Large Sanctuary usually equals acoustical nightmare unless it is acoustically treated.

Hi!

If the pro sound gear includes pro personnel, they should know what to do.

If not, here´s some advice based on experiences I made in different recording situations:

First question:

Do you record like in a "live"-situation (all play together) or one by one?

If second, the best results you will get with two condensers as overhead plus one or (better) two room mics. Put one room mic about 14" above the floor and approx. 36" away in front of the bd (this gives her the "boom"!), the other one on the opposite side of the room in normal ear height. With a setup like this I always got very good results.

If all play together, set the mics as usual (one at each drum plus 2 overheads). The bd-mic should be placed in front of the head on half way from the mid of drum to the hoop, if you use a closed front head. Damping, if necessary, only with felt stripes under one or both heads. If you have a mic-hole in the front head, I would use a towel lying on the bottom of the bd that slightly touches both heads for an "open" kind of sound. The mic should be placed centric between both heads and towards the shell. But, as always, trial tells more than study, as we say here in Germany...

For the bd you can also use ambassadors on both sides or an emperor on the batter side. - It´s difficult to answer this question, because sound varies with tuning and choice of heads.

If you prefer an agile, vital sound, maybe you better forget about all that´s said above and try to record with only two room mics - the most fascinating recordings were made like this, my living-stereo-records of Henry Mancini and his Orchestra for example.

I think, best way is to try different solutions, if you have the time to!

So I wish you a successful recording session and hope, this might help you a little bit!

Cheers, Jürgen

Oops, now I see what "large sanctuary" means, so don´t take my post too serious! Thanks, Vibes!

The recording will be us all playing live...all at once. This won't be a live concert though. The reason for the venue is a connection that I have for a church that I play for...given our budget, it's probably our only hope.

Good feedback so far. Keep it coming.

They will probably close mic everyone and set up one or two ambient "room" mics. The old blue note drum mic approach is 3 mics: two overheads and one pointed at the snare. These days a 6 mic stereo mix of the drum set is preferred: 2 overheads, 1 on mount tom, 1 on floor tom, 1 on BD, and 1 on snare. Some engineers will pan the drum set to play back like your sitting behind the kit and I prefer that. A professional engineer will want to record your jazz kit just the way it sounds, just the way you tune it, just the way you play, just the way you like it. If you play your drums wide open and let them sing, it's his job to record them that way. If the room is really big they may want to spread the band way out to prevent mic bleeding. If that is the case, you will need a good headphone mix to hear everyone properly. You don't want to have to compromise your natural dynamic range.

I wish you the best of luck with this project and remember this: In 1959 the legendary Miles Davis recording of "Kind of Blue" was recorded in an abandoned Greek Orthodox church with very high ceilings and 100X100 feet of floor space. The sound was incredible. Jimmy Cobb used a small Gretsch kit 18, 12, 14. Seven mics were used total.