4 Tips For Recording Acoustic Guitar
Recording acoustic guitar can often be a difficult endeavor. Just trying to find the right mic position alone can take a lot of time and effort. Beyond that, any sort of background noise can absolutely ruin a recording.
If you ever find yourself having major issues with recording acoustic guitar, or if you simply want to improve your acoustic guitar recordings, then these tips are for you!
Choose the right room
The first and most important step to any acoustic recording is to choose the right room. Because there is no direct feed for an acoustic instrument, this means that you will end up capturing the sound of the room along with the sound of the instrument, regardless of how well isolated the instrument may be.
This could even become an artistic choice, so don’t be afraid to try recording in every room in your house, if you can! Ultimately, it’s important to ensure that the room you choose to record in sounds great, has the energy you are looking for, and is free of external noise.
Choose the best mic for the job
The choice of microphone used when recording an instrument can be just as important as the choice of the instrument itself. Each microphone has its own tone and sonic qualities that can either add or detract from a recording.
The most common microphone choice for recording an acoustic guitar is the condenser microphone as they often do the best job at encompassing the entirety of the guitar’s sound. However, we would suggest experimenting with more than just one microphone.
A common technique is to blend a dynamic mic with a condenser to achieve a fuller, richer sound. Either way, use the microphone that works best for you.
Decide how many mics you need
After choosing a microphone for your recording, the next step would be to decide where to place it. Many engineers decide to place a microphone both near the soundhole and near the 12th fret.
This allows for a capture of both the low mids coming from the soundhole, as well as the crisp clarity coming from the strings near the 12th fret. There are many ways to mic an acoustic guitar and this is just one of them.
But with any technique you may use, it is important to remember that using more than one microphone can often lead to a more realistic picture of the source you are trying to record-in this case an acoustic guitar.
Mute excess resonance
Resonance muting is a rather basic tip, similar to our first, because it focuses on cleaning up the actual sound of the guitar so that the recording is free from extra noise pollution.
If you find that you are getting an excess ringing in your acoustic guitar recordings it might be wise to invest in a string mute (or tape!).
Place on both ends of your guitar’s strings, on the opposite sides of the bridge and the nut, this will mute those sections of the strings which will cut down on excess resonance that may be bleeding into the mics.
If you are looking for more useful information for your next recording, check out our blog covering a variety of different recording topics.
