tour?  if 2 weeks = 14 days  and  3 hrs = 1 night  that's 42hrs.   probly not that heavy a schedule, but something to think about just the same.

Even at that, assuming a 44100/16 recording, 42 hrs = about 26gb, not 40gb.  (

44100 samples/second * 2 bytes per sample * 2 channels * 60 seconds = 10,584,000 bytes/min
10,584,000 bytes/min * 60 minutes = 635,040,000 bytes per hour
635,040,000 bytes per hour * 3 hours = 1,905,120,000 bytes per night
1,905,120,000 bytes per night * 14 nights = 26,671,680,000 bytes total.

That's well under 40gigs.

[admkrk]

i just figured(for no reason at all) 1 hr = 1 gig

but then again, i'll bring at least 2 extra tapes to a show