Recording orchestra with stereo pair

Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 1:46 am

Hello,
I'm going to have to record a symphony orchestra and a flute soloist using only a stereo pair, in a good acoustic environment. I can choose from a lot of good mics though (TLM50, U87, Royers, 4006/4011/4015 and alot others). Do you have any immediate reactions or recommendations?

Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 7:57 am

My choice is the 4006's in a spaced stereo pair config.

I usually add a spot mic for any soloist, just to be covered, although the soloist is often strong enough in the stereo pair that I don't need the spot for much at all. It really depends on the type of music, where they're standing, and placemnt of the stereo pair.

You may be ok with just the pair, but you'll probably have to experiment a little. Hopefully you can get some time during the dress rehearsal to try it out.

Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 8:14 am

I've done the same with spaced TLM50's, often the soloist can sound a bit off/unbalanced (especially against large tutti). Myself, like Joe, would often set up a spot on the soloist!

With the local band, I'll have just about three rehersal sessions to hone in on the best position, if its a conductor who knows how to balance orchestra and soloist, there's usualy no problem! if he does not (not uncommon), then there's a lot of leg work!!

/ptr

Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 9:58 am

Seems like a loaded question to me.

Let's see...if I get hired to do a gig and I haven't seen or heard the venue or group before (in other words, I'm in the situation I'm in now because I don't know the group you're recording and I don't know the venue...)I'd bring everything that I have and let the venue and group tell me what to do by listening.

In some venues, an SF12 would do the trick quite beautifully (and actually, Royer will be putting up a clip of mine on their site soon of an orchestra with a soloist recorded with nothing but the SF12). In some cases, I'd consider it quite bold and daring to even try an ORTF pair of Schoeps.

IOW, we need more information. Can you provide the details? Picitures of the venue? The ensemble type/size/quality, etc.?

If I have a chance later today, I'll post a clip of a flute solo with orchestra (Mozart Flute Cto.) recorded with only stereo pair. This may give you some indication as to the balance you could expect.

Cheers-
J.

Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 2:20 pm

I'm one of the least experienced at this around here, so take this for what it is worth. With so little information, it's just a guessing game, but I'll play. I'd eliminate coincident pair configurations since they depend more on the acoustics to give a wide orchestral stereo field. That leaves me with something like ORTF or spaced omnis. Since the only info we have is that there will be a soloist, I'd choose ORTF.

If you eliminate the constraint that it has to be a single pair, I'd go with a center pair with omni outriggers. Since the outriggers can pretty much guarantee a sense of space, you are more free to choose the center configuration. I'd base the choice on the best mic pair - preamp combo that I had available.

Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 2:24 pm

BobRogers wrote:

I'm one of the least experienced at this around here...

Spoken as though there were years and years of experience...

Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 2:37 pm

Thank you all for your replies. Very kind.

Cucco, you're quite right in that it is not the most favorable conditions for a detailed reply. I was merely looking for any general workflows, ideas or such when working only with a stereo pair but recording a full orchestra.

If my employer only pays for a stereo recording, that's what he's gonna get. If he pays for transport as well, I'll go all-out and bring the entire mic cache from the school...

Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 4:03 pm

Cucco wrote:

Seems like a loaded question to me.

(and actually, Royer will be putting up a clip of mine on their site soon of an orchestra with a soloist recorded with nothing but the SF12).

J.

Great!!!

Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 12:14 pm

johannes_o wrote:

If my employer only pays for a stereo recording, that's what he's gonna get. If he pays for transport as well, I'll go all-out and bring the entire mic cache from the school...

Are you sure that when the employer says "a stereo recording" is ok, that he understands that You think about only using a stereo pair? -- I expect, that he means that you should use whatever number of mikes necessary to make a perfect recording and then deliver it in any common stereo format!! -- Usually "customers" don't give a damn what kind of mikes or how many one uses as long as they get their prized recording.

In these days of "multitrack" everything, we've quite forgotten the noble art of mixing on the fly (to stereo). In the school (not really a school) where I was taught, basic skills included how to balance a complex mix of anything from 4 to two dozen mikes to stereo (on the fly) -- set up on stage with a symphony orchestra, sometimes with soloist, singers, a choir.. I belive that is who many radio engineers still do it when confronted with classical music...

Thats really why they used to call the most skilled of us "Balance engineers" (in Germany "Tonmester")!!*

If you believe that you can pull of a symphony orchestra and soloist with only a stereo pair, then go ahead; I'd for sure try to cover my ass and set up half a dozen spots (soloist, woodwinds, DB's, first violin) just to make sure that I have everything on "tape"...

/ptr

*who calls himself recording engineer as he don't think he's balanced enough!!! Wink

Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 1:23 pm

I would tend to agree with ptr.

One of my pet peeves nowadays is to see recording companies that charge extra for multi-track work but their basic recording setup is a simple stereo pair.

Yes, an orchestra can be captured qutie beautifully with a stereo pair. However, the following variables MUST be in line before it's even remotely (pun maybe intended) possible:

1 - The orchestra must be top notch and balance quite perfectly
2 - The hall must be top notch and project the timbre of the ensemble perfectly
3 - you have to find THE single spot where that set of mics in that pattern pick up the orchestra JUST right.

When all of these things happen, it's beautiful. I'll let you know when (or if) this ever happens for me.

However, wonderful recordings approaching the purity of what I just stated are quite possible by working with even a small handful of mics and channels.

Considering hard drive space is cheap and ADCs are cheap and mic pres are even more affordable now than ever...why should a client have to pay more for a couple extra channels?

I try to carry what I need for the job for whatever it is, regardless if it's a 800 person orchestra and chorus (Mahler Cool

or if it's the Schubert Octet. My job as an engineer is to make the recording sound as true-to-life as humanly possible with perhaps my own spin or interpretation.

My goal lately has been to minimize the quantity of equipment while maximizing the quality of the equipment which I take with me. This benefits me, my customers, my back and in the end the final product and thus my business and my bottom line.

Anyway...this has just been my version of venting.

On with your regularly scheduled programming...

Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 4:53 pm

ORTF pair in front of conductor and it also picks up the flute soloist as s/he stands on the LFT. Call it a day, collect check, pack up everything in a knapsack. Walk out with light alu mic stand.

Drive away and adjourn to a smelly Indian or Thai restaurant to celebrate a monumental stereo picture!

Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 5:41 pm

I go with what Ptr and Cucco said, plus respond to this....

If my employer only pays for a stereo recording, that's what he's gonna get. If he pays for transport as well, I'll go all-out and bring the entire mic cache from the school...

There's a lot of things wrong with this statement, but you're certainly welcome to your opinions. I have about 40+ current employers. (Read: Clients). If I took this attitude, I'd have been out of business years ago.

I don't know if you're doing this as a school favor, or as a professional, or even what your relationship is to this person who is your "employer."

If you're looking to do this professionally, I'd suggest you re think your attitude. Very few people sell this kind of product "by the yard" these days, at least not at the level we're talking here. Very often, the competition is so cutthroat, you can't NOT offer extra goodies and services. Always assume there's someone breathing down your neck, waiting to get THEIR shot in front of YOUR employer. Even if you don't see them now, TRUST ME: They're out there, just waiting and scheming to eat your lunch tomorrow.

Sure, you don't want to be a doormat, that's for chumps. But as the Zen folks say: "To serve is to be served." You can always structure your rates to make yourself look great, while "Giving away" things that are already built into your fees, but in more subtle ways.

Let me explain further... As Ptr has already stated, most clients don't give a DAMN about how many mics you use, as long as you get the job done properly. All your soloist is going to care about is if HE/SHE can be heard properly above the rest. (You would not BELIEVE how many engineer wanna-bee's miss this very simple fact of life!)

Every time I do a choral concert (esp with a hired-on orchestra), I make DAMN SURE the choir can be heard above the din, no matter how many mics it takes - usually four, plus soloists. I make sure the conductor (who is usually also the choir director) can HEAR the singers on his CD copies. (Guess who gets the call-backs for the serious stuff next time, eh?)

Of course, I'm delivering a "stereo" CD to the client, but I go the extra mile every time I go out. I bring extra stands, plenty of cable for at least a dozen microphones, and more than enough mixer channels to cover all possiblities. I go to each client's website (or check in via email) to make sure I know the program ahead of time, how many soloists will be involved, extra and exotic instruments, etc. You just never know, and you DONT want to look like an idiot (I can do that just fine on my own) by not being ready for the gig.

Like many others, I went multitrack back in the early 90's, as soon as the Tascam DA-x8 machines became affordable, portable, and reliable enough to take out on gigs. Of course, rock had been multitrack since the Beatles and Les paul before them, but very few folks locally in the classical & jazz biz could understand why I was lugging around an MDM with extra tape when all they wanted was a CD. How times change in just a little over a decade! (Now it's 24 tracks on a laptop, if nec.)

Ditto for recordable CDs. I was one of the first kids on the block in the early 90's to offer clients a CDr copy (at no extra charge!) of their work in progress. Once the cost of a blank dropped from $10 or $15 down to less than a buck apiece, below the cost of a blank cassette - which had to be done in real time..guess who got the callbacks? Some clients didn't even GET why a CD would be a better sound & deal than a cassette dub, but eventually it became the norm. Now it's expected. I'm sure I'm not the first one that thought of this, but believe me, you wanna talk about Client LOYALTY???

One last bit of advice here....sure, you can charge for every little thing, and you may get away with it just fine. You may even become one of those super-rare, ultra-audiophiles guru-types, who sniffs at asking how high when a client says "jump".

But if you're like the rest of us work-a-day types who want to be in biz 5, 10, 15 years from now, you may figure out it's not about the least amount of work you can do for a client's project, but the BEST WAY you can get it done, with the highest quality, and at the same time make that client luuuve you enough to budget enough cash to hire you for the NEXT project, and the next and the next after that.

Or you can just record in stereo onto a DAT, charge him for the tape, postage, and hit him for cartage, too. Rolling Eyes

Posted: Thu Jan 10, 2008 3:22 am

Thank you very much for your replies!

Regarding the possibility of using more mics or my attitude towards this gig, I feel I expressed myself very clumsily Smile

I'm a sound engineering student, and I live in a town 300 km from where the recording is going to take place. I can either take the bus and do a small recording, or I can bring loads of equipment and drive down. This is dependent on if my employer can afford to pay for the car, cause it'll cost me $400. I could do this for free of course, but I don't feel like losing money doing it. See?

But yes, you're all quite right about attitudes and expectations regarding the overall setup of a gig. I'm just looking for your great experience if it should come to that I'll have to settle for the stereo pair option.

Posted: Thu Jan 10, 2008 7:35 am

Yikes...that is a pretty good distance to travel for a student.

Well, if you must, you must.

If you could somehow manage to squeeze 4 tracks of gear onto the bus (borrow mic stands at your destination or plan on flying in the mics??), you would be a lot better off.

However, if that wouldn't be possible, I would agree with Plush's (hopefully somewhat tongue-in-cheek) reply. Grab a pair of DPA Cardioids and go ORTF and call it a day.

I just can't imagine how miserable I'd be after a 4 hour bus ride lugging around audio gear. Then to have to turn right around and get back on the bus again...no thanks.

Posted: Thu Jan 10, 2008 7:54 am

Johannes-

I'm with Joe here. Regardless of the reason that you got into this and the previous arrangements you have made, it may be important to your professional future that this recording is something that you are not ashamed of. It may not get wide distribution, but in particular, a lot of local musicians will know how it sounds. Whether this means getting the orchestra director to provide transportation or getting a couple of friends to help with the promise of bus fare, food, and beer it is in your interest to bring the equipment necessary to make a recording that you feel is satisfactoy.

Just a subtle point of language as an aside: In US English there is a distinction between the client/contractor and employer/employee relationships. The first is usually a specific agreement between equals. In the second, the employee agrees to be subordinate. In blatant contradiction to this we regard the customer (client) as always right while the boss (employer) is always wrong. Wink

UPDATE: Gulp! I missed the bit about the 300km bus ride. You'd need some very good friends to help out with this. Yeah, a single ORTF pair may be what is realistic. On the other hand, if things like mic stands and cables were provided on site, you might be able to bring a couple of extra mics. Good luck. I hope this works out well for you.

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