The orchestra recording of that time period used a decidedly colored set of gear. Lots of tube and ribbon mics were used, lots of tubes in pres/consoles and of course analog tape.

This whole notion of the almost sterile straight wire with gain from mic to recorder is a pretty modern notion since we have the equipment to be able to do that.

The rooms they'd record in are great acoustic spaces and they had great players on the sessions as well. The studio recording method also uses a number of spot microphones inside the various sections- from the strings to the winds. It isn't purist, but it gives you a great sound.

If you want to get a sound that is similar in the field, I have a couple suggestions. First of all, warmer sounding mics... You have some good mics, but many of your condensers have a presence peak to them. A more reasonably priced tube mic to look at is the Neumann UM57. It will give you a "larger than life" kind of sound- especially if you use a pair of them as your mains. Then because of the limited frequency response, use a more full range pair of omnis for flanks so that you preserve your top end. Something like a good pair of ribbons would be another way to go (ie Coles, Royers, etc...).

Also, with your focusrite, be careful of gain staging... There are a lot of lower-end pres out there that sound good as long as they are nowhere near distorting levels. Use better pres for your mains/flanks, and keep stuff like the octopre for spots so you can keep the levels going through it lower.

Hope this helps some...

--Ben

Helps quite a bit...actually, gives me exactly what I was looking for (and sadly, financially expecting...)

Thanks again, Ben