Sound recording advice

[Rhythmdvl]

I take group Djembe (an African drum, an evolutionary ancestor to the Conga) lessons in a smallish rehearsal space with about fifteen other people. It is a huge help to record the classes, but not much with the primitive equipment I have. I've been using a small Walkman-style personal cassette recorder that I used in schools to tape lectures. I record through a five dollar microphone that I used to get voice sounds into my PC. Needless to say, the sound leaves quite a lot to be desired. I can barely make out the difference between tones played. And when the sound is very full (i.e. the class is playing different accompaniment parts) I get an almost incomprehensible garble of sound, just about worthless for all intents and purposes.

But what to do? I don't want to spend one-fifty on a minidisk recorder - I don't have that type of spare cabbage and I don't think I need that much capability. All I really want is to be able to distinguish individual sounds with a medium degree of clarity. What would make the most difference in the outcome of the recording? Would getting a better mic help? This is, of course, hard to answer because you don' t know anything about the tape recorder. Is record quality dependent equally on the record heads and microphones, or is the split skewed toward either one?

Thanks in advance for your help / recommendations.

[Opengrave]

I do a bit of amateur sound engineering so maybe I can help a little bit. It would serve you well to improve BOTH - split the money equally.
1) Buy a decent recorder - like a home stereo (rack) model, sure it is bigger but I can only guess you will get better quality. Hopefully you can find one that has some adjustments for gain and bias.
2) Buy a decent (cheap) mic - I know Radio Shack has some, I suggest the best CONDENSER mic you can afford, you DO NOT want a cardoid mic for this.
3) A cheap equalizer may help wonders! It can really help to 'clean up' the sound...problem is now we are running into money and setup time.
4) Buy the best tapes you can afford for your master recording. Something like TDK SA series. If you are recording on low bias tapes your recordings will always sound like mud.
5) Microphone placement is a BIG issue. Try to arrange everyone in a circle and place the mic in the middle. Record a little bit as a test and if someone is too loud have them move away a bit. Basically you are manipulating the input signal's strength by moving its source. Last, experiment with mic position, hanging it overhead may give you better results than on the floor or vise-versa.

If it makes you feel any better drums are one of the toughest instruments to deal with recording LIVE and trying to record 15 of them would be rough, - what you are trying to accomplish is no small task.

[Rhythmdvl]

Thanks Opengrave. I'm off to RadioShack and BestBuy to pick up some tapes and a good mic. Condenser mic, good, cardoid mic bad. Gotcha. I have class tonight and will see how much the mic / tapes improve the sound. Again, I don't need too much clarity, just enough so that when I practice between classes I have something halfway decent to go by. If things are still atrocious, I'll head back or to Ebay to find a better deck. Portability is key though, so I don't know if I'll be able to find a walkman-like recorder up to the task. I've seen basic equalizers on Ebay for under twenty bucks. It sounds like it might be worth it to put them between the portable and the home system when I am editing them down. Again, I'll see what it sounds like after tonight. Thanks!

[Renton_lvr]

FYI-Cardioid refers to the pickup pattern of the mic. It is possible to have a condenser mic(which you need a seperate power source for like phanton power) that uses a cardioid pattern. A dynamic mic needs no outside power source and can work quite well for percussion instruments...in fact the cardioid dynamic Shure SM57 is almost always used to record snare drums and toms in professional recording sessions.

Have you ever thought of renting some equipment? You could get a mic or two, an ADAT or Dat recorder, and a Mackie board(with EQ) for under 50 bucks for a few days. It would sound loads better than anything done on cassette.

[Opengrave]

Originally posted by Renton_lvr
FYI-Shure SM57, Mackie board(with EQ) It would sound loads better than anything done on cassette.

She's beautiful AND she knows sound.... Renton_lvr ladies and gentlemen......

A 'real' system would definitly be the way to go. For more on mics see http://www.shure.com/catwired.html .

[Renton_lvr]

Thank you my dear.