Audacity Forum

I recorded a jam/performance of a six member band. There were six vocal mikes in the board and no instruments were miked. The vocal mikes picked up a lot of music but the vocals are much louder. It's a mono recording and I'd like for the instruments to be louder in the mix.

The compressor helps some, but not as much as I'd like. I've tried various settings.

The limiter helps some but not as much as I'd like. I've tried various settings.

I guess the leveler seems to help the most, but the heaviest setting distorts the overall sound.

This is a quick and dirty recording I made with an Edirol R-90 recorder. It sounds better than I expected, though I really wish I'd been able to mike some instruments.

I'd appreciate any suggestions. I'm not expecting miracles.

really not much you can do at this point

next time use a couple of mikes for the instruments
or
move the people back from their mikes so they are not so loud
or
use two mikes in an xy stereo configuration back several feet from the entire group

In general, you can't separate performers or instruments from a mixed show. All the tools for "Vocal Removal" and other tricks like that all work from a Stereo Show. In mono, you're dead.

Chris's Compressor is a world-class post-production volume manager and you can try that.

Chris's Compressor
http://pdf23ds.net/software/dynamic-compressor/

Koz

I appreciate the responses. I will try Chris's Compressor.

Years ago I made many recordings using cassette decks, sometimes two mikes in front of the band, sometimes one mike and a line out from the board. Some of them sounded pretty good.

This recording was a last minute thing, I borrowed the digital recorder and barely knew how to use it. If I'd had more time I would have miked some instruments.

A friend suggested I try this: http://www.celemony.com/cms/index.php?id=dna

Too pricey for now.

Thanks again!

swangdb wrote: A friend suggested I try this:

It's amazing what becomes possible if you throw enough money at it, but sit down before you look at the price tag.

I sometimes make "quick and dirty recordings" at rehearsals - generally have the problem of the kit drums drowning out everything else as we use a tiny PA system at rehearsals. Microphone placement is everything - in my case it's a Zoom H2 set to minimum sensitivity and placed close to one of the PA speakers so that it picks up some vocals and instruments apart from the kit drums.

After recording, the "hard limiter" effect helps to suppress drum kit peaks so that the recording can be amplified enough that the vocals and other instruments can be heard.

After working with Compressors, limiters, etc., I finally settled on:

Leveling (Heavy) -> Limiter (maybe heavier leveling would have done the same) -> normalize

So how did it sound? Well, slightly less crummy than before!

The vocals aren't quite as overpowering as before and the music sounds like, well, music, but some of the individual instruments still sound pretty mushy.

I liked the compressors but I had to use a lot of compression to make the mix sound better and this caused quiet sections to be too LOUD all of a sudden. I probably could have just not compressed these sections of the tunes but that would have required actual effort!

Oh well, this performance wasn't THAT great. I made some CDs (raw and processed), gave them to members of the jam and asked them to see if any of them could make a better mix. Yes, I passed the buck!

Thanks for the help.

<<<Years ago I made many recordings using cassette decks, sometimes two mikes in front of the band, sometimes one mike and a line out from the board. Some of them sounded pretty good.>>>

Some of the early crystal and HiZ microphones had terrible low frequency response and that would have helped with the tendency of the bass and drums to take over the show. Line Out from the board is how you're supposed to do it. That gets you direct access to the vocal microphones and the other microphone takes care of everything else.

Koz