SwingDJs

Here's a potentially great situation with a serious problem:
Oscar brown Jr. is letting us record the dance this Saturday. He wants nothing but a copy of the music; we can share the music with DJs for free.

I don't have equipment though.

We are thinking of using the sound mixing console's "effects" bus to send a seperate mix to another mixer, making adjustsments and recording it. Or setting up a second set of mics and a mixer to record.

The real problem is that no one has anything to record it on except an MD recorder ...or a computer.

I have a 5.1 sound card and a big hard drive on my PC, but I have never done anything like this. I'm guessing it "should" be possible, but I really am clueless.

I'm going to study for the next day or so and try to practice doing this, but can anyone guide me? Give me an explaination of what I am supposed to do? Any suggestions at all?

Thanks in advance.

Peace,
Greg

Greg,

I have done a lot of concert archiving on Minidisc. First tip is don't use the mix from the mixer. It most likely will sound pretty bad. Unless you mic everything, drums, cymbals, piano, bass, etc.. the mix in the mixer will be incomplete. Plus you'll need top quality mics and a good mix person to run it all.

You'll be much better off using the minidisc and some binaural mics. I have recorded a lot of shows with just such a setup and results vary from good to excellent depending on the accoustics of the room.

Seeing that it is a dance event, the results of recording the 'ambient' sound may be on the poorer side. Get the mics around 10-15' in front of the stage and let the minidisc roll.

If you don't have access to some small binaural mics, you can create a decent set here:

http://www.minidisc.org/index.html

http://www.minidisc.org/jim_coon/

The later link is a project to build your own.

I hope this helps.

The "Live at the Lindy Binge" CD was recorded using a stream directly from the sound board into a Powerbook, ie the mixing meant for the recording was done on the fly. If I remember correctly, there were two mixes, one going to the sound system in the room, the other going to the Powerbook. So, the only thing you may need is 1) a good external soundcard and 2) some good recording software.

The sound on the Binge CD was pretty good. I've heard better but it's set up by pros that do the audio for broadcast.

I wouldn't trust Winblows to run an entire evening without a hickup. If you can get a digital recording device or pehaps redundant computers grabbing the same stuff you'd probably be safer. If you are stuck with one computer, I'd suggest setting up a separate install of Windows with minimal software installed and all but the essential hardware disabled.

For best results, hire Marcelo

Funny, I've been using XP for 3+ years without a "hickup." In fact, I can't think of a single time either my home or work PC has had a "hickup." Let go of you bad Windows 98 memories, they are ancient history.

::now back to your regularly scheduled program::

Thanks for the advice up to now.

So far, I'm planning on using the MD as a back-up, but the editing capabilities of an MD are limited. There's also the issue of transfering from MD to CD which means a loss in quality.

But I do love minidiscs; I wish the format had taken off like it should have.

As for the computer, does anyone have any experience with the built in recorder that comes with windows?

Jerry_Jelinek thats really cool and simple.
It's a shame iTalk (add on to iPod) only records in mono, other wise you could do a simular trick on it.

Brian

That sounds like a great opportunity, Greg! I've tried it, and it is a lot more difficult than it seems, as I'm sure you know. This stuff might end up being like telling Julia Child's daughter how to bake a Duncan Hines cake, but you asked....

First, as noted above, avoid relying on the feed from the sound board. The sound board reflects what needs extra amplification, not every sound you hear. Also, keep in mind that even with over-the-ear headphones, the recording will not sound like what you hear from the board, even if you tap into the seperately-mixed feed. That makes a sound-check before the show irreplaceable to work out any kinks in the mix. Take the sound-check CD to your car or re-play it over the sound system to verify that the mix sounds well-balanced.

Second, on a related note, use as many mics as you can. Many of the acoustic things that you hear in the room during a live show are not amplified and are not miked, so they won't show up on the recording or will be under-represented on the recording unless you purposefully add mics. Especially drums. Drums need at least four mics: a kick drum mic, high-hat mic, and two condensor mics over the top of the set to catch the cymbals and other drums. All of them can be rented very cheaply at sound equipment stores (like $5 per mic, including cables and stands).

Also, I suggest including one or two high-quality, ambient condensor mics in the audience or way above the band to capture the effect of how the sounds blend together in the entire room, as opposed to how each individual instrument sounds when miced very, very close-up. Without the ambient sound mics, the sound becomes more "canned" and loses the richness of a live performance.

As for the recorder, I would not rely on the Windows recorder. The Windows recorder seems much more geared toward taking voice memos than recording music. Using a software program would be the only way to record seperate tracks on your computer, which is necessary to be able to adjust the levels afterwards.

As for the recording medium, I recorded directly onto a CD burner, using a minidisc as a back-up. I rented the CD-recorder from the same place that leased the sound equipment. No software necessary, but the recording is one-track, so you lose the ability to adjust the levels afterwards. But if you don't find the software, it at least gives you an option besides the minidisc. It's like recording on a cassette tape, except you can't erase: just press "record" and it records. You can edit the length of tracks afterwards with Nero.

Finally, as I'm sure you know, there are lots of post-recording digital editing software products out there that can normalize pitch, synchronize horns so they are together, and otherwise adjust and alter the recording to eliminate many snafus. I have not used any, myself, but I have seen them work and they are amazing.

Best of luck. Should be fun.

GuruReuben wrote:Funny, I've been using XP for 3+ years without a "hickup." In fact, I can't think of a single time either my home or work PC has had a "hickup." Let go of you bad Windows 98 memories, they are ancient history.

<tangent>
Depends how hard you push the system ... on my system, the bottleneck is usually the PC bus, I think interrupt starvation. The drivers don't service the various cards fast enough (RAID controller, Firewire card, Soundblaster Live, NIC and SCSI controller) so data isn't doesn't get to/from the cards when it needs to.

Even under light load, I still wouldn't trust Windows in a real-time system. I think there's an electrical utility in Ohio that would probably agree with me.
</tangent>

Back on topic, Greg also posted on Yehoodi and Marcelo posted a great suggestion to use the "tape out" off the mixer.

Toon Town Dave wrote:Back on topic, Greg also posted on Yehoodi and Marcelo posted a great suggestion to use the "tape out" off the mixer.

That "tape out" assumes that every instrument is miked and balanced (leveled) the same, including the drums: not a safe bet. It might work, but if it does, it will work by accident, not because it is the way to do it.

Thank you all so much for helping me!
the reality is that with the workshops starting tonight, i haven't had any time to fool with this stuff so i'm going to going with the simplest set up:
Seperate mics and mixer feeding an MD recorder. fortunately I've done this a bunch with chamber music and jazz groups, so it shouldn't be too bad.

Thanks again, this thread 9and the one on yehoodi) are a good starting point for someone in a similar situation.

The hardest part now is that I can't find a "boom" mic stand to get over the band, so I'm going to make a pair with speaker stands and pvc tubing.

This is funny: I'm not allowed to use a ladder at the venue because it's a union building. It's too late to hire a "master ladder dude" and I'd have to pay double scale anyway since it's a weekend.

This is starting to get me excited.
High quality easy live recording is now at hand.



link

Brian

Bob the Builder wrote:Jerry_Jelinek thats really cool and simple.
It's a shame iTalk (add on to iPod) only records in mono, other wise you could do a simular trick on it.

Brian

If you use two iPods placed in two different sections of the room, you'd have two tracks you could combine into a stereo recording.

Synchronizing them can be a bit time consuming but it's just a matter of inserting silence of the right length at the beginning of one of the tracks.
A loud occurence in the song (a spike in the wave) can be used to determine the length of time needed to synchronize them. (You need to line up the corresponding spikes).

I made a false stereo track using my three mono recordings of "Flat Foot Floogie" from one of my albums. (Slim & Slam original 1938 recordings) There were two takes of the song on the record and the band played consistently enough that for about 80% of the song, if you played two of them simultaneously, it sounded like a stereo track. When the two tracks differed, I'd paste one over the the other for that section. I never used that false stereo track, It was just fun to try it.

Ug- that sony thing is $2000!!

suck.

I need me a sugar daddy

My sister is a jazz/brazilian singer and I've been wanting to make some nice live recordings of her groups, but I guess I'll have to save up a little! Or just embrace the transient nature of live performance....

After doing some work in sound reinforcement for the past few months, I would say screw it and just hire the proper recording gear. I will only end up costing a few hundred bucks and you will end up with a professional recording, rather than a half arced recordings.

Brian