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Pickups 442 moving to 440 (Calling all tech-heads)

IndianaGlen 28 January 2022

If one has some vibe bars that are tuned to A=442 with pickups ( assume no resonators) is it possible to electronically pull the pitch down so one hears A=440 from the amp? 

 

Comments

tonymiceli Sat, 01/29/2022 - 14:05

i just wrote dieter at k and k today about this.

i'm just buying new pickups and putting them on 440 bars.

however, i imagine if you put chorus on the vibes that might make the 442 a little murky and might help a bit. i wonder what randy thinks, he would know more about this than me. but that's what i usually dol.

Randy_Sutin Wed, 02/02/2022 - 12:20

Real time pitch correction does odd things with the overtones on a vibes bar... and there would still be a fair amount of acoustic sound from the player’s vantage point. The end result would be like two instruments playing in unison, albeit out of tune with one another.

I do a separate set of bars for each pitch center. Haven’t really found pickups that I like. I get lots of gain with mics.

tonymiceli Thu, 02/17/2022 - 16:46

ps i think you can technically lower the pitch. but you need a pro to do it.

they actual take metal off the bars. sounds counterintuitive but I if you do it right it makes the bars go up and down higher, and that I think lowers the pitch. I'm far from an expert (very far), so check with someone about this.

IndianaGlen Tue, 03/01/2022 - 10:31

Hearing 442 over the bars, 440 pitch correction coming out of an amp, sounds like a recipe for a really good (and expensive) headache. I was thinking about experimenting with pickups without resonators on 442 bars. Per Tony above, yeah, a retune to 440 would probably would cost between 200-300 which would make a lot more sense than trying to by some gizmos that wouldn't sound good anyhow.

Randy, how do you keep the drums out of your Mic mix? Feel free to recommend a search if this has been discussed previously.

jassiii Mon, 02/20/2023 - 02:56

You can use a microphone that only picks up sound from certain directions, so that it doesn't pick up as much of the drum sound. Additionally, you can use tools like filters or noise gates to remove sounds you don't want in your recording, like drums or other instruments that might be bleeding into the mic. You can find more advice on audio recording forums or websites.

Randy_Sutin Thu, 03/16/2023 - 14:15

The vibraphone is actually 37 separate physical instruments. Using a highly directional mic placed very close to the instrument may give you more gain and less bleed, but... it will create hot spots on the instrument where the mics are pointing and weak spots where they are not. Ironically, the best mic setup I ever had for live sound on my vibes was a single omnidirectional mic. I did not need a lot of gain on that gig, so it really served to simply make my area of the stage a live zone without altering the sound or feel of the instrument in any detrimental ways.

The filters/software you are talking about are useful. My preferred piece of software for getting noise off my recordings is Izoptope RX10. I have a few other tools, but that one is the best. That said, it is not a panacea. It only is useful when employed manually and with great care, especially if the bleed you are trying to remove is drum bleed. Software recognizes the drums by its sonic signature. The bad news is that the vibraphone is also a drum in a sonic sense. It has a nearly identical signature to a ride cymbal, triangle and even a hi-hat. The automatic "turn the drums down" modality of such software will turn down the vibes as well. Worse yet, it will distort the sound left and create many very undesirable artifacts if run automatically; it is only useful when used surgically. It is great for getting rid of pedal noise, motor noise, accidental strikes on the frame or resonators, rattles, etc., but they need to be done manually and one at a time.

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