Saxophone Recording / Phase Alignment with faGuitarAlign – A testimonial from Producer Stephan “Grete” Weiser

Saxophone recordings are fun! It’s a vibrant acoustical instrument with a lot of dynamics. Predestined to be a special flavor within your mix. Today we take a sneak peek into the studio of Stephan “Grete” Weiser, a jazz musician and producer from Germany, while he’s recording saxophone takes for the 6th album of his jazz band “Köstritzer Jazzband”.

Saxophone Recording Setup

Stephan always use a microphone techniques incorporating 3 mics to get the best out the instrument:

a clip mic, directly mounted at the sax
an AKG C414 B-ULS (50 cm distance)
a RØDE NTR ribbon mic (50 cm distance)

The clip mic covers the direct sound from the instrument, whereas the two other mics cover the ambiance similar to like a listener in the room would hear it. The RØDE, being a ribbon mic, has a darker timbre and detailed lowend. The AKG, on the other hand, has rich upper mids. Bright and shiny. Combing these 3 mics with their different sound qualities and acoustical positions results in a tight, cohesive sound.

Phase Alignment with faGuitarAlign

Mastering microphone techniques in saxophone recording is crucial, and proper phase alignment is an essential part of this process. As the clip mic has about 50 cm distance to the other two mics, severe phase cancellations are occurring when the mics are mixed together. Stephan is a big fan of our Automatic Phase Alignment Plug-in “faGuitarAlign“. You can hear and feel the excitement in his voice when he talks about it. He uses it regularly on a wide base of instruments like saxophone, cello, violin, double bass, piano and so on. During the video you’ll learn how to use faGuitarAlign to get the optimum out of your recording within just a few seconds.

Do you want to hear the final product from Stephan’s band? Here’s the link to amazon mp3. Show me Stephan’s song on amazon!

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