Microphones placed on the concertina

[Lawrence Reeves]

Tom, just the info I need. I have been trying to track down someone who has used the DPA mics. I would like to know if compared to the Audio Technica do they seem smoother in treble response. I know it is possible to EQ things quite a lot, but it takes away from the acoustic sense of a great instrument. The AT mics and my AKG C416L are very similar in sound, although my AKGs are a lot smaller. I want something that when used does not give the sound guy a big challenge( also some are totally baffled with what the hell a concertina should sound like). In practicality we should realize we have instruments worth multiple thousands of dollars, euros, or pounds and should have a quality representation through our choice of microphone.

I agree that a totally acoustic venue is ideal, but when I look out at a crowd such as this

I have to rely on someone else creating my sound for the crowd.

Edited September 3, 2009 by Lawrence Reeves

[Lawrence Reeves]

Wrong photo, this one shows the distance to the fellow running the mains. I have no idea what I sounded like on flute or concertina. Well, not loading the attachments at the moment.

[TomB-R]

I did the comparison of ATM350 and DPA4099 when I had a DPA4099 for review as a fiddle mike. Just checked and I do still have the test recordings so I could post/email samples if anyone is interested.

(Pretty sure I know which is which! )

 

Warning - Fiddle Recordings !

Tom

[Lawrence Reeves]

That would be very cool. I know that it is not the same as being there, but I am looking at tonal balance. There is a different DPA I was looking at, 4061.

[JohnEverist]

We mostly play acoustically for dances, sessions, and at play parties, but were lucky enough to score some bigger "festival gigs" this summer and needed to wire up.

 

Here's the set up for these large venues that I came up with. At the advice of another member here earlier, I located a couple of Sennheiser 608 wind instrument mics and cobbled up mounting brackets that utilize the strap thumb screw. I run the two XLR outputs from the mics into a Samson input "combiner" and then to an ART Studio V3 tube amp. These mics are dynamic mics so you don't get the feedback problems you would with condenser mics in this application.

 

Ran one gig without the pre-amp and wasn't happy at all......."harsh", uneven sound and had to really play "loud" for the mics to work. The pre-amp solved these problems. I was able to really push up the input side and back off the output for greatly increased mic sensitivity. Playing much more relaxed (softer) and getting all the sound to the board that is needed. Additionally this pre-amp has some voicing pre-sets. I am using the "warm vocal" setting, which really does warm up the sound. Still have to tell the techs to roll off the highs though.

 

Problems: if you accidentally bump the mics you get a big thump sound. And as mentioned the air button gasp is not nice. Big incentive to work on balancing your playing so you don't have to use it.

 

Thanks to dpmccabe for starting me down this path. YMMV

 

John

 

 

[TomB-R]

As promised here are a couple of fragments of fiddle recordings I did when doing a comparative review of a DPA 4099 against my own ATM 350.

 

In each case the microphone was plugged into a power supply/preamp giving the phantom power, then direct into my sound card.

 

Just fiddle twiddles, not very suitable for technical comparison I'm afraid.

 

First the ATM350

Tom

ATM350.MP3

[TomB-R]

And here's the DPA 4099....

DPA4099.MP3