Drum Recording/Microphones

Dynamic mics are the ones you usually see on stage at a concert They are good for live performance because they are relatively cheap and durable

Condenser mics pick up sound differently than dynamic mics They are mostly used for studio recording because of the quality of the sound

The Test I used two different condenser microphones to record a drum set. I experimented with putting each of them different places around the set to see what combination would capture the best sound.

I recorded this loop with the “over the shoulder” recording technique. Being aimed at the tops of the snare drum and toms it gives a very clear sound of those. However it is not able to capture a very deep sound for the bass drum because the direction of that sound is closer to the floor.

I recorded this with the same over the shoulder recording technique but this time I used a different microphone. I didn’t like this microphone as much as the other one. It’s a good quality microphone so all the set parts, especially the cymbals, are detailed but it lacks good dynamics. It sounds a lot less punchy and defined than the other mic.

I recorded this with the microphone in the overhead position. I used the 1 st microphone because from the other test I found it was better for drum set recording. Because the mic is aimed directly at the snare drum it picks up a really great and well defined sound. Same thing with the cymbals. The bass drum isn’t able to be picked up very well from this position though.

Conclusion With one mic it’s impossible to capture a good sound of every element of the drum set because each piece has it’s own sound direction. The ideal situation is having a mic for every tom, snare, and bass drum, with two overhead mics to capture the cymbals. The setup I liked the best was the overhead mic. I felt like it had the best balance between snare, toms, and cymbals. Even though a lot of the bass drum’s bass was lost