Drum recording and Mixing

Total Duration: 8 hours

Drum recording

Date recorded: 31/10/09
Duration: 4.5 hours

I recorded drums for a composition I am working on. The drums were recorded in sections varying in length (4-8 bars).
I set up 7 new audio tracks and I set the appropriate input for each channel. The first two channels are the overheads which I recorded with the X-Y configuration, 3rd channel is the snare, 4th rack tom, 5th first floor tom, 6th the second floor tom and the last channel was the kick drum (no microphone was used to record the underside of the snare).
I played to a click track at 140bpm throughout.



Mixing the drums

Date: 01/11/09
Duration: 3.5 hours

The first thing I did was to pan the overheads hard left and right. I placed the snare and kick drum dead centre and the toms were placed appropriately in the stereo field.

I used EQ primarily to cut/reduce any frequencies from a particular part of the drumkit. For example I reduced the amount of bass & lower-mid frequencies in the overheads mics so I am left with mostly high-mids and the highs. Separating drum parts by their frequencies lets them sit better altogether as a 'entire' kit but also when other instruments are added on top of it. During my corrective eq'ing, I discovered unpleasant noise/ring when the snare drum was struck.
I used a technique where by I use a bell EQ with very high Q at around 15dB gain. I slowly scroll through the frequency spectrum and listen out for any oddities (such as overly resonant frequencies).
When I discover the frequency/s responsible, I flip the gain from +15dB to -20dB. This will rid any problematic frequencies from the recording.

After reducing frequencies from various parts of the drumkit I went about adding/boosting frequencies. I added extra bass freq to kick drum, highs to overheads etc.

After EQ I decided to strip silence from recordings (other than the overheads) to control bleed. This will make the various parts of the drum kit sit better in the stereo field and allows for more greater control.
I added compression to the snare and kick drum making sure they were the loudest in the mix and their perceived loudness were about the same.

I Added small amounts of reverb to the snare and small amounts to the entire drumkit using a separate bus. I made sure the reverb were subtle and it did not make the mix sound 'muddy'.
Then I made sure each drum part's was appropriate using the faders and I went about bouncing the drums.
The drums were bounced in sections in the form of a 'loop' instead of a entire performance. These bounces were then transferred to my project were I will be adding other instruments.