live music recording

[keaten]

I have never shot a live event before and I am curious what is the best way or my options to capture audio? I have a zoom h4n... no idea what equipment the bands have. Is there some way I can plug directly into their mixer or something? I am not an audio guy at all so any help would be greatly appreciated.

Note: I tried to search but got an error message every time.

thanks so much,
keaten

 

[gpforet]

Plugging into the band's mixing console will often yield poor results. The FOH engineer is mixing for the room, not your recording. He/she is compensating for any acoustic energy coming from the stage such as drums and guitar and bass amplifiers. Therefore, his mix may be lighter on these instruments than what you would want in your recording. Most consoles will allow him/her to send you separate aux. mix but his attention will not be on that mix and again, you may not like the results.

My best results have been to use your recorder, find a place in the room where it sounds good, and record that with either the internal mics, or better, a couple of quality external condenser mics.

The downside to this approach is you're going to get alot of crowd sound in your recording, but with directional mics, and proper placement, you can control that to a degree.

If it's a loud band, you're going to need some headphones or in-ears which can help isolate the outside sound and allow you to monitor your recording to hear what the mics are actually doing. I wear the m-audio IE-30s which give me about 25db of isolation.

Good luck. It's harder that it seems.

I have never shot a live event before and I am curious what is the best way or my options to capture audio? I have a zoom h4n... no idea what equipment the bands have. Is there some way I can plug directly into their mixer or something? I am not an audio guy at all so any help would be greatly appreciated.

Note: I tried to search but got an error message every time.

thanks so much,
keaten

 

[keaten]

thanks man. I really appreciate the quick response and the useful information. Sounds like fun! (sarcasm) Hopefully I can get some okay results from this.

 

[gpforet]

I've done everything from FOH mixing for bands and live musical theatre to recording studio engineering. Location sound recording is by far the hardest thing I've ever done in sound.

Either you'll love it, or you'll hate it to the point where you'll find someone else to do it for you.

But if you love it, the challenges will keep you coming back for more!

thanks man. I really appreciate the quick response and the useful information. Sounds like fun! (sarcasm) Hopefully I can get some okay results from this.

 

[Chadfish]

For live music a "Matrix" recording is best. You need 4 , or 3 channels.

Get a board feed from the sound man for one channel, or two if it's mixed in stereo.

Then get a stereo recording live in the room. You mix the board feed with the mic and you get a decent blend. The board feed provides clarity of the vocals, and the stereo mic (or 2 mics) provide the full band sound that the audience is hearing. That's the way it's done. Board feed alone is sterile, and a mic recording alone is muddy. Together you have a nice sound.

Beyond that you have to get a channel for each instrument and mix everything in post. So the Matrix method is the best way.