Looking for help recording a 10 person "choir"

[pedrohead]

I've got a client in who's bringing in a 10 person "choir" to do some vocals next weekend. I've got a modest basement setup with an attached bedroom that's been converted into the live room.

I don't have near enough headphones for 10 people, just curious if anyone has any good ideas of going about a good monitoring/recording setup that would work.

I'm currently planning on just stagering the folks in a 2 x 5 person rows and setting some kind of floor monitor or amp in front of them, feeding the accompanying tracks, then sticking a couple of LDCs behind that monitor to hopefully capture more of the choir and less (as little as possible) of the monitor.

Any other advice?

[The Scum]

Never done it myself, but have seen it mentioned before:

Set the choir up so they're comfortable and the monitor is reasonable for them.

Get levels.

Record a take.

Now, without changing anything (don't change monitor or recording levels, don't let the choir move), record a second track of just the monitor bleed.

Then flip polarity on that second track, and blend it in - it should reasonably cancel the bleed in the other track.

Alternatively, use a figure-8 mic, and put the monitor in the null. I've had good results with a fig-8 overhead on drums rejecting a nearby bass amp....can be tricky to translate to stereo, though.

(keep in mind that fig-8s were invented in the early days of "talkies"...when a movie camera sputtered and whirred pretty mightily - the intent was to put the camera in the mic's null to keep the noise out of the recording.)

[Ryan Silva]

Scum is right, I did this with a children?s choir a few years back, and it worked like a charm.

What ever you do don't let anyone move, 10 people make a big difference in phase timing in a small room.

Cheers.

[ott0bot]

Can you rig go mobile?

If so see about renting a concerthall for an afternoon. Some of the city owned properties can be afforable.

Or rent out a studio that has what you need for a half day.

Big rooms with choirs sound amazing. I can't image you'd have as good results with a small basement studio.

I don't have much experince recording a choir, but the one time I helped record a choir they were good enough to do the performance on key without any playback music. It's all about working together with the natural sound of their voices which doesn't always translate on headphones.

So having a little monitor bleed would be normal I think. If you do that phase flipping trick as mentioned it may be a good way to go. I'd practice it at home and make sure it's viable before committing to it when you whole choir shows up.

good idea about the figure 8....but not how that would work in stereo. You could try setting monitors to stage left and right facing each other. Then have a spaced pair of figure 8's in between them with the null facing the two monitors and maybe a gobo between the spaced pair. You could also add some sound absorbtion behind the mics to get rid of some relfelcitons if they don't sound good.

Have the choir practice a bit without the monitors and record it, then see what frequencies are most predominant. Then cut those in the playback and keep the monitors at the lowest level possible. In my experince a good choir doesn't need much music to perform well.

0r just live with a small amount of monitor bleed.

Just some ideas. good luck.

[firesine]

+1 for trying to rent a larger room. Spaced omnis in a large room are where its at for a choir, but the room has to sound decent.

Like Scum said, whatever mics you end up using, keep their polar pattern in mind and use it to your advantage. if you have to use cardioid, try placing them in front of the monitors to reject as much as you can in the first place.

[roderick]

Can you rig go mobile?

If so see about renting a concerthall for an afternoon. Some of the city owned properties can be afforable.

Or rent out a studio that has what you need for a half day.

Big rooms with choirs sound amazing. I can't image you'd have as good results with a small basement studio.

If it's a really dense mix and you're just looking to have some lush vocals added to it, you may be able to get away with doing it in your room, but if the choir is the focus and/or it's a really sparse song, then a basement setup isn't going to be the best thing. I definitely endorse looking for a hall, big studio, or church.

I don't have much experince recording a choir, but the one time I helped record a choir they were good enough to do the performance on key without any playback music. It's all about working together with the natural sound of their voices which doesn't always translate on headphones.

There's some truth to this. Having them all isolated with headphones I suspect is not the way to go, especially if this is a group of pros that regularly perform together. Do the monitor at low level thing and live with a bit of bleed (and if the playback take with no singing and flipped polarity thing works, then fantastic!) I suspect you'll get a far better performance this way. Also, is there going to be a choir director/conductor leading them? That would also help keep things tight.

As for miking techniques, I'm partial to ORTF in front of the choir (typically a couple of feet behind where the director stands, and seven or eight feet up from the floor), possibly augmented with spot mics and maybe with a spaced pair of cardioids pointed forward and upward several more feet back to capture additional ambiance if needed. Depending on the space--especially if it's too large--omnis alone may get too much reverb and not enough source. To give you an idea of where I'm coming from, most of my choral experience is in big echo-y churches, and often in front of a live audience. So spaced omnis are simply a no-go for me. Too much ambience, too much audience. But in an empty concert hall or big studio, they'd probably sound fantastic.