Since many of you work exactly with those (and similar) artists, I wonder if you can share any details about the micing and mix of double bass on those recordings.

I have some ideas and already know a bit about the two mic technique - a bridge mic and another near the neck, maybe a third room mic.

Also, a difference between recording solo, isolated and/or in combination (and the same room) with piano, drums...

Do you phase allign? I usually didn't like the effect when they did it in some tutorials, probably prefer to get it done right at recording/mic positioning stage... Was it done on those recordings?

Also some possible one mic examples? I know I like some recordings I heard with a single Neumann M49... A friend has one in the studio, might try once...

Here's one example as best as I knew when I last recorded and mixed double bass:
https://damirmazrek.bandcamp.com/track/mirim

(one mic - DPA double bass clip on - on the bridge)


I will work on a project that will feature double bass and wish to get to the next level...

Fat, yet natural and detailed sound like this:

https://tidal.com/browse/track/244296073

or

https://tidal.com/browse/track/278682246

and

https://tidal.com/browse/track/217813528

or https://tidal.com/browse/track/273678141

If you don't use Tidal, I think those songs are also elsewhere...

I see the topic is uninteresting or no ideas or no will to share "secrets"...

After some more thought I think I have enough info, but to get "THAT" sound one needs Christian McBride. (and such)

This is a deep topic (pun intended).

With the recordings you posted, I think I know the sound you are going for. Good luck getting Christian McBride but there are lots of players out there that try to emulate that sound. I would also check out John Clayton, he's an LA studio cat, protege of Ray Brown (the grandfather) and has played on some of Dianna Krall's records. Personally, I find he has a sound that is superior to the more contemporary upright players because while it has the depth and richness of tone, and percussiveness that is popular, he also has a clarity so that every note is beautifully sculpted. I prefer this sound to the more vague, boomy, "contemporary" upright sound you often hear. Although Christian is an exception.

Yes, it is mostly the player. Each player is quite individual due to their own physical stature, hands, plucking technique (side of index finger, close to end of finger board, or two fingers, more perpendicular, and higher up the fingerboard?). How about the bass setup: Are they using gut strings high off the fingerboard, or Thomastik Spirocores lower to the fingerboard? Or Spirocores, medium high off the fingerboard? Does their sound have more of a "boom and click", or more of a "meaty growl", or a blend of the two? More technical description might be: low-end initial transient (boom), then the fingers hitting the fingerboard (click), then, how much sustain before the next attack? Compare that to less boom, less click, and more of a vibrato or growl to the sound and maximum sustain before the next note. Also keep in mind more harmonic content or edge will be obtained if the player plucks closer to the end of the fingerboard (closer toward the bridge).

Check this video from John Clayton about upright sound.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEjH2niA2ww


Also the tune Do it again from the Dianna Krall album, check out the short bass solo at 2:11 by John Clayton. I believe it was recorded by Al Schmidt. I think he used two mics, one to capture the depth and more of the "boom", and another by the fingerboard to capture more of the "click" and "growl" (I could be wrong but remember reading that was his standard setup for upright).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aruuI8cawkw

Always surprises me how much real low end is there in an orchestra. You can feel the Bass. I always put a spot in there to get some low end heft. It usually goes where I can squeeze it rather than some special position.

Always feel sorry for the Upright players in old jazz groups who look vey busy but hardly get heard on some of those old films and videos.

McBride? Yeah saw him helping out some not very experienced musicians a few years back ( Colaiuta, Corea, McLaughlin and Garrett). Some lineup....

Thanks, super helpful.

That two mic technique is something I intend to apply...

imo there's no secrecy amongst sound techs or a lack of knowledge how to get a decent bass sound:

put a stellar player with a good instrument in a decent sounding room and aim your best mics at the instrument - voilà!

sorry if this sounds trivial but that's all you need to do in terms of recording. mixing by comparison is a too broad topic and most everyone indeed has his/her unique twist on things - in terms of alignment, i can recommend to use apf's if you intend using the full frequency range of two (or more) mics; however, you don't necessarily want or need that! often, you want articulation and/or a bit of air from the mic on the fingerboard a solid foundation/ooompf from the lower mic.

which mics, preamps, converters etc. get used imo is a heavily overrated 'discussion': we all use the mics we're most familar with and of which we think they get the job done in the best possible way.



[i'll be live mixing christian mcbride, john patitucci, avishai cohen etc. in the next two months - i do not intend using any different tools or techniques than with anyone else unless they want me to do so!]

Found a useful sound for my project... a spaced pair of CM3s... might add a ribbon closer at the bridge for live recording, we will do no studio recording probably...

CM3 - really THAT good?

Are you going to record in an iso booth, or all musicians together in one room? How is the bleed of the other instruments going to interact with the imaging of the spaced pair?
I assume, you are talking about a "normal" horizontally spaced pair, not a two mic thing with one between bridge and f hole and one over the fingerboard.

Yes, I am talking about the AB pair in the position I described.

You have to be careful with placement of other mics and position of musicians/instruments...

I just did a bit of a quick mix of the practice recording to hear what is possible and to not be distracted by too rough sound and I already changed the panning of percussion mics to work better with double bass... I will not bother posting more examples, I think one can hear the tone of CM3s good enough in those two examples... even when rough and unperfect as such.

Here we are in a 17m2 tiny room, standing and sitting almost on top of each other in the recording sense and even having the monitors open for some smaller stuff like kalimba, sundrum and other exotic tiny and silent instruments...

It is good enough for practice... and even here it sounds OK.

You embrace the bleed... position ourselves strategically and the important thing - using mics that have great off-axis response - if I would solo the double bass track, you would hear a nice room sound of percussion - only more silent, but a nice clear sound... not some weird off axis mud... CM3s have excellent off-axis, so do MKH40 and MKH30 that I use on percussion...

For the album we will not be so close and the bleed will be nice and even less prominent - we will record in this place that I attach in the photo - that is a rather big venue with very high ceiling and no excessive reverberation - it is "open", the roof/ceiling is mostly wood, it sounds like a big studio, not a big hall... this will help, too... in Lexicon reverb terms - this is a "Large Wood Room".

In short - we will embrace a nice sounding bleed and pay attention to panning and balance ratios to achieve good colour - phase response, clarity... separation.

I'll post it when it's done... next year probably... the recording will be in november.

I am liking the spaced pair of CM3s more and more on double bass... I'll also do a shootout between Sennheiser MKH40 and CM3s in the next months... but I suspect that the "wide cardioid" response of CM3 might suit my application even more than the more focused MKH40, but let's hear.

Also, I wonder how this micing style would be possible in a larger jazz group, I love the fact that the bass stays nicely in the center, but has this "aura" of space around it - a stereo presence... but with some piano and drum set it might not work... one should try probably, especially when the bass player is also the leader of the band and plays many solos and melody lines... In this duo setting it will obviously work very well...

Thanks for clarification. I am just so used to the term "spaced pair" for a stereo technique, synonymous with AB.
Because, recording the bass in AB might force you to pan the mics hard L/R, to avoid comb filtering, and that affects the imaging of the group.
Your approach with one mic on the bridge and one mic over the fingerboard is of course a different one. I guess, you are going to pan both mics to the center.

No, you meant correctly - I used the classic AB spaced pair. Did you check the link to the post with examples?

Yes, you have to pan wide - I did pan in a bit, but still 80% on both sides... I wanted a tiny bit less wide stereo of the bass, it sounded better to me...

I attach an example with an excerpt of practice recording - a quick demo mix for ourselves - one is complete mix of percussion and bass mics and in another only the AB spaced pair of CM3s on bass... you can hear the leakage - we are no more than 1m apart...

The picture of percussion is just fine - udu on the left and handpan RAV VAST on the right as I had them in my set and also sounds nice to me that way... I could pan any way I want, despite the leakage, you choose where it sounds good to you...

Positioning is all, the image of the group is an illusion you create - drum overheads panned L-R are not a natural sound of the band as you hear them in the room, neither the player's position sound of piano, etc.

Close mics are louder for the source you record and if you place everyone strategically, it can be done I guess, but probably this type of micing might not work with a loud band with drum set and piano... I don't know...

I suspect Avishai Cohen has stereo recorded bass on some albums - it sounds that way to me...

Anyway, for my particular purpose I think I found the solution, I really like the sound.

Sounds nice!

May I ask the rough dimensions of the space you recorded in? Wait, in a 17m2 small room? That's crazy! Extra points for that!

Sounds great. Very airy and dreamy. Fits the style of music.
For straight ahead Jazz, this approach might loose the weight and definition in the center, but on your recording it clearly works.
What was the spacing of the AB pair?

Yes, I think for straight ahead I would add this to the more standard mic approach and mix to taste...

The spacing was 25cm.

Are you doing "double" duty (no pun intended), bass player and engineer?

That venue looks super.

The room is treated, though, my project studio room... but still, I was surprised, too...

I am percussionist and recordist, yes, but for live, there will be another engineer... I will just set the mics and "help" ?

A bit louder example - this is still a 17 m2 room, practice, 4 mics... CM3 spaced pair on double bass, Sennhesier MKH30 as overhead closer to udu to pick that instrument well and cover one side of the set and MKH40 on the other side to pick up the rest - both working as quasi overheads and close pick up for udu, frame drum, flutes that I also play and stuff...

This almost accidental "practice set-up" works surprisingly well and for the real recording I might only add one ribbon (a simple T.bone RB500 that is amazing for the price and on loud sources there are no noise issues) in front of the set - for cajon direct to get more definition and MD441 for close flutes, frame drum, voice fx... and that's it probably... and it will be done in the mentioned big venue.

This example already shows some limitations of the small room, but the AB on bass still sounds appropriate to me, but I guess in a band with horns, drum set, piano, one might need something else... must try one day when I record such a band again.

Sounds good.
Are you sure, there is no reverb/room on that tracks? Or are the percussion instruments so resonant, that they somehow imply a much larger room?
I'd love to see a picture of the setup in the room.

These examples are my quick demo mix with Quantex room and Relab REV6000 in combination on mixbuss... raw are the ones in the CM3 thread... the room is pretty dead, there are also absorbers hung on the ceiling... but it is not unpleasantly dead... for such a tiny room it sounds surprisingly pleasant to me... not to really record anything beyond a single performer overdubbing, but for practice it suffices...

Here you go. The bass mics are now approximately in the position... I pedantically allign them when we practice... ������

After some more experimentation we arrived at this practice room sound...

I love the double bass sound, I am completely happy with it...

It's a mix - no EQ on AB pair of double bass... Also minimal EQ on percussion overheads, just level balance and some reverbs... mixbuss compression and limiting... Mic chain for double bass is CM3s into Neve 4081 into Steinberg AXR4U. I must add that I also love the sound of those preamps and AXR4 conversion is also outstanding to me, no lust for better anymore.

I think we "hid" the small (albeit "dead-ish") room rather well... we might even record the "rehearsals" album along with the live one...


LISTEN HERE:

https://samply.app/player/KsRydbBYur...BYurbzPLPbyGPf

The bass sounds excellent. Reminds me of some of the Manfred Eicher ECM stuff. If you have an occasion to record a live cello, I would love to hear that as well.

Thanks, hehe, there's no hiding we like ECM sound...

Arild Andersen especially, Barre Phillips... etc.

I recorded cello just twice in this tiny room.

Once a more classical style with MKH40/30 MS (but I would probably go with CM3s AB next time) - here you go with examples:

MIX, Relab Quantx & REV6000 reverb used together:

https://samply.app/p/7Kwyc8tG39Oo9Jr01lBe

ONLY Relab Quantx reverb used:

https://samply.app/p/cqO531dxG5bdPSFwQOkZ

DRY:

https://samply.app/p/N9wmHj2rO9dgglZXwQsA

And here another in a more "jazzy", world music context of a song - this one was a less resonant five string acoustic cello with DI output plus MKH40/30 MS - overdubbed for a "cello" orchestra kind of "ambience":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWFBefHR-gk

(solo cello around 45 second in the song) and the cello arrangement textures troughout... a bit dense for my taste, but that's how they wanted it)

If I got to chose I wouldn't record cello in this room... but hey...

Trust me your room isn't bad at all. I wouldn't hesitate to record in that space.

The mix of the d minor Bach Prelude first example (Relab Quantx & REV6000). It's quite nice.

I didn't care for the second example with the Quantx only. Hard to describe but it almost added a "predictable" sound despite register, dynamics, etc. In other words, the way the reverb responded felt kind of static.

The dry cello: you did a nice job with your room acoustics and micing because room artifacts are very minimal (barely detectable)--nothing unpleasant at all. The player has a nice tone and the instrument is even--no weird wolf tones.

Looked like the dog was enjoying too (he provided wolf tones)?!

I am happy with my tiny room... for mixing, occasional overdubbing of some close miced instruments and vocals, but I prefer to record elsewhere... planning on much more location work in the future, let's see...

The player is a friend, orchestral player and cello teacher, graduate of Lizst Ferenc music academy in Budapest, but now playing in our local opera house orchestra. The cello is some nice 200 year old cello, but it doesn't sound its best here... the dog fended off the wolf tones, hehehe... (or it might be Soothe2, not sure... )

So, here's the latest result.

Our promo pack with a couple of songs in full resolution:

https://samply.app/p/hfjOLxAWVcZNJBPzaPGy

It is still rehearsal recordings in our tiny room of 17m2, with a stereo pair of CM3s on double bass, a pair of Sennheiser MKH40 as overheads on percussion - strategically placed so they pick up silent percussion (udu, frame drums) closer and less cymbal and cajon, additional MD441 in front for flutes (ca.50cm from my nose), which is also used in the mix as a little addition to the overall kit, also close mic for frame drum and steel pans (just a bit, most sound is from the two overheads), T.bone RB500 ribbon in front of the kit, aiming at cajon - like a lower "dick mic" position for some additional close up on cajon and also a bit in the mix for the kit, but very low mostly... even if I mute the dynamic and ribbon mic, the sound is good, but I mix them in a bit to add clarity and texture to some sounds.

The sound of double bass is actually a combination of the spill from MKH40s - there is a lot of nice double bass leak in the percussion mics (I can't state enough how much I like the MKH40s), plus the CM3 stereo in the position we found by experimenting, which seems to be very similar to the double bass spot mic position that is recommended in the DECCA Classical Recording book (Dunkerey, Haigh, Rogers), which I noticed a bit later when we already placed them like that and it was a nice confirmation that the intuition was right.

The spill of percussion in the CM3 pair also adds nicely to the percussion sound. I also can't say how much I like those affordable and truly good sounding mics. I would like to test Neumann KM143 against them one day, though.

The preamps are Neve4081 (all four condensers) and Steinberg AXR4 (DI signals, ribbon and dynamic mic) - conversion is from the latter and I can't hear anything bad about it. Recorded at 32bit/48kHz. (would use 96, but we record all rehearsals and I don't want to waste too much HD space).

Minimal mixing. Very little subtractive EQ (Nuendo channel EQ) on some channels - the double bass is mostly without anything - everything else is tailored to it (but also with minimal touches) and a bit more complex chain on the master buss (because - no mastering planned): UAD Ampex tape (very neutral settings, just a touch), UAD Neve 33609 - just a tiny touch, almost no compression, Gullfoss - just a teeny tiny percentage in mastering mode to tame some resonances a tiny wee bit, Fabfilter Pro L2 - almost no limiting, slow attack, faster release, 32x oversampling, true peak disabled, the reverbs are Relab Quantx and REV6000 in combination and a tiny bit of LX480 on flutes and steel pans.

Kalimba is through a Strymon Nightsky and DI-ed, acoustic sound is also picked by overheads.

A nice coincidence - my friend, the bass player, got a pair of Line Audio CM3s as a gift, during the process of our rehearsals, from another friend (completely unrelated to our project, where we use mine)

Now he uses them also in other bands, mostly jazz and improvised - but usually just one, a bit closer than our position and also the two mics technique - one below and one higher at the neck... and panned mono. The louder bands with drum sets, saxes, horns, etc.

For our project - this is how it will remain, also for the album. I am very pleased with the sound now.

The only thing that intrigues me is - how a Neumann TLM170 would sound in our set-up - a bit closer to double bass and in mono - and the two CM3s in the position we use, but a bit further away (probably not in this room, though). Or a pair of TLM170s (in wide cardioid), instead of CM3s - that would be fun to test one day... But I am happy with how it is now.

Well, here's my 2-cents. (pardon any spelling errors) I usually record bass in the same room as other musicians. I like a good ribbon mic for bass, so if a RCA 77 or 44 is available, I'll choose that first. I also like to use a SDC of some kind, preferably a tube mic like a KM54 or KM56, or something like that. However, I have found that an old EV664 works well on bass, and has good off-axis rejection, so you can crank it without too much drum leakage.

Here's my big band, with no isolation, and minimal drum baffles. Jennifer Vincent is the bassist, and is mic'd with a RCA 77 just where her right hand pluck the strings, and the EV664 on the G-string side of the bass, just beneath the f-hole. There is NO bass amp in the room, or and DI, just a mix of the RCA77 and the EV664. I think the RCA was the DX type, but a can't remember.

https://youtu.be/cH0PGc8h1WY

Great, classy!

edit - after listening on my studio monitors (Neumann KH150 and HD600) I would only have more bass in the mix (not neccesarily meaning boosted low end, but the overall level of the instrument) and solo sax just a tad softer and smoother - or perhaps only less loud... Sax is especially jumping out of the picture, trumet too a bit, but less obvious... Probably overall more rhythm section vs the brass... I love the Al Schmitt sound... and James Farber (not related probably?) - fat low end and smooth high end - and everything golden in between... your recording sounds like it could be like that with some little balance tweaks...

I would rethink the mix a bit... But that is coming from a bass loving percussionist, so take that with the grain of salt... It is very "live" as it is, but I sense the possibility to become a bit more "cohesive", perhaps with a pinch of well done mixbuss compression... don't know... it is good, but I sense it could be even greater. Probably some more balancing and a pinch of master buss compression to glue it all... of course I am talking about minute changes, not some drastic rebalancing... just a pinch more bass in the mix, just a tad less solo sax, or if some EQ was used - maybe back off with an attempt to make it "clearer", or maybe just a hair less room mics, etc.
Don't know...

Overall I really like your video... I am just thinking out loud how to make it "wow" to my perception... because it already is "hell yeah!". But again - maybe its me and my preference for big bottoms...

The Decca book suggests a fairly high placement if one is recording a double bass section, but in the case of a single solo bass I'm assuming you'd go lower, for more presence and detail ? What is the height you place your 25cms AB CM3's ?