Study of Preference for Surround Microphone Techniques Used in the Recording of Choir and Instrumental Ensemble

The aim of this paper is to describe the process of choosing the best surround
microphone technique for recording of choir with an instrumental ensemble. First,
examples of multichannel microphone techniques including those used in the recording
are described. Then, the assumptions and details of music recording in Radio
Gdansk Studio are provided as well as the process of mixing of the multichannel
recording. The extensive subjective tests were performed employing a group of sound
engineers and students in order to find the most preferable recording techniques. Because
the final recording is based on the mix of “direct/ambient” and “direct-sound
all-around” approaches, a subjective quality evaluation was conducted and on this
basis the best rated multichannel techniques were chosen. The results show that
listeners might consider different factors when choosing the best rated multichannel
techniques in separate tasks, as different systems were chosen in the two tests.