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Dear all,
first of all - happy holidays and a great start into 2015!
Lately, I got very interested in the acoustic sound of archtops and I love the acoustic sound of my golden eagle. So it seemed natural to look for ways to amplify that sound. The magnetic pickup through an acoustic amplifier doesn't provide the natural sound of the guitar (and doesn't sound good to me). So Santa has been kind and brought a microphone that is meant to amplify acoustic guitars and has a good reputation - a dpa d:vote 4099 Guitar (who came up with that name?)
So far it has been quite frustrating. I tried to connect it the way they suggest and to go directly into the mixer of a small PA (Bose L1 with mixer) - no volume, only feedback. Put a phantom power and L.R. Baggs para DI in between - same result. Went into an AER acoustic amplifier - some volume, but still mainly feedback. The least disappointing was to go out of the AER into the PA with the master of the AER turned down.
Whatever I do, I barely manage to get louder than the natural sound of the guitar before feedback sets in. Now that I need AC/DC stage volume, but to fill at least a small room should be possible? How do the pros do it? How does Lulian Lage manage to play a concert hall with his acoustic archtop? I wonder what I am doing stupidly wrong? Any advice?
Here is a picture how the manufacturer suggests to mount the mic - I get no volume, only feedback (but talking into the mic confirms that it is working fine) .
The best result is obtained by pointing the mic towards the upper f-hole (the lower one sounds bad). But in this position the support is in my way and I would certainly knock the mic off the guitar sooner or later. The sound I hear from the PA is the natural sound of the guitar but still a bit thin.
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12-27-2014 03:20 PM
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From what I see online it's not a cheap mic, so you should be having better results. You need to do two things: 1) Get the gain structure right; 2) Get the placement right.
Gain structure: It requires 48v phantom power, so make certain it's getting that. Plug straight into a high quality full range mic preamp such as that found on a mixer or acoustic instrument amplifier. Be very conservative with the preamp volume or it will likely squeal at you.
Placement: Clamp it to the lower treble bout or near the treble waist, and point it down at the bridge. The f-hole produces a very boomy, unbalanced sound that is not practical for mics most of the time. Try the bridge instead.
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When I first saw the title of your thread, I thought it had to do with mice and guitars.
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I second Rp's suggestion.
Most acoustic guars are recorded with a mic placed around the 12th fret, although I have found the 14th to be better on archtops and angle it back towards the body slightly.
Putting the Mic into an F'hole will also increase your feedback issues, if I'm not mistaken.
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I would say that mic placement they recommend might be okay for a flattop with the sound hole close to end of neck, but not an archtop. Mic placement is all about getting the sound your looking for i.e. high end, bottom end, percussion of the picking a balance, etc. In studio we would start by listening to the player and guitar and moving around seeing where they different sounds are coming from. Sometimes we put the mic on a loose boom stand and then have 2nd engineer (me) move the mic around while engineer is in the booth listening. Once the sound wanted is found then tighten down the boom stand. That would probably work for you is get someone and explain how the mic attaches so they can move it around basically where there is room to attach it. You can listen and once found clamp it in place. I would probably start on lower bout a see what you get out of bottom of the F-hole. It's a experimentation.
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Where is the PA speaker in relation to you where you play?
How high do you have the preamp gain set?
How high do you have the level of PA or amp set?
The only way it will feed back is if the speaker is too close to the guitar and microphone. That's the only way the feedback oscillation can start.
Try positioning the PA/amp speaker about 8-10 ft away from you and sit parallel with or slightly behind it and have it face the audience. edit-just realized you're using a Bose system. Maybe the Bose manual has a suggestion for instruments using a mic as opposed to a built in pickup.
Start with the preamp gain set low - may be at 25%. Master volume set off. Some preamps have a clipping light. They normally ask you to play your loudest passages so the clip light barely comes on. Bring up the master volume a bit till you hear your guitar in the PA speaker and then adjust to taste. Experiment. by turning the master up till feedback is an issue then back off. Is this loud enough for your performance? Sometimes you may need to put some tape over the F holes of the guitar. I like the green painter's tape as it won't peel off the finish.Last edited by DRS; 12-28-2014 at 07:47 AM.
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To reduce the onset of feedback, you need the largest signal from your guitar, i.e. the mic placed at the point of greatest volume, and the lowest volume from the amp at the mic, i.e. the amp in front of the guitar and pointing away from you.
Originally Posted by rpguitar
Like RP says, the spot for the greatest archtop volume is over the bridge. The mic is very directional, so amp placement matters a lot.
But after all of the above, mic'ing your guitar will not get anywhere near electric guitar volumes, or even horn combo volumes.
Have fun. Play.
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Many thanks to everyone who took the time to reply! I'll try everything tomorrow and perhaps also trs to record.
cheers,
frank
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That's a supercardioid (highly directional) mic, which in general is a good thing for avoiding feedback. But if you are using the Bose PA with the PA behind you (as Bose reccommends) you must avoid pointing the mic toward the speakers or toward any surface they might reflect from (such as a back wall).
I'd suggest experimenting with the mic first in an environment free of feedback (e.g. a studio) to find the several placements and eq settings that give you a good tone and signal level. Then move your experiments to the bandstand and do some experiments to identify the sources of feedback and how you might mitigate it.
What's the approximate frequency of the feedback? That can help diagnose and mitigate it. If it's a specific frequency, an EQ notch might be an option.
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[Use channel 1, microphone input, on the BOSE L1. - wrong]
Correction: BOSE L1 microphone input does not support phantom power. Unless you have an external 48V box, channel 1 won't work.
Instrument input may not have enough gain or may have impedance mismatch.
miking the neck join won't work. It will sound very thin as the resonance of the guitar is not picked up by the microphone.
For a steel string acoustic, the hole is near the neck join and the resonance can be picked up from that position.
For guitar with F-hole, placing the mic near the f-hole will be necessary to get the best sound.
Try moving the mic to the top of the F hole to get out of the playing zone.
push the mic into the hole will give you more boomy sound.
Enjoy! it is a very nice microphone.Last edited by r_cc_c; 12-27-2014 at 07:50 PM.
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Miking acoustic guitars for sound reinforcement is not as easy as it might seem; the growing popularity of acoustic guitars with factory installed transducers (could that be an oxymoron?) attests to that. The advice on mic placement provided by the other members' postings is sound (not a pun). Positioning the mic is critical - somewhere around the bridge is a good place to start. Listening via headphones, with no amplification/speakers in play, may be helpful in determining optimal mic placement, if you don't have a 2nd engineer hanging around. It won't be at the 14th fret; that placement is often useful to avoid the booming bass associated with dreadnought (full size) flat top guitars, but probably won't be very effective for an archtop.
I've never used the Bose L1 system. Apparently, the line array cabinets have a 180 degree horizontal coverage angle. You'll get a lot more gain before feedback if the mic is not located within the coverage area of the main speakers; with a 180 cabinet, that's not going to be easy. Ideally, any open mics should be located behind the main speakers, well out of their coverage pattern, and the main cabinets should have tightly controlled coverage angles, as well as very uniform off axis coverage (response/"leakage"). I know that Bose touts the wide horizontal coverage of the L1 arrays as enabling them to function as monitors as well as mains, but that concept would make me very nervous if I were trying to get significant volume from a miked acoustic guitar. The louder the guitar, the more likely the chances for success; my friend's 1939 L5 comes to mind, but my Campellone, although a great guitar and a legitimate acoustic instrument, not so much so...
The other thing that would make me nervous is setting up any sound system without a quality EQ (a 1/3 octave graphic or multi-band parametric) in the signal path; in fact, I wouldn't do it. It's a combination of mics, speakers, mic placement, speaker placement, analysis/EQ, venue acoustics and operator experience that enable Julian Lage to fill a concert hall with sound from an acoustic archtop guitar.
That being said, it is possible to pull it off on a budget. That DPA mic, in combination with a simple (Mackie?) mixer,
(Ashly) 1/3 octave EQ, a (QSC) pwr. amp and a well behaved pair of speaker cabinets (yeah I know - old school; tried and true) will work well in a lot of cases - maybe marginally in a crowded, noisy bar, but just fine if the audience is paying attention. I've had great success using JBL SR speaker cabinets (kind of heavy and pretty expensive) and JBL VRX932LA's (much lighter, but very pricey). A viable, lighter, economical choice for small venues, believe it or not, are EV Sx300 cabinets; I've had very good results in terms of volume vs feedback with a pair of those cabinets. On the other hand, I've had some very disappointing results with cabinets manufactured by some other well established speaker companies, who shall remain nameless.
Still, that's a heck of a lot of stuff to haul around. These days, in any situation besides a sit down concert performance, I rely on the pick-up and an amp. Of course, I'm getting old; there was a time (about 15 years, all told) where I refused to use anything but a mic while playing acoustic swing on a Martin D 21. Played it in all kinds of situations/venues - ah youth...
I hope this doesn't sound too negative; that DPA mic is to die for, and will work great for gigs where there's a quality sound system and an experienced operator. The more you experiment with sound reinforcement systems, the easier it will be for you to become that experienced operator, and to get the results you want. Next time you play a festival where things are sounding good, bring along that mic and you'll really light 'em up...
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Freddie Green insisted on having a supercardiod small condensor mike pointed at the lower scroll of his treble F-hole. It was on a stand, not fixed to the guitar. At one point he had red gaffa tape in the shape of an arrow on his guitar to indicate where he wanted his sound picked up from. (Some say the tape was there to fix a loose binding, but the other story is better, isn't it).
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Forget flats. Try a set of phosphor bronze or 80/20 strings.
Do you have it running off the DPA DAD 4099 phantom power adaptor and a phantom power supply?Last edited by Jabberwocky; 12-28-2014 at 07:03 AM.
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Many thanks for all the suggestions - there has been progress this morning by putting the mic closer to the bridge and watching my position relative to the speaker. I also found a picture of Julian Lage using it in a similar way. I guess he is using the violin adapter to clamp the mic to the tailpiece. I don't have that adapter, but I will get one as the way I do it now is awkward and unstable.
You see it here: Audio Technica ATM350 mic: A nice solution to amplifying an acoustic archtop - The Acoustic Guitar Forum
Jabber, I am not using flats (Thomastik Bebop, round 13s - my favorites) and I don't want to put phosphpr bronze on my golden eagle as I mainly use it electrically amplified. But I am toying with the idea of a dedicated acoustic archtop.
I am using a 48V phantom power supply and an eq. The chain is mic-> phantom power -> l.r. Baggs para di -> aer -> bose tonematch mixer -> bose l1. ... That may be a few devices too much :-) without the aer, the feedback problems were worse though - and a bit of the magnetic pickup mixed in sounded quite good.
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nice story oldane! Thanks for sharing! Originally Posted by oldane
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well i too wanted to go the acoustic route with mic for my flamenco guitar ...worked a treat in the studio but almost every concert was a nightmare ... i wondered how paco did it and eventually just used the acoustic tone for studio work ...and fitted an LR baggs for performance ....think the same applies for you ....
yes i'm sure there's a way to get acoustic tone and oddly enough it's easier on a big stage in an auditorium than a small intimate stage ... and i would suggest you use the pickup live or for a more acoustic tone even fit an LR baggs i beam pickup that is not under saddle but attached under the bridge inside the guitar and picks up the top and that might give a very acoustic tone ....
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It does seem that you have perhaps too many amplifier stages in your signal chain. It only "needs" to have:
Mic --> Preamp --> Power amp --> speaker
The preamp usually provides on board phantom power at the XLR jack.
Multiple amp stages will produce weird tonal artifacts and hyper-sensitive response, leading to feedback and general unpleasantness. I would suggest simplifying before investing too much time in the mic placement experiments.
For example, in my case, I'd plug the mic directly into a channel of my Clarus head. It provides phantom power. The head has an integrated power amp and drives a cabinet. Done. I have a Baggs Para DI too but would insert that only after achieving a satisfactory tone with the basic setup. Just a thought.Last edited by rpguitar; 12-28-2014 at 11:20 AM.
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Thank you Roger!
the options are a bit limited. The aer does provide 9V but not 48 V of phantom power. So if I want to use it i need at least the phantom power device. The lr baggs is not required and i'll try without it - it was in the chain from previous attempts where I found that it improved the sound. But the dpa mic is sounding a lot better and more natural than any piezo (obviously) and it also sounds - at least to me - more natural than the Schertler dyn-g.
The Bose ToneMatch does provide 48V phantom power but going directly in there provided the worst feedback problems. I thought the signal that arrived there was too weak, which is where the para di came in and then i needed the exzernal phantom power since the para di has none etc etc etc - but your point is well taken - i'll try simplifying before moving on.
cheers,
Frank
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thank you for sharing Keira! That is probably right ... But for now I'll be a boy and play :-) the i beam looks interesting but it requires some drilling, right? Originally Posted by Keira Witherkay
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12-28-2014, 12:57 PM #20destinytot Guest
I've been following this thread with interest as this is a topic of importance to me, and I'm pleased there's been progress.
I haven't chimed in because I've no advice or suggestions to add to what's been posted. However, it now seems appropraiate to comment that - coincidentally - I've also just acquired a condenser with an adjustable gooseneck.
As soon as I read Jonathan Stout's post about affordable ones on his great Swing Guitar blog, I wanted a clip-on condenser so I could move while playing (instead of having to hold the guitar close to the mic). It wasn't designed for guitar, but it's excellent - even clipped it to the strap of my nylon.
I'm not on any kind of commission - and I hope it's OK to post this - but this is the one I went for AKG C 519 M Miniature Condenser Clip-On Microphone. I like this one because (i) it has a bass-cut switch; (ii) the phantom power adapter is built-in to a standard XLR connector, and (iii) the detachable 3m cable is also reasonably robust. Besides which, I found it affordable.
I'm using it for my Godin 5th Avenue acoustic archtop (which I've had set up with a decent bridge and adjusted to take extremely heavy-gauge strings - .85 - .16 Newtone customs - for learning to play in the tuning used by Marty Grosz).
This guitar may sound like a toy compared to my Sonntag - and I'd love to get something with a bigger bark one day - but I'm doing what I can to make it work and can easily get a perfectly good sound by using a condenser mic into a small Polytone via portable mixer (vocals, too). Here's an example using that set up:
On the other hand, if I were using a fine archtop, I'd certainly invest in a mic to match it.Last edited by destinytot; 12-28-2014 at 01:33 PM. Reason: organisation
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12-29-2014, 07:10 AM #21destinytot GuestI prefer that, too - but only in a 'concert' setting and with sympathetic listeners. For practical purposes, it remains an ideal; a guiding principle that inspires me to persevere and not capitulate. Originally Posted by 2bornot2bop
I prefer the adjustable stand route....I couldn't imagine having to maneuver around a mic clipped to a guitar too.
My problem is getting the recording process down!
I love the electric sound of my semi, too - but even then, I'm going resist the temptation to turn up in order to get people to listen. Better to 'turn down' the gig, in my opinion. Although I'm fine with it (because that's just the way it is), the noise level here was too high for my liking:
This interview with (my hero) Marty Grosz is a 'must-read' for acoustic warriors/strugglers. (I love his humour, e.g. "I hate electric guitars. These guys sit there with these boxes and the first thing they have to do is plug in. It's like a life-support system."): http://www.martygrosz.com/pdfs/marty...al_11-1992.pdf
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In the acoustic guitar world, everyone has been moving to dual source systems. A magnetic soundhole pickup, or soundboard transducer, or undersaddle pickup, with a low pass filter so it's just picking up bass/mid-range. This is paired with an internal microphone with a low cut filter, so it's just picking up the high frequencies. This usually has great results, because the treble is where the mic is most needed to sound "real", and the feedback problems usually happen in the low end.
Look at systems like the K&K Trinity, L.R. Baggs Anthem, Fishman Rare Earth Blend. I don't know why archtop players haven't followed the trend. Solid-wood/carved archtops are acoustic instruments.
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12-29-2014, 10:42 AM #23destinytot GuestThe AKG clip-on condenser does a fine job. Originally Posted by RyanM
However, I've had a taste of how effective an LR Baggs soundboard transducer can be; a (very kind and helpful) local luthier here in Valencia fitted one to the flamenco guitar I use to play chordal accompaniment for bossa nova. I've been running it through the preamp of an Evans RE200 to a vocal PA for the last six months, and it's given me a whole new direction to go in. (I'm a long-time Earl Klugh fan.)
I was very pleasantly surprised by this, so I'll keep an open mind and look at those dual-source systems for when I upgrade from the Godin 5th Avenue. (Any suggestions for solid-wood/carved archtops appreciated - I've read about The Loar, but the V-shaped neck puts me off.)
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I use a Fishman Rare Earth Blend on my gypsy guitar into a Baggs Para DI into the mic/line input on a Quilter MicroPro 200. It's the best amplified sound I've been able to get so far (I've tried about everything out there) but it's still a compromise at best. Of course, gypsy guitars are ridiculously difficult to amplify...
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Wait. No. Something isn't right. Yea, placement and all that but it should not feedback at the acoustic volume of the guitar. You are using a DPA4099 XLR adapter, yes? Seems something is hooked up wrong. First off, ditch all the extra pieces of gear. Go straight into the AER or the Bose. Either should work as they both provide 48V phantom power.
AER Manual:
5.4 Phantom power
Microphones requiring 48V phantom power can be
connected to the XLR-socket of channel 2 directly.
Factory-provided phantom power is activated but,
if required, may be deactivated by an internal jumper.
In contrary 9V phantom power, if required, can additionally
be activated in channel 1 by an internal
jumper.
Bose Tone Match manual:
3. Phantom power switch – Applies +48V power to input channels 1-3.
A red LED indicates that phantom power is on.
Use the XLR input on the AER <or> Channel 1-3 on the Tone Match. Make sure 48V is enabled.
That's it. This should allow you to turn the mic up until you get some volume. Don't aim the mic at the speaker (would be hard to do given a directional mic mounted on the guitar) and allow some distance (guessing 3" to 6") between the guitar top and the mic. It should work as you would expect and then you can go about optimizing the sound.Last edited by Spook410; 12-29-2014 at 04:50 PM.
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