Zoom hand held recorder for tuba

[MG]

Hey all:

Any recommendations for which Zoom hand held recorder works well for tuba?

MG

[BopEuph]

Any and all of them are great. Depends on what this is for.

If you're just recording the tuba for practice and/or audition tapes, just get the H1n, which you can get for less than 100 brand new. The "brain" on these things does very well, records in high quality, and has some very nice settings. The weak link is just the mic, which does very well for what it is.

I also have an H6 with all the accessories that are sold separately. I love it for what it is, but that is overkill for you, unless you want to use "real" microphones, and record in a fidelity that lets you do things like drastically change the tempo or pitch and not lose fidelity (and what I mean is, doing something ridiculous like taking it down two octaves and slowing it down to 1/8 speed for sound effects), or record with multiple microphones. The shotgun attachment has a lot of great applications, though.

[Bassboner]

I got an H4 essential, which I use for brass quintet and tbone quartet. It seems to work brilliantly with low frequency stuff. I recommend a giant, high quality sd card with it, and a mic stand with appropriate holder.

It comes set up for 2 track, but with 2 additional XLR mics and wires, you can get 4 track data.

If you just want to place the mic and go, it's a great setup. If you really have a need to spin all the dials, you can spend a lot more time and money on that.

Read/watch a few reviews to make sure it's really going to do what you need. I've been loving it just to make rehearsal tapes. Put it down in the middle of the group with fresh AAs and a big SD card, and it tales care of levels (although not balance, as the mics are fixed). Then I chop the big file into individual tunes for us to check out. Under $200 H4 Essential.

[arpthark]

I got an H1 essential, which I use for brass quintet and tbone quartet. It seems to work brilliantly with low frequency stuff. I recommend a giant, high quality sd card with it, and a mic stand with appropriate holder.

It comes set up for 2 track, but with 2 additional XLR mics and wires, you can get 4 track data.

If you just want to place the mic and go, it's a great setup. If you really have a need to spin all the dials, you can spend a lot more time and money on that.

Read/watch a few reviews to make sure it's really going to do what you need. I've been loving it just to make rehearsal tapes. Put it down in the middle of the group with fresh AAs and a big SD card, and it tales care of levels (although not balance, as the mics are fixed). Then I chop the big file into individual tunes for us to check out. Under $200 H1 Essential.

I always used the H1 in college to record myself. Pretty good little recorder.

[travisd]

The newer "HxEssential" line has the benefit of recording in 32-bit Float which means not needing to set levels prior to recording - but you will need to adjust the gain in editing afterwards. Also don't overlook that most of them (all?) support functioning as an audio interface, so you can use them to feed external Mics into your DAW (Logic, Audacity, Protools, etc).

I've been using the h6Essential and a couple of very inexpensive condenser mics (AT2020's) to record the community bands I'm playing in. 32-bit Float means I can set and forget with no worries about clipping.

[BopEuph]

The newer "HxEssential" line has the benefit of recording in 32-bit Float which means not needing to set levels prior to recording

Whoa...this is a thing now?! My old H1 and H6 actually record two different files; one of which is set at a much lower gain in case you get too much clipping. This 32-bit float is new and I'm now very interested in this feature.

[Mary Ann]

Me too. I have an H4 I've had for a LONG time and noted back then that it could actually hear the tuba in a quintet. Used it with a Rode mike, made one four-track recording of a woo-woo violin piece that I still send to people. It would be nice to have a more point-and-shoot version of it for recording funzie stuff.

[BopEuph]

It would be nice to have a more point-and-shoot version of it for recording funzie stuff.

Isn't that what you would use the xy mic for? And I believe the old H4 still has the two recording files with differing gains so that you can have a salvaged take. They also record up to 96kHz, which is overkill for music recording (and just bare minimum for field recording for sound effects).

[Bassboner]

Yeah, the float is the part that really makes this thing super easy to use without having a lot of prior experience with the device and without a lot of pre-checks or post-processing. I've never had to adjust levels in post for recordings from this device.

Here's a link to a portion of a raw recording I made at a recent quintet reading rehearsal. The tuba starts it off. The recorder was just placed randomly about a foot off the floor in the center of the quintet, and just using the buit-in mics. The tuba is a little fluffy sounding, which I think is due mostly to the placement of the recorder - plus he's kind of in training for the position. Playing a 184 C on which he's not really confident yet. But you can hear the lower end of my trombone playing sounds pretty good. This wasn't intended to be a pro-quality recording, it's just a reading rehearsal to get an idea of what's going on with some new arrangements we were checking out.

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/3lb18wbs ... bvewg&dl=0

The bad thing about these recorders, and you can hear it in this recording, is that it's hard to achieve good balance if you are close-miced and have more than 2 players. It would be better at a distance where the sound has a chance to blend out. On this recording it picks up the trombone and one trumpet really well. The F horn you can't even hear, and the tuba isn't as strong as it should be. If you had individual mics on stands this would be easier to control. It was recorded in a small practice room with 5 people in a tight circle, and the recorder in the middle just off the floor level.

PS: Sorry, I've been calling this the H1 Essential, and it's really the H4 Essential.

I have a 500+ GB SD card in it, so I don't worry about storage or session length. A 1.5 hour rehearsal takes up about 2.5 GB, and it seems to split it after about 2 GB of recording into multiple files. It records as a WAV file, which might be a setting, I don't remember. The batteries are really the limiting factor. A couple of regular AAs last maybe 4-6 hours. Rechargeables maybe half that depending on their condition. You can also use a USB C wire to plug it into another device like a laptop.

[BopEuph]

Sounds like it's more dynamic, which can hurt musical performances with dynamics, as well as change the balance as things go. Was the cartridge aimed at the trombone? Because it seems to have the most presence. The tuba volume seems to lower as soon as the rest of the ensemble comes in.

Yeah, if you were recording for something a bit more like an album or something, you'd want some distance to let the sounds even out and "blossom," as it were, before hitting the mic. This is a good rehearsal recording, though!

The float is definitely good for lesser-experienced musicians when it comes to recording, but it sounds like gain staging is still superior in the long run. But I know the experience all too well of finding out the gain was set far too high (or too low) after a great performance.

The recording setup in this situation would have more control if you were to individually mic each instrument closer to the bell, as well as have a room mic which may or may not be used in the end product. But for rehearsal situations, that's way overkill...and this H4 Essential is doing exactly what you need in this context. I'm liking that Zoom keeps up with the technology!

[Bassboner]

Sounds like it's more dynamic, which can hurt musical performances with dynamics, as well as change the balance as things go. Was the cartridge aimed at the trombone? Because it seems to have the most presence. The tuba volume seems to lower as soon as the rest of the ensemble comes in.

I don't remember exactly the placement. I keep trying to put the mic closer to the horn and tuba because those players are the "least strong" in our group. Listening with headphones allows for more detail than just cheap speakers. I tend to play a little louder than I should, but especially on this recording since I was carrying the melody. We're putting tunes together for a wedding...

This is a good rehearsal recording, though!

Thanks!

The recording setup in this situation would have more control if you were to individually mic each instrument closer to the bell, as well as have a room mic which may or may not be used in the end product. But for rehearsal situations, that's way overkill...and this H4 Essential is doing exactly what you need in this context. I'm liking that Zoom keeps up with the technology!

Yeah, totally agree. Sure, a perfect recording of an imperfect rehearsal might be helpful, but we don't really have time or resources for that kind of setup. The rehearsal recording gives us things to check, and we might have to play in a bigger hall to get a better idea of the real result under performance conditions.