Looking around in one of my crazy quests, i found this site.
I was looking for some kind of “onboard” microphone to install on my Frankensflute project (actually on his way to Poland) to play him directly connected to my PC (or a tube amplifier) through a GX1 pedal board (or some other pedal effect). I love experimenting and i build some electronic stuff as well.
The price is quite high: the complete system is 305 Eu, and sincerely i won’t and i cannot spend so much money for an electret microphone and a preamp. I own a LOT of good preamps, one of them with subminiatures tubes.
The question is if someone has previously tried or installed some kind of cheap microphone on his whistles-flutes and (if yes) where i can find something good.
More, which is the best effects combination to enhance a (low) whistle for recording or live playing.
Yikes, do you really screw that into the side of the instrument? I certainly wouldn’t do that to any of my whistles or flutes, no matter how brilliant the resulting sound quality!
http://www.microvox.co.uk has always been my preferred solution when a pick-up system is required; a velcro strap goes round the barrel and holds the mini swan-neck mic in place over the fipple, or on a flute as near to the tone hole as you can get without picking up too much breath noise. Buy the more expensive ‘standard’ power/pre-amp unit with an on/off and volume control, buy a few of the mini swan-neck mics so you can have them in place before you start gigging, and also make your sound engineer very happy indeed by putting the output through a DI box before it goes into the main PA feed.
But whenever I can I use a Shure SM58 on a boom stand; can’t beat it, even if you aren’t going to do all those wonderful Brian Finnegan effects of leaning in or out from the sweet spot of the mic.
As regards effects for a low whistle; maybe a tiny tiny bit of reverb (if you think of the Titanic theme as being 100%, you want about 10%). Anything more obtrusive than that and you’re just using the low whistle as a tone generator for an electronic sound, so why not play a cheap electronic keyboard set to ‘flute’ instead.
The recorder mic has one big drawback for most whistle players. Whistlers tend to play more than just one whistle. They are simple diatonic instruments. To cover a variety of keys we have to have whistles designed for each key played. So using that recorder pickup would require each whistle be prepared to accept the mic or each mic would have to have the mic built into them. I see that as a high hurdle.
As has been mentioned already, it is common practice to mic whistles for performance. You can use a variety of micing techniques as has already been described. The key is that the mic be able to support which ever whistles you need to play. The 57/58 on a stand is pretty common. I sometimes use an Audio-Technica lavelier mic velcroed to the whsitle. And I have a headset mic that I’ve used too. Each has their own puts and takes but they all work for as many whistles (and flutes) that you need to play.
The gear beyond the mic can be as varied and crazy as you like. Once you pick up the sound of the whistle you can use whatever effects you have at your disposal. Everything you hear those recorders doing is available to the mic’ed whistle. And there is no accounting for taste in some cases.
I happen to own and use a TC Helicon Voicelive Touch. I use it when I play solo for vocals but my acoustic guitar plays through it as well. It offers a broad variety of audio effects including very good reverbs, delays and choruses. It also has a harmony generator. And it includes a looper. Just play the whistle into the vocal mic as you would in any audio set up. Then it is possible to structure and play whistle choir arrangements on the fly. And that is somewhat like tightrope walking without a net. This is not something I do every day but it is possible.
Well… we are talking about a cheap (but strangely in tune) ebony flute converted in LowD, a sort of prototype that i will use to record some tunes.
Anyway i must agree with Feadoggie: is better a simple mic fixed on every whistle.
Actually i’m following these auctions:
The first is a decent mic, cheap and small. The second is a VERY good microphone, already tested by some players on various woodwinds. Seems to works well, and is a good vintage piece.
Too much money: sincerely in my experience expensive electronic stuff don’t worth the price. The brand rise the price a lot, too.
I built a lot of effect pedals, amplifiers, preamp, assembling kits or using schematics found on the web and i can say that most of them are professional stuff and work really well. More, i can use high quality or vintage components that make the circuit much better. And using different caps or resistors allow to customize the circuit.
I just purchased a mid-range lavalier mic, i have to looking for a small preamp in my collection and make some test.
The Zoom GX-1 is a cheap but good multieffect pedal, with an expression/volume pedal really useful. I tried the Gx1 with basses and electric mandolins and if you don’t look for the absolute perfection is really a very good investment, paying little money for a nice product. You can program a lot of “patches” with different sounds: things that make this stuff really handly.
I’d be concerned that the mic has an omni pick up pattern. Much of what drives the mic’ing of a whistle has to do with competing for audio space against the banjos, pipes, button boxes and drums. An omni mic is meant to gather sound from a large space. They usually pick up a lot of sound from what’s around the instrument the mic is meant to amplify - lots of room sound and any other loud instruments in the area. So many of us prefer to go with a highly directional pick up pattern. Granted the Sennheiser would be placed close to the noise maker of the whistle but the drums and pipes would probably find their way in.
You probably know this but you want to avoid an impedance mis-match between the lav mic and the preamp. The GX-1 is a guitar pedal, as you know, and it is geared for high impedance devices - electric guitars. Most mics will be low impedance devices. But I am sure that you know the specs of the mic your are using.
The Zoom pedals do have some useful effects. I used a Zoom 504 for some time for acoustic guitar. Instead of the GX-1 the A3 might be a nice choice. It has more appropriate effects for acoustic instruments although I realize you may be going for wild and crazy effects. Another advantage of the A3 is that it has inputs for ultra-high impedance (piezo), high impedance, line level and low impedance devices.
As told before i have some mic preamps, one of them (work in progress) is a small tube one with a couple of Raytheon subminature tubes. Powered by a 9V battery.
I’ll test all thes tuff and yes: the GX1 has a lot of setting really interesting