{"id":5363,"date":"2015-10-29T23:30:53","date_gmt":"2015-10-30T06:30:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/?p=5363"},"modified":"2015-10-29T23:46:43","modified_gmt":"2015-10-30T06:46:43","slug":"a-high-resolution-session-in-mainz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/?p=5363","title":{"rendered":"A High-Resolution Session In Mainz"},"content":{"rendered":"

After the early presentation and demonstrations at the Johannes Gutenberg-Universit\u00e4t Mainz audio studio and lunch break, we setup a recording session in the large concert space at the school. The hall had a small stage with a couple of grand pianos and a harpsichord and an audience area containing about 300 moveable chairs. The plan was to record a jazz quartet demonstrating my miking techniques for the students.<\/p>\n

Moritz and I went through their microphone cabinet and selected a variety of condenser and dynamic mikes includes some Schoeps MK 21s, Neumann 184s, a Sennheiser 421 for the kick drum, and a few AKG mikes. We selected 14 microphones to be deployed around a drum kit, acoustic bass, piano, and tenor saxophone.<\/p>\n

\"151030_piano\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The concert hall had tie lines connecting the main control room where Mortiz had an HD ProTools rig and a controller. I spent the next hour explaining to the students how to arrange the microphones around the instruments, why I chose the microphones, and why I place them as I do. Most of the students had no real experience setting up microphones and weren\u2019t terribly comfortable with the whole situation\u2026but we managed.<\/p>\n

We started with the piano. I\u2019ve written extensively on how and why I mike a grand piano as I do. Despite the contrary opinion of some amateurs, I\u2019ve found the best sound\u2026the most realistic sound\u2026can be captured by placing two stereo pairs of microphones inside the instrument. I use a pair of small diaphragm condenser mics (a couple of Schoeps in this case) in an XY stereo configuration on the highest range of the piano and a couple of large diaphragm condensers in an ORTF configuration over the power part of the piano harp.<\/p>\n

\"151030_photo_1_wide\"<\/a><\/p>\n

This guarantees an intimate sound and the flexibility to create mixes with both narrow and expansive spatial presentations. Choosing to use a single stereo pair at some distance from the piano limits options during the postproduction phase of a project. In addition, having the microphones \u201cclose up\u201d means that the ultimate delivery system\u2026the speakers\u2026become the location of the piano. I prefer listening to a piano from about 10 feet away\u2026other may prefer the sound sitting further. The students and pianist seemed to agree that the sound of the piano was particularly compelling.<\/p>\n

I placed another stereo pair of large diaphragm Rode condensers on an ORTF pair in front of the acoustic bass just above the bridge. The use of a stereo pair opens the overall sound from a point source to a 3 dimensional sound image. When tracks were in limited supply, using a single microphone was a requirement\u2026not anymore.<\/p>\n

We used 7 microphones for the drums. The kick drum, high hat, snare, high tom, and floor tom each got their own mic and track (Sennheiser 421, KM-184s and an AKG 414 in order). A pair of Schoeps omni-cardioid MK21s on a long stereo bar were placed in a wide ORTF pattern over the top of the drummer.<\/p>\n

Finally, a single Neumann U-87 was placed directly in front of the tenor saxophone player above the bell and about 18 inches away.<\/p>\n

Several of the students plugged in all of the microphones according to chart Moritz provided and we returned to the control room for some initial sound checks.<\/p>\n

To be continued. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After the early presentation and demonstrations at the Johannes Gutenberg-Universit\u00e4t Mainz audio studio and lunch break, we setup a recording<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5364,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[97,1067,657,50,1041,40,172,57,1066,17,1032,70,640,26,639,1043,980,1061,42,298,251,645,638,637,227,643,169,1026,1027,150,347,27,116,659,660,661],"class_list":["post-5363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dr_aixs_posts","tag-5-1-surround","tag-800-d3","tag-advanced-resolution","tag-aix-records","tag-analog-copies","tag-analog-vs-digital","tag-audio-resolution","tag-audio-specifications","tag-bw","tag-dsd","tag-dvd_audio","tag-hd-downloads","tag-hd-music","tag-hd-audio","tag-hi-res-audio","tag-hi-res","tag-hi-res-music","tag-hi-res-sound","tag-high-resolution-audio","tag-high-res-music","tag-high-resolution","tag-high-resolution-audio-experience","tag-hires-audio","tag-hires-music","tag-hra","tag-hra-listening-experience","tag-mark-waldrep","tag-music-and-audio","tag-music-and-audio-a-user-guide-to-better-sound","tag-pcm","tag-spectragram","tag-spectragraphs","tag-surround-music","tag-uhd-audio","tag-ultra-high-definition-audio","tag-ultra-high-resolution-audio"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5363"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5363\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5367,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5363\/revisions\/5367"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}