One of my favorite drum mic techniques

Jay Barracato

Jay Barracato

Graduate Student
Jan 11, 2011
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Solomons MD
I work with a jazz trained drummer in a rock setting. He wants his kit to sound like a single instrument and rarely needs any drum at all in monitors. I am not fond of gated drums anyways. So here is how I usually mic his kit. This is simply using the principle of "loudest source at the mic wins" and the pattern of the mic to get an even sound that matches what he hears when playing. On a larger stage, I will also add a single overhead.
 
Re: One of my favorite drum mic techniques

Jay Barracato said:
Just a shure ksm27 on the hard mount.
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This reminds me of Manu Katche discussing the micing technique used on a Joe Satriani album he played on in the 90's:

"I worked once with one of the greatest producers in the world: Glyn Johns. He produced a Joe Satriani album I played on in 1995. He recorded my drums with only three tube microphones: one in the bass drum, one overhead above the snare drum, miking the charley, the left cymbal and the alto and mid tom, and one microphone above the floor tom, just under the ride cymbal. The sound he got was amazing! But I had to be very careful: with such a setup, the sound engineer is trapped. What he gets on tape is what the drummer played, he can't change the balance."

Not what you might imagine for a rock album!

He talked in another article about how he really had to watch HOW he played with this setup -- the low rumble of the floortom was there even when the drum was barely touched, but could get out of control quite quickly if either the drum or the ride cymbal were not played carefully.

I'm assuming the rest of the band is working to help you out using this concept live? What is the other instrumentation in this group?
 
Three piece :

Singer/guitar
Upright bass
Drums

All three have had this bizarre musical training where it is more important to listen to each other than having "me" be the loudest at the playing position. I rarely have more than vocals and acoustic guitar in the monitors and they stand close enough to hear and communicate while playing.

The band does all types of music and the rhythm section can be as heavy as anyone out there, when they want to be.
 
Re: One of my favorite drum mic techniques

I have gotten an incredible drum sound several times with just a single sm57 overhead centered 4-5 feet above the snare and toms and a kik drum mic. The balance with the cymbals is perfect and focused, obviously no phase problems. It goes without saying that this is for a well tuned kit with an excellent player. I have also done this technique with a stereo pair of Oktava 012 in an XY configuration as well both in the studio and live with good results. I actually prefer the sound of the sm57 over any of the many other mics I have tried this with including all of my condensers. The cymbals are just enough off axis to sit in the mix properly and the sound of the dynamic element is very thick and natural. I will add that I am a drummer and am very particular about drum sound.
 
Geoff Doane said:
Just the KSM27 Jay, or is there a bass drum mic too?

GTD
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Nope, just the one Mic set so all four drums are equal in volume so the drummer is responsible for controlling his own dynamics.

This technique is a lot more effective at getting the whole kit with less bleed from other stage sources than the single overhead. The drum furthest from the Mic is the snare at about one foot. So by the old 3:1 distance rule everything else on stage is easily more than 3 feet away. When an overhead is four feet from the source that means the other possible sources would have to be at least 12 feet away to maintain the same ratio. Add the fact that my position puts the monitors firmly outside the mics pattern while the typical overhead is pointing back into the monitors to some degree and my position has great advantages.

Sent from my DROID RAZR HD 2
 
Re: One of my favorite drum mic techniques

Jay Barracato said:
Nope, just the one Mic set so all four drums are equal in volume so the drummer is responsible for controlling his own dynamics.

This technique is a lot more effective at getting the whole kit with less bleed from other stage sources than the single overhead. The drum furthest from the Mic is the snare at about one foot. So by the old 3:1 distance rule everything else on stage is easily more than 3 feet away. When an overhead is four feet from the source that means the other possible sources would have to be at least 12 feet away to maintain the same ratio. Add the fact that my position puts the monitors firmly outside the mics pattern while the typical overhead is pointing back into the monitors to some degree and my position has great advantages.

Sent from my DROID RAZR HD 2
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Cymbal coverage? And from the angle, everything is off axis, right?
 
Rob Spence said:
Thanks. Maybe I will try one of my AT2020 mics on a big band drum kit this weekend?
I have been using a pair of Heil PR31BWs - one over the ride/floor and one over the rack with a PR35 on the hat.


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I have been meaning to get a pr31bw for exactly this technique. I think it should work great. I have also done this with an ev re320 or nd468 as dynamics.

Sent from my DROID RAZR HD 2
 
Rob Bolling said:
Cymbal coverage? And from the angle, everything is off axis, right?
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This was a small room. No cymbals needed. In a larger room I would add a single overhead with an aggressive hpf as high as I can reasonably make it.

The snare is the closest to being directly in line but the other drums are still in the mics pattern.


Sent from my DROID RAZR HD 2
 
Re: One of my favorite drum mic techniques

Jay Barracato said:
This was a small room. No cymbals needed. In a larger room I would add a single overhead with an aggressive hpf as high as I can reasonably make it.

The snare is the closest to being directly in line but the other drums are still in the mics pattern.


Sent from my DROID RAZR HD 2
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How did the kik sound? Did you use any EQ?
 
Eric Cagle said:
How did the kik sound? Did you use any EQ?
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Board eq was straight up. Not flat but consistent slope across the crossover. No giant sub level imbalance. The kick was the same volume as both of the toms just at a set of lower tones. The whole kit is treated as a single instrument. If you were to stand 10 feet in front of it without the PA, that is what it sounded like at the back of the room with the PA on. Straight up reinforcement where the drummer is responsible for his own tone through the way he tunes his kit and then hits it.

Sent from my DROID RAZR HD 2
 
Re: One of my favorite drum mic techniques

Jay Barracato said:
Board eq was straight up. Not flat but consistent slope across the crossover. No giant sub level imbalance. The kick was the same volume as both of the toms just at a set of lower tones. The whole kit is treated as a single instrument. If you were to stand 10 feet in front of it without the PA, that is what it sounded like at the back of the room with the PA on. Straight up reinforcement where the drummer is responsible for his own tone through the way he tunes his kit and then hits it.

Sent from my DROID RAZR HD 2
Click to expand...

That scares me, you must have a pretty spot-on drummer in your midst. I would also like to hear some clips at some point.
 
Spenser Hamilton said:
That scares me, you must have a pretty spot-on drummer in your midst. I would also like to hear some clips at some point.
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We just recorded a three hour solo jazz drum show he did last week. When we get done editing I will post something. I will look around and see if there are any crowd videos from one of the shows. I always see people recording but never see the results.

But yes, I have kind of set up my weekend warrior business where I get to pick and choose the types of musicians I work with.
 
Re: One of my favorite drum mic techniques

I will have to give it a try. I usually pull out a little in the 400-450hz range on the sm57 when I do the 2 mic technique just to clear the mix up a bit.
 
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