Hi everyone,
Now that I've had the Zoom H2 digital recorder for a few months, and
tried it out under various conditions, I thought I'd put up another
sample. This one was recorded at the 18th annual Blues Harmonica
Showcase (aka "Night of the Harmaniacs", with over 20 harp players on the
bill!) at Phoenix's top blues club, the Rhythm Room. I had the
recorder set on a bar table about 8 feet from the side of the stage, with
the mic level set at low, recording straight as an mp3. and it was fairly
noisy with a decent crowd. I did no adjusting, just set it with the 120
degree stereo mic recording setting with no compression, and since I
didn't have headphones I didn't know what it would sound like until later
so I didn't spend more than a minute getting it out and turned on. The
band (the Rocket 88s, with harp great Bill Tarsha on drums and spoken
introductions) and vocal mic were all mic'd into the PA, while my amp was
not (amp was my tweed 1955 pro, incidentally, and mic was an old 545s).
Since there were over 20 harp players on the bill, I had almost no time
to get plugged in and going once onstage (I followed Hans Olson, one of
the real icons of the Phoenix blues scene for many years and he gave a
great harp-and-guitar performance) my settings weren't exactly my ideal,
I would have preferred to get my amp into the PA also, but things seemed
to go OK. Anyway, here it is, for your amusement. I'm still very
satisfied with how well this little recorder works (not so satisfied
with my own playing, maybe I'm better off not hearing myself! Just
kidding.) and the size made carrying it in my jacket pocket an easy
thing to do. The quality of the sound seems pretty good to me and the
balance seemed close to right with almost no effort, and I'd recommend
it as one way to keep track of your playing. Just try to find a place to
set it where there aren't people talking loudly nearby. I know that
every recording I've done has given me ideas, in playback, of how I could
have done things differently so it's a good learning tool.
http://www.members.cox.net/jkally3/littlegirl.mp3
Oh, and since it will be a bit until my next posting, happy holidays to
all the folks on the list. After my last "yard sale" of harps I thought
I might clear out some more stuff, but with Christmas looming it never
happened. I play a four-hour duo gig with a prewar- style blues
guitarist this Saturday night, and if I can figure out a way to get a
decent recording of that in a really noisy bar I'll try to get another
sample out since this will be a completely different event.
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