What's in YOUR closet?

[partsmanba]

I'm interested in seeing what everyone has for mics and how they are using them, and maybe getting a dialogue going about using what we have to a better purpose. Also, if you could give some idea of what size sanctuary/congregation you have (assuming that people with larger churches will have more toys .) I'll start:

1 Shure WL185/PGX1 for minister
1 Shure SM58/PGX2 - wireless handheld for speakers/singers
4 Shure SM58's - vocals
2 Shure SM57 - piano mic (AARGH!) and 1 extra
3 AKG C535EB - choirs, some vocalists, instruments, etc.
2 A/T AT935QMRx - drums in a Recorderman overhead setup (Google it!)
1 Astatic 827 - podium mic
1 Shure SM90 - congregation capture (may put in piano if we can get a second one!)
2 Stageline SPM130 - if someone needs a mic with a switch, or we run out of SM58's
1 MXL 2001 - Never have pulled it out...

Sanctuary is appx. 50 X 50, congregation is about 40 for early service, 140 for later.

[waynehoskins]

Here's what's in our mic package at the moment.

Lead vocal - Neumann KMS 105
Backing vocals - Sennheiser 865, 855, 935
Acoustic - Avalon U5 DI
Kick - AKG D112
Snare Top - Audix I5
Hat - SM81
Toms - Audix D2, D4
Overhead (ride) - SM81
Electric guitars - Sennheiser 609, SM7, SM57

Body Mics (2) - Sennheiser MKE2 (tie clip config) on EW100G1 radios
Handheld Wireless (1) - Sennheiser 835S (with switch) on SKP100G1 radio

We seat 250-300, church size 500-600, sanctuary dimensions 70x60, modern music.

Improvements I'd like to make:

- I have an Audix D6 to put in the kick, but it's a pain to get to behind the shield, and the D112 sounds acceptable enough, so I haven't changed it. Love the D6 more than the D112 though.

- More KMS105s on vocals. We have usually 2 backing vocals, no more than 3 (for a total of four vocal channels); I want to be able to put 105s on all of them. They're a simply phenomenal mic.

- Add bottom snare mic. I have a Sennheiser 604 to use, just takes doing.

- Switch pastors etc. to DPA 4066 headband mics. They're just about the best mic in the world for speech applications.

Hope that gives you a decent idea of what I'm looking at.

[hoosierdraft]

Wayne, have a D6 coming in this week. Tired of the kick being lost in the mix without any miking. Do you use it inside or outside the drum? Other tips for using this mic??

[prochlea]

Here's our mic kit - (we're in a portable situation, so the mics get shuffled around alot)

Shure SM58's - Mostly used for background vocalists, but sometimes toms or kick (depending on who's setting up that day
Shure SM57's - Vocal mic for our worship director(with foam windscreen), toms, bottom snare mic, other various aux percussion
Audix OM5 - Mostly used for a few female background singers or tenor males, sometimes low tom
Audix i5 - sometimes used in kick or bottom snare
Heil PR20 - vocals (depending on the singer) edit - We also use this on the kick if we don't have a vocalist that needs it
Shure Beta 58 - vocals (depending on the singer)
Sennheiser 441 - Top Snare mic
Oktava MK 219 - most often used on electric guitar amps, sometimes aux percussion
Oktava MK012 - stringed instruments, sometimes used on low end of grand piano
Shure KSM Stereo Pair - Drum overheads, room ambiance, high end of grand piano
AKG 414 - drum overhead, acoustic guitar, guitar amp, mid-range of grand piano

I also have a DIY version of a Yamaha Subkick for the kick drum - I took an old 5.25" woofer that I had laying around and mounted it into a PVC toilet flange and built a little housing around it with a mic stand adapter. I wired a speaker cable onto it with a 1/4" connector and we run it into a DI, and it works great on the kick drum. It needs to be used in conjunction with a regular mic so that you get a little snap of the beater, but the subkick gives you a lot fuller low end to the kick. It needs a little bit of gating and compression, but it sounds pretty great.

We average about 350-400 attendance and have a full band that generally consists of electric gtr, acoustic, bass, keyboard, drums and vocals. We have other instruments that come in from time to time... violin, cello, upright bass, grand piano, sax, mandolin... We have alot of music grad students who play lots of different instruments, so it always keeps us on our toes.

[bladeaudio]

Lead vocals/BG vocals - Shure KSM9
(through wireless Shure SLX transmitter, replaced the SM58 capsule with a KSM9 capsule as by default you can't purchase a KSM9 with the SLX line.)

pastor - Countryman E6 through a shure SLX transmitter.

piano - Audix SCX25

kick - Shure Beta 52A
toms/snare - Beta 98
hi hat - Crown CM700
overheads - Rode NT5

All our guitars and bass are DI through Radial DIs.

When we have orchestra... Arrangement varies depending on what instruments are playing, the first mic is my first choice, then backup, etc.

violins/violas - DPA 4099, SM81
cello - Audix SCX25, SM81
string bass - Audix SCX25
flute - Audix ADX10-FLP
oboe - Audix SCX25, SM81
timpani - Shure SM57
clarinets - Crown CM700
brass - usually just put up an area mic to get the brass on the recording, Crown CM700, or Shure SM57. Would like to get simple clip on mics, like the AT pro35, etc to clip on individual instruments.

I'm in the process of converting our orchestra from being sectionally mic'd to individually mic'd so they can keep up with the rhythm section (drums, electric guitars, bass, acoustic guitars) which are DI'd in to the system.

Our style is varied, we'll do a full rhythm section band, electric guitar, bass, drums, acoustic guitar, synths for one number, and pipe organ for another. We have an orchestra about once a month.

Our room seats 1700, about 3000 in the congregation across two services.

[waynehoskins]

Originally Posted by hoosierdraft

Wayne, have a D6 coming in this week. Tired of the kick being lost in the mix without any miking. Do you use it inside or outside the drum? Other tips for using this mic??

The D6 doesn't take much work to sound good. Put it inside and roughly aimed at the beater, and you should get a pretty decent mix of thump and slap. Theoretically you should flip the phase on it too, since it's pointing the other way.

[Jay Bee]

We have a relatively simple set up, our music groups (we have three) are composed of similar sets of instruments:
Piano, Guitar, bass, drums, Cello (we seem to have a lot of these!), violin or viola, flute or clarinet - give or take, that's a typical setup.
We use Audio Technica ATM33a for most of the musicians, DI's for guitar/bass and we have Sennheiser e845 for vocals and for combo's
We have sennheiser lapel mic's ME2's for speakers/leaders and a hand held SKM 100 for various roles (interviews etc.. sometimes used for vocals, but this is the condenser version not the dynamic - I have been known to use it for more 'operatic' voices)
Our lectern mic's are AKG goosenecks, but I don't actually know what capsules they are using - we have a spare one so I constructed a spare piano mic out of it... (Grand piano). We normally use one of the ATM33a at the 'bottom' end, and the converted lectern mic for the 'top' end.
We use the ATM33a's as overheads and the 845 as kick of we have enough mic's spare (musicians requirements vary from week to week).

I am not vastly experienced, so would be interested in any (kind) comments...

The congregation - usually about 250-350 per 'sitting' - two morning services, one evening service

[Nathan J]

Sennheiser e835 (6) for vocals
Shure MX418 (4) pulpit mic for occasional speaker or drama use
Audiopile 454 (2) kick, bass guitar amp
AKG C1000s (2) assorted instrument use
Shure SM58 (2) assorted instrument use
Sennheiser e835-G3 (2) handheld for WL, Pulpit
Sennheiser HSP2 (1) for Sr. Pastor (Sennheiser G2 bodyback)
Countryman E6i (1) for Guest speaker or drama (Sennheiser G2 bodypack)

Average Sunday attendance is around 100.

[Jay Bee]

It seems to me (judging from the answers so far) that the premise of the larger churches having better toys may not apply to microphones... maybe it applies to mixers/amps?

[prochlea]

I know that in my church's case - the reason we have a pretty decent collection is that there are two professional sound guys on the team... and some of the mics are on loan from personal collections. In my mind - the mic is just about the most important thing in the signal chain... if you don't have a great sounding signal coming out of the microphone, you can process it all you want, but it just won't sound as good. That doesn't mean that it's the most expensive mic, but it's the right one for the job.

[partsmanba]

Originally Posted by waynehoskins

Here's what's in our mic package at the moment.

Lead vocal - Neumann KMS 105
Backing vocals - Sennheiser 865, 855, 935
Acoustic - Avalon U5 DI

Gee, Wayne, can I come play guitar at your church? I Googled that DI and about started crying...

[partsmanba]

Originally Posted by Jay Bee

It seems to me (judging from the answers so far) that the premise of the larger churches having better toys may not apply to microphones... maybe it applies to mixers/amps?

Pretty sure that's going to be true, Jay Bee. Larger churches have to put more elements into the mixes, and have a larger space to fill.