For most churches, the addition of drums to the worship team represents a major leap forward. A second guitar or additional vocalist is nice, but adding a drum kit is a move up to the big leagues. There are numerous considerations to be pondered if drums are going to happen — for instance, whether an isolation booth or Plexiglas shield will be deployed — but we’ll save these things for another day. Today our focus will be drum miking. This can be as simple or as complex as you like, but in order to do it properly, a little thought is required before execution.
Starting from the Bottom
First thing, let’s break the kit down into its individual elements. Invariably, we start with the kick. Obviously, we want a mic that is capable of reproducing plenty of low-end, and typically we want one that can take plenty of SPL. For these reasons, a dynamic is almost always going to be the first choice. But it’s also nice to capture some of that transient snap our kick provides, and while dynamics can deliver this, a condenser can react more quickly to the transient and give us a nice sharp attack. Optimally, if we have enough mixer channels available and the budget to do so, miking our kick with two mics can yield the best results. Inside the kick, we would place a mic that can deliver that sharp transient, and outside the drum, a mic that delivers the low-end thump. In fact, an additional element can be used to deliver more low-end… a sub-kick. Using three transducers to capture the kick drum is a level of sophistication that is probably limited to a relatively small proportion of churches, but if it’s plausible to do so, the results can be great. Also, a few manufacturers offer hybrid mics —such as Audio-Technica’s Artist Elite AE2500 — that have both dynamic and condenser elements in the same package with two discrete outputs — very clever.
The snare is a unique element, in that it features, by design, both the round, full throatiness of a drum, but also the transient snap and sizzle of the metal snares stretched under it. If we’re only going to allocate a single mic to capture this sound, we’ll invariably place a dynamic mic above the snare, such as the Sennheiser MD 441 shown in Fig. 1. But if we choose to get more sophisticated with multiple transducers on the kick, we’ll probably add a second mic to the snare as well — specifically a mic underneath the drum — potentially a condenser that can capture more detail of the bright transients delivered by the drum’s metal snares. It’s important that the polarity (“phase”) of these two mics are reversed in relation to one another so they’re not working against each other. For that matter, it’s a great idea to experiment with the polarity of all the mics on the kit with the goal of achieving the most phase-coherent blend possible from the numerous mics.
Tom miking is a simpler prospect. Almost every time, we’ll see just a single dynamic mic on each tom. And indeed, the strong tendency here will be toward dynamic mics (although miniature condensers are another popular choice), which are suited to capturing the larger, rounder and fuller tone of the toms. Most of the time, due to the acoustical constraints of some kind of booth or shield, the tom mics will be placed as close as possible to the drums, and there are a couple of considerations to think about here — isolation and avoidance of mics being hit by drumsticks. We’re nearly certain to use mics with tighter cardioid pickup patterns to help achieve directionality, and we’re going to carefully point those mics in a way to avoid picking up spill from other elements of the drum kit. We’re also going to be careful to place the mics in such a way as to give our drummer a clear shot at the head without a mic in the way. The same is true for the snare, where the mic can be obtrusive and obstructive to the drummer if it’s not placed carefully, so take that into consideration.
The Overhead View
Overhead mics can be the most important tools in the miking of a drum kit. For instance, if only two channels are available on the mixer for the drums, a pair of overheads is probably their best and most efficient use. The same is true if only one channel can be spared for the drums — a mono overhead mic can nicely deliver the sound of the drums into the mix, and a pair can improve this to a nice stereo image. Adding overheads to a group of close mics on the kit can nicely round out the full stereo image of the kit and grant more precise control over the various elements in the mix. Condenser mics are commonly used for overheads, although there’s nothing wrong with using dynamic models. If a stereo pair is deployed, the phase relationship between mics can be an issue because the overheads are invariably further from the drums than the close mics, and hence present the signal a few milliseconds later than the close mics, resulting in less-than perfect phase coherency. One way to reduce this negative effect (and my personal favorite) is to use stereo mics in an X-Y pattern over the kit. A spaced pair creates two discrete phase incoherencies, while X-Y mics essentially reduce that effect to a single incoherency divided between two mics.
If you have the luxury of adding a mic for the hi-hat, you’re probably going to end up muting it in the mix anyway. I’m only half kidding about this… Yes, it’s nice to be able to represent the hi-hat in a clean, clear, close-miked fashion, but remember that this will increase the number of phase-smearing incoherencies in the mix, and simply may not be necessary. A properly-placed overhead pair should present all the cymbals nicely.
Plan of Action
My standard operating procedure with miking drums is to let the drummer set up the kit, play it a bit, and get comfortable with it. Once they’re happy with the placement of the elements of the kit, then — and only then — place your mics. More pointedly — don’t force drummers to change the placement of their tools to accommodate your mics. Your mic placement should accommodate their drums. Comfortable drummers are happy drummers, and happy, comfortable drummers deliver better performances. A good performance improves the quality of the sound more than almost anything we can do as technicians.
For the church that’s just starting down the path of using live drums, a great place to start is with drum mic kit — most major manufacturers offer kits with several mics. I think that most churches will begin to methodically replace each of the kit mics with higher-quality purpose-made mics that will deliver better results, and the long-term occasional replacement of one mic at a time eliminates the sticker shock that raises the eyebrows of the bean counters and reduces the likelihood of being granted the budget. Get a mic kit, plan carefully, deploy the mics effectively, then replace them over time with high-quality mics that will deliver the sound of the kit to your mixer in high-quality fashion.
John McJunkin is the chief engineer and staff producer in the studio at Grand Canyon University.
