Mic-ing The Drums & Experiment

HOW TO MIC UP A DRUM SET



LIVE BAND DRUM MIC-ING EXAMPLES



DRUM FUNDAMENTAL MIC PLACEMENTS  

Overheads

XY
- Mics almost touching
- One point left and other right
- 90 degree
- Mics pointing downwards

ORTF

 - 17 cm apart from the two mics
- Using a stereo bar
- One points left and the other right

Spaced Pair

- More stereo spread
- Spread in your tom fills, cymbals
- Centre the kick drum
- Watch out for phase issue

Glynn Johns

- One dynamic mic 3/4 feet up direct under the snare and the other looks in over the tom drum
- Must be equal distance with the top mic

Mono
- One condenser mic 3/4 feet up

Room Mics

- Add a gobo in front of the drum set and add a XY technique dynamic mics behind it to get a more washy-er sound.

EXPERIMENT

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO KNOW ? 

- To know how to minimise bleed and obtain clarity on drums by figuring out the proximity and placement of the drums.

GENERAL PLAN

Before micking the drums

  1. Tune the drums 
  2. Make sure it is in playable condition 

Number of equipments

We will be using 10 mics and mic stands in total. 

MICROPHONES USAGE AND PLACEMENT

Bass drum
  1. Using the bass drum mic from the AKG drum mic kit 
  2. Placing it slightly further and away from the centre of the beater
Toms
  1. All toms are going to be micked up with the Sennheiser MD421 II (Dynamic)
  2. Placing the mics slight away from the sides and more towards the centre of each toms
Snare
  1. Same with the toms, the Sennheiser MD421 II is being used with the same placement as the toms
  2. We are adding an additional dynamic mic, Shure SM57 under the snare to capture the sound of the snares. 
  3. In the mix, we have to phase invert the bottom mic. 
Overheads
  1. (Using the Spaced Pair technique) We are placing two condensers 4/5 feet above to capture the stereo sound of the drums set, one will be in the middle of the Ride cymbal and Tom, and the other between the crash cymbal and tom. 
  2. Both mics will have the same distance from the snare drum to avoid phasing issues.
Hi-Hat
  1. We will be using a C451B (condenser pencil microphone) also from the AKG drum mic kit, to mic up the hi hats
  2. For its placement, because of its pick-up pattern (cardioid), We will point it away from the drum set and aim it at the edge of hi-hats to minimise additional bleeding. 
Room Mic
  1. We will place a condenser microphone (with it's settings set to omni) in front of the drum kit but further away to capture the overall sound. 

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