How To Record Drums

Hello. I am Martin Keating the head engineer and song writing teacher in London Music School. I am going to talk to you about music.



OK, I am going to show you at this moment how to actually mike-up and record a set of drums at this right specific ways of doing this and there is a variety of ways to people do about but very set way that will make sure that you actually got a good transcend from the start. And as I said the variations at this that people use, this is the way I do it.
Off course first of all you need a drum kit, here we just using a very straight form strict forward Yamaha stage kit.

So, we are going into different kind of microphones as we are using and why we place them or replace them. So, we start with the base drum, on this base drum we are using a very specific microphone this is an audio technical base from microphone I preferred that the one twelfth of these your microphone because inside it uses two microphones so it's condense you in dynamic, which I explain later on when we have a listen, why that's very handy later on if you want to change the sound. So, it's a very specific microphone used by the red hot chilly peppers so, one of the few facts about that over microphone.

So, I see only very specialized microphone that I use.

Next we are going into the sneer drum I always like the mike up sneer drum from above and below by using two SM57, I like to make sure there is a mike underneath it can't actually sneer itself, so you see I have got them placed, always remember when you are placing your sneer drum mikes the drum is so has to play the kits so, mike in the way you will hit the microphone it's a mistake a lot people make I was like they go close to edge of the sneer from the top and underneath close to the edge of the sneer underneath that gives you a variation later on if you want to get that sneer drum sound from the bottom. Just two ordinary box stand there to SM57's moving on to the high hit I used the actual AKGC451 is a great microphone for picking up top end.

In this always place your microphone pointing towards the bell of the high head otherwise you are just going to pick up the edge and never forget the actual height is somewhere it's a symbol and for the drummer will play in middle of the high hat and so that has to be picked up as well as the edge of high head and never ever put on this side which I see a lot of people do because the air that comes from the high head will just start when using the microphone. Over the tomb you see I have got three Sennheiser I like these all the microphones you see in seventies and they still around they got a great tomb sound, you can use them for anything if I use them for the base drum but I am using the here three matched on length of three tombs and always with mikes when you are making up the tomb try and make sure that the mikes art is closed as you will putting into other drums because the tombs need to breathe so, if you got closes you just got the sound of the hit so, I was like to bring my little bit of the tomb so that they actual sound rises of the edge of three tombs. And that the tune properly you get a really good sound with these three microphones again we are use another 451 on the Christ symbol, straight forward AKG, mike that we still have on a high height as well.

That going to your overheads and so two most important microphones when we are recording drums because people forget that you can isolate certain instruments but overall drums Sennheiser and I do this with using two 451's I can use any match pairs that can dance for microphones but I like the 451's nice and bright, I like them about the kids so you are picking up the whole kit properly from left and right so that I will got the normal Sennheiser on the tombs here your AKG is on the symbols on 2414 is above and the specialized audio technical mike on the base from. Fundamentally it know with the mikes up to drum kit they shape in the size of the