Recording piano.

I am going to record piano stuff for a friend of mine. Has anybody got any tips of how to do at least a passable job? The last time i tried it ended up being very mid range.

you want to use a good wide diaphragm condenser with a preamp.

you want to deaden the room as much as possible... hang thick blankets on reflective surfaces etc.

if the mic is close to the piano, it will pick up more volume from the portion of the strings it is closer to.

it is sometimes good if the piano is in a nice accoustic environment to place a couple of ambient mics farther from the piano to mix in with the sound.

hope that helps.

or you could just open the piano and stuff an sm58 in it.

  loganfive said:

or you could just open the piano and stuff an sm58 in it.

This is my method for micing everything (because all I own is an SM57).

  ten fingers ten toes said:

  loganfive said:

or you could just open the piano and stuff an sm58 in it.

 

This is my method for micing everything (because all I own is an SM57).

i bet your hihats sound great.

  loganfive said:

you want to use a good wide diaphragm condenser with a preamp.

 

 

you want to deaden the room as much as possible... hang thick blankets on reflective surfaces etc.

 

 

if the mic is close to the piano, it will pick up more volume from the portion of the strings it is closer to.

 

 

it is sometimes good if the piano is in a nice accoustic environment to place a couple of ambient mics farther from the piano to mix in with the sound.

 

 

hope that helps.

 

 

or you could just open the piano and stuff an sm58 in it.

Very helpful. Although i do not own two large diaphragm condensers. I only have two small diaphragm condensers. Nor do i have a preamp. Is there still anything i can do with this?

yeah.

your bass response won't be as good, but you could probably compesnsate for that with a bit of additive eqing and some judiscious compression.

does your desk have mic preamps?... most do these days.

I assume that is what phantom power is. Yes?

no.

phantom power is to supply 48v to powered mics.

basically, you might have just line level inputs, in which case a separate mic preamp would be adviseable, or you'll have channels on your desk that specify mic/line, or mic.

they will have a hefty gain at the top of the channel strip usually. that is your mic preamp.

Ok, in which case yes i do. I am obviously getting mixed up. I have only ever recorded guitars before and they are much easier.

I am thinking that becuase of the small width of the diaphragm, i am going to need place the mics further back with a whole lot of gain. What would you suggest?

i'm presuming you're home recording, so i would experiment with the positioning a bit... try recording and listening back, then adjusting the position.

small diaphragm basically only means it will pick up less long wavelengths, so as i said, your bass response won't be great.

if the condensers are good, you shouldn't need masses of gain... be careful not to distort... the piano is a very dynamic instrument, and if you whack the gain right up and then your mate plays loud, you'll get nasty clipping.

That's true. This has been very helpful. Thankyou very much. I will come back with news of how it went.

  loganfive said:

  ten fingers ten toes said:

  loganfive said:

or you could just open the piano and stuff an sm58 in it.

 

This is my method for micing everything (because all I own is an SM57).

 

 

 

i bet your hihats sound great.

Never recorded a high hat, but I can set up a killer plate reverb!

1. create an ambient room

2. do not shout in the ambient room

Upright piano or Grand?

If you can find two small diaphragm condensor microphones you could try some nice stereo recording tecniques on an upright. Maybe just a standard spaced pair, or maybe a coincidental pair. I think you'll get a much better sound this way rather than using just one mic. Remember to keep to the 3-1 rule though if you're gonna use a spaced pair (i.e. the distance between the mics is 3 x that of the distance to the sound source)

Upright. I will keep these things in mind. Please spill some if you have time!

i was at friend's house and after the party died and people were passed out i took my field recorder, opened up his upright piano, and sat the recorder right by the opening, above the internals. recorded a bunch of single notes with the built-in mics and made a patch for Renoise

i've never had the opportunity to really set up something complicated but i would really like to mic the foot pedals, the chair, the mallets moving and creaking are nice too, maybe the actual keys if they make any noise, while playing. would be cool to put the listener right there with the piano.

  Adjective said:

i've never had the opportunity to really set up something complicated but i would really like to mic the foot pedals, the chair, the mallets moving and creaking are nice too, maybe the actual keys if they make any noise, while playing. would be cool to put the listener right there with the piano.

very nice idea.

check out gonzalez - solo piano

you hear the keys, pedals the whole lot it sounds friggin awesome.

I'll have to check it out.

eeasy man, just get one of those thing on the right, that big horn in the middle and be sure to have a beard or a moustache (and wear those clothes)

Haha, awesome!!!

  Fred McGriff said:

1. create an ambient room

 

2. do not shout in the ambient room

ooh, I totally forgot about that. You thankfully have made me avoid a faux-pas for when I visit an ambient room next week.

be careful where you put the mics. the last time i recorded a piano, i wasn't paying attention, and got a very noticeable thud whenever i released the pedal. unless, you know, you want that sort of thing.

2 mics - one for the low notes and other for the high ones!!!

There's actually an article all about this in this month's Sound on Sound!