# Recording An Orchestra Section By Section



## robgb (May 3, 2018)

I'm not sure where to ask about this, but thought I'd try it here. Those of you who have had the pleasure to record with a real orchestra can chime in.

I was listening to Guy Michelmore's orchestral stems and I noticed a LOT of bleed between the tracks. Very significant, loud bleed. And I wondered if, when recording an orchestra, anyone has done it much the way we do it with samples. One section at a time.

Have the entire orchestra run through the piece, then record only the cellos playing. Record only the violins playing, etc. Does anyone ever do this or would it ruin the organic nature of the sound?

Just curious.


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## N.Caffrey (May 3, 2018)

I think usually it's more for section (E.g. woodwinds-brass etc) rather than individual section within the section. But I agree, having recorded with orchestras, the bleed is really annoying. Once even though the horn track was muted I could still hear it through the other tracks, and it was still too loud!


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## studiostuff (May 3, 2018)

I've done quite a bit of it that way. And, it's a toss-up in regard to benefits. 

There definitely is a cost regarding the organic nature of the sound. But bleed is not a problem. 

Having everyone sit down at the same time can be faster. But most of the time, you start with cues where everyone is involved, and then release musicians, cue by cue, as you wade through the score and get to cues where there are fewer musicians involved. 

Never had a score where everyone played all the time... and never bothering to actually do the math, I'm not sure there is a giant savings in regard to studio rental hours. Probably a little bit, but when doing it section by section, it's somewhat easier to hear the small and less obvious errors that are fun to catch and correct. So, in this regard, I'd rather spend more time to get it right.

Intonation is IMHO the most difficult issue when you record section by section. It can be worked out, but slows the session as whoever plays later bitches loudly about the center of the previous tracking. Naturellement... 

Not to dodge the question, but it depends on the score, the players, the studio and way the music fits within the project.


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## Scoremixer (May 3, 2018)

robgb said:


> I was listening to Guy Michelmore's orchestral stems and I noticed a LOT of bleed between the tracks. Very significant, loud bleed. And I wondered if, when recording an orchestra, anyone has done it much the way we do it with samples. One section at a time.
> .



It's an orchestra. It's meant to work in the room as an ensemble, and in an ideal world the majority of sound comes from the room mics with the spots just providing a little extra definition. Bleed is natural and unavoidable, and not usually too much of a problem provided you've balanced the dynamics appropriately in the room. 

In practical terms, very few people record subsection by subsection- normal breakdowns don't go much past Strings+WW+HarpsKeys/Brass/Perc. To get any smaller takes an awful lot of studio and musician time, and becomes increasingly difficult in terms of pitch and performance for the players. Naturally, the more you stem out the orchestra, the more post-production time you need to finesse it afterwards. 

Not that you should mind too much (you're paying them after all) but if one were to record each string section separately you should also be prepared for all the players hate you just a little bit...


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## chrisphan (May 3, 2018)

In a way that's not really possible because a real orchestra rarely records to a click track, as far as I know. So it's a trade-off between getting the whole orchestra really gel together at the expense of mic bleed, and using virtual instruments where every section is perfectly clean, but might be lifeless.


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## studiostuff (May 3, 2018)

Just to be clear, I'm talking about sessions where everything is definitely to a click (usually). And when recording sectionally, I'm talking strings, brass, woodwinds as separate sessions with keys/synths, perc. and misc. pre-recorded.


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## bryla (May 3, 2018)

I usually only monitor the decca tree when recording. Balance, intonation and timing is fixed from this standpoint. The amount of engagement from players hugely outweighs the time intensive section recordings. Balance is usually VERY off in separate section recording sessions, since the brass don't know what in-room-volume the strings were, when they played the forte section and the players don't have a consensus on how soft the _*mp *_is and how short the staccato is.

Sure you can hear some finer details on the back desk of the violas when you only hear the strings, but if it's drowned out by the bassoon/horn unison line then there's no real advantage in spending time on it.

The deccas are also usually 90% of the mix, so if the balance is off in the deccas you can't fix it easily in the mix. It takes considerations in orchestration and in mic placement.

And btw I'm talking about session recordings for film and stuff, not your Mozart re-release but players at session orchestras are used to playing with click.


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## aaronventure (May 3, 2018)

If you have the same mics setup and record the close mics of the vacant positions, you could technically get that same bleed. 

Aren't e.g. Spitfire's Tree Mics actually a combination of various different mic positions - Tree isn't just the three Decca mics, etc.?

That being said, if you plan to record an entire orchestral library, wouldn't it make sense to set up all the mic positions as if you're actually recording the entire orchestra and then record section by section? So you'd get the bleed for each section and then once you play in other sections, since they're recorded with the same mic setup, it sounds the same?


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## AlexanderSchiborr (May 3, 2018)

robgb said:


> I'm not sure where to ask about this, but thought I'd try it here. Those of you who have had the pleasure to record with a real orchestra can chime in.
> 
> I was listening to Guy Michelmore's orchestral stems and I noticed a LOT of bleed between the tracks. Very significant, loud bleed. And I wondered if, when recording an orchestra, anyone has done it much the way we do it with samples. One section at a time.
> 
> ...



There are a couple of differences: Musicians interact to each other, sections interact which affects the outcome and result. The result is I doubt the same good as recording all together, just from a stylistic point. And then there is the technical point with instrument section micing bleeding PLUS the point of Musicans filling the room which are absorbers of sound PLUS the point that those wave signals interact also in the room. Very complex subject. Probably you could make that but I would not recommend that recording like that. Just my opinion of course.


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## fixxer49 (May 3, 2018)

robgb said:


> Have the entire orchestra run through the piece, then record only the cellos playing. Record only the violins playing, etc. Does anyone ever do this or would it ruin the organic nature of the sound?
> 
> Just curious.


 It's called "striping", and it's done quite a lot these days. (Although not in the same way you suggested, with the entire orchestra going through the piece together, and then individual sections playing separately - that would be too expensive.)


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## INCIRIOS (May 3, 2018)

aaronventure said:


> If you have the same mics setup and record the close mics of the vacant positions, you could technically get that same bleed.
> 
> Aren't e.g. Spitfire's Tree Mics actually a combination of various different mic positions - Tree isn't just the three Decca mics, etc.?
> 
> That being said, if you plan to record an entire orchestral library, wouldn't it make sense to set up all the mic positions as if you're actually recording the entire orchestra and then record section by section? So you'd get the bleed for each section and then once you play in other sections, since they're recorded with the same mic setup, it sounds the same?



Our chamber strings has a specific bleed mic position.

Bleed is not a bad thing, it's normal! Also keep in mind a lot of the time you don't use that much close mic for live setups (for samples you'll want more close since a lot of the detail is lost through crossfading), but so long as everything is panned appropriately you'll still get a great stereo image anyway.


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## aaronventure (May 3, 2018)

Light and Sound said:


> Our chamber strings has a specific bleed mic position.
> 
> Bleed is not a bad thing, it's normal! Also keep in mind a lot of the time you don't use that much close mic for live setups (for samples you'll want more close since a lot of the detail is lost through crossfading), but so long as everything is panned appropriately you'll still get a great stereo image anyway.



Awesome, that's what I had in mind!


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## JohnG (May 3, 2018)

Done it both ways, but vastly prefer to record with everyone playing together, for all the obvious reasons. 

Since most of what I do is to film or other media music, and most of that has pre-records, I almost always use click either way. The main reasons to record separately would be four that I can think of off the top of my head:

*1. Library music* -- just about 100% of the time the libraries want to be able to provide clients with "strings and brass only" or "percussion and strings only" or any other configuration. So they often record sections separately.

*2. Hard part and need to punch in* -- sometimes one writes parts for players that one knows are going to be really hard / nearly impossible for the players to execute in one pass. A typical example of that would be brass parts that are for some reason just too hard to get through without punching every couple of bars. To save money having a 40-person string section just sit there while the brass struggle, recording separately can be worth it.

*3. Producers want 100% flexibility* -- sometimes filmmakers want total flexibility to turn off a section (similar to library stuff, above). Game companies nearly always want this flexibility.

*4. Stacking parts in one section but maybe not another* -- if you have a score that mostly is suitable for, say, one trumpet and two French Horns, but there are a couple of cues that require, say, three trumpets and six French Horns, it might be more economical to record at least those cues in separate sections. (Of course, whether or not you are allowed to stack the same players on a track depends on the applicable union rules etc.)


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