Our theater is looking to invest in a drum mic set. Emphasis should be bang for buck. They'll get used maybe once a year, but I'm tired of trying to EQ Sennheiser 835s to sound half decent.
Often times we have the pit orchestra right in the (tiny) theater, and in those cases we're trying to get the drums to be quieter with a shell, pillows, and foam, but when we put the pit in an ante-room, I need something that will make them sound decent.
Let's say an arbitrary $300 cap.
In reply to Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) :
Look for a reputable brand like Shure or AKG, shop used. Something like this set but you really only need four pieces, a snare, kick, and two overheads, to do most things. And you can easily use SM57/58 for snare and kick and you probably already have access to those.
From the sound engineer side of things, have you considered electronic drums? Some sound decent enough and you don't have problems with the drums dominating the mix, remember that you can't turn them down! Sometimes you hit feedback on your other mics before you balance the drums.
In reply to triumph7 :
Yes, but two things are preventing us from doing that. 1) cost per SQ ratio, and 2) we employ any one of a dozen percussionists, some of whom aren't overly comfy switching formats. We know how musicians get picky with things. I have a pianist who complains about playing my Steinway because she prefers her Yamaha.
triumph7 said:From the sound engineer side of things, have you considered electronic drums? Some sound decent enough and you don't have problems with the drums dominating the mix, remember that you can't turn them down! Sometimes you hit feedback on your other mics before you balance the drums.
Yeah, I was gonna agree with this. Our church recently changed from a decent Mapex set to some kind of e-drums, and while I feel that the drums don't sound as good, we're not getting complaints that they're too loud.
Unless you can find used stuff, I've got to believe that Sweetwater would be as good a place to shop as anywhere.
I have no idea how they actually are to use, but I've been eyeing the Yamaha EAD10 drum mic thing as a way to mic my home kit easily without having to become an audio engineer in the process. Might be worth looking at? I've seen them cheaper than your price cap used, occasionally.
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