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microphone: a professional percussionist replies



The Shure SM-57 is a very good and dependable microphone.

That being said and done (and all respect to Kris Hartung),   it has a 
very 
uneven
frequency reponse and has quite a pronounced 'proximity' effect (high roll 
on of bass frequencies)
and a boost in the midranges that make it particularly advantageous for 
micing two really specific
instruments:    a very loud electric guitar cabinet and a snare drum.  All 
of this is because it really
can handle high SPLs (sound pressure levels) without feeding back under 
normal live monitoring cirumstances.


A great microphone.

Compared to a high quality condenser microhone or even the vastly improved 
Shure Beta SM 57, however and
it is a fairly mediocre microphone for things like some human voice and 
percussion (or found sound).

The trouble with condenser microphones is that they have a fairly omni 
directional pickup pattern which makes them
highly susceptibale (sp?) to feedback under normal monitoring situations.

One condenser microphone in particular,  the AKG C1000S,   has a special 
plastic 'focuser' that, when placed over the
microphones element,  narrows the pickup pattern to a very, very narrow 
cartoid pattern.

This incredible focus of directionality of the microphone (something that 
makes the SM57  really good and the BETA SM57 fantastic)
means that there is a lot less feedback potential in live situations.

I used my brother's borrowed BETA SM57s a lot until I did a gig at the 
legendary Freight and Salvage Company performance venue in
Berkeley, California with legendary finger styled/altered tuning guitarist 
Martin Simpson.

I had a very difficult 'found sound' percussion instrument that I helped 
to 
innovate, called the Liquid Glass Ghatam.
Fashioned out of a large four sided, clear glass flower vase filled with 
water (for pitch manipulation) it was a very difficult
instrument to mic,  let alone to loop live.

It sounded like god in at this venue...................so much so that I 
sprung for two AKG C1000S in the next couple of months as I could afford 
them.



This microphone is still problamatic when it comes to high SPLs with 
typical 
front monitoring live solutions so I eventually went to a rather cheap
but elegant solution of using a Radio Shack Wirless Headpone system (run, 
directly  off of my live mixing board).

It really helps if you have multiple tracks to loop on, so that there is 
no 
grave danger of monitor leakage when you are recording new and multiple 
tracks.   With the wireless headphones,  this becomes a very high quality 
listening experience that I highly recommend (and trust me,  I tried EVERY
micing solution to make my frame drums and unusual percussion instruments 
sound really good , live).

If you have typical monitoring solutions (normal stage monitors in front 
and 
underneath you),  then I highly recommend that you use
a BETA 57 (which I think is highly superior to the wonderful normal SM 57).

One thing you can do to make it sound a little more pristine is to boost 
your treble or upper midranges by +3db on the returns of whatever looping
solution you use.     Even hard to mic Indian tablas sound good with this 
approach.

Best of luck.    Email me off list if you have any other solutions for 
micing or sound reinforcement ideas for your looping.