How the gear and recording methods effect each other?

[habbanson]

Hello! I'm about to start record and mix music again with some new gear updates and such. I'm a beginner but i have seen a bunch of different stuffs on youtube, so i'm not a complete beginner.
But i have not much experience at all from actually doing it practically, so there is a question that goes in my mind i would like to know.

I would like to know what the best effective approach for me would be to record judging from my gear.
What i want to do is instrumental music with an acoustic guitar, digital piano and some drum loop samples. Perhaps vocals sometimes.
Piano and guitar is the instruments i can play and have access to, so i would like to play them myself and get them into the mix.
Drums is nothing i have so i really have to use drum samples, even though i would have liked to play the drums myself.

Gears for recording:

2x RODE NT-5 Microphones.
1x Acoustic Guitar (Takamine) with pickup.
1x SE Electronics sE X1
1x Yamaha P-35 (Digital piano)
1x Scarlett Focusrite 2i2 Generation 2.

What is the best approach here to get a good base of dry recordings to mix with?
I wished i had an acoustic piano so i could have recorded with my RODE NT-5's for everything. It feels like that would make the mixing a lot easier/better?

What i have recognized before when i recorded with RODE NT5 for the guitar, and a regular pickup for the digital piano is that the quality of the records differs a lot.
Am i supposed to be able to fix this problem by mixing? Or does something not make me justice here?

What i have recognized before is also that when i do only acoustic and vocals, the quality of the vocal records doesn't fit with the guitar records. Should i be able to mix this up or do i have to get another microphone that blends better with the RODE NT-5 recordings? In this situations i used the SE Electronics sE x1 microphone for vocals. Recorded everything separately.

Thanks!

[Richie Witch]

Here's the process I use for singer/songwriter friends who wanted to create a demo CD.

• 1. If there is going to be a drum track, start with something simple that gives the rhythm and pace of the song.
  2. Record the instrument that plays the harmony/chords in your song, probably the piano or the guitar. If there are no drums, record this first.
  3. Record the lead vocal
  4. Record any lead instrument that supports the melody.
  5. Record any backup instruments
  6. If you're going to replace the drum track, do that last.

In regards to recording quality, you don't mention what was wrong with the recordings. Microphone position plays a huge factor in the quality of the recording. Don't be afraid to record a just a verse or chorus several times with the mic in different positions at different angles. You really want to avoid trying to fix things in the mix. Just keep moving the mic until you get the best sound you can. Take good notes of what worked so you can recreate it for the full recording.

It looks like you have everything you need to get started. Good luck!

[habbanson]

Here's the process I use for singer/songwriter friends who wanted to create a demo CD.

• 1. If there is going to be a drum track, start with something simple that gives the rhythm and pace of the song.
  2. Record the instrument that plays the harmony/chords in your song, probably the piano or the guitar. If there are no drums, record this first.
  3. Record the lead vocal
  4. Record any lead instrument that supports the melody.
  5. Record any backup instruments
  6. If you're going to replace the drum track, do that last.

In regards to recording quality, you don't mention what was wrong with the recordings. Microphone position plays a huge factor in the quality of the recording. Don't be afraid to record a just a verse or chorus several times with the mic in different positions at different angles. You really want to avoid trying to fix things in the mix. Just keep moving the mic until you get the best sound you can. Take good notes of what worked so you can recreate it for the full recording.

It looks like you have everything you need to get started. Good luck!

Thank you! I will try to describe it again. What was wrong? The thing that was wrong was that i get good quality dry recordings when i record my guitar with the 2 stereo microphones, but the piano recordings doesn't sound as clear/good as the guitar tracks i record, probably since the piano isn't the best quality, but perhaps i could EQ this better to make it fit with the guitar tracks better. I imagine that recording an acoustic piano with the same microphones for both guitar and piano would give a more balanced image. To me it feels like the Rode NT5 and my guitar together has really good quality compared to the piano recordings i get. Do you get me now?

[Richie Witch]

I took a look at the owner's manual of the Yamaha piano and here is what I would suggest. Forget trying to use microphones on the piano. Instead, use the headphone output with a Y-adapter and record the sound directly into your Focusrite interface. Just make sure you have the Master Volume on the piano and the gain on the Focusrite inputs all the way down when you connect them and bring the volume and gain up slowly. I found posts from other users who claim that they plug this headphone output into a keyboard amp for live performances, so you should be able to use it for recording.

If you still don't like the sound from the piano, consider using the piano as a MIDI keyboard and use Live's Grand Piano pack, or any other virtual piano of your choice, to record MIDI data into Live. Once you have the MIDI data recorded, you could continue to swap out different virtual instruments until you find one you like, and of course, editing individual notes becomes very easy with MIDI. If I remember correctly, the Focusrite 2i2 does not have MIDI ports, but the Yamaha manual said that they sell a MIDI-to-USB adapter that would take care of that.

[fishmonkey]

if you what you are doing is miking up the crappy little speakers of the digital piano, well, you don't wanna do that.

follow Richie Witch's advice above...

[habbanson]

Thanks, good advice.