ProAudio Review - September 2008 - (Page 16)

STUDIO | REVIEW by Dr. Frederick J. Bashour Earthworks PM40 Piano Mic System Lay it inside a piano, connect two mic cables to your preamp, and hit record; you’re guaranteed to get a really good sounding reproduction of piano sound. At last fall’s AES convention, I was intrigued by a new “piano bar” gizmo at the Earthworks booth; it was an adjustable telescoping bar upon which were permanently mounted two special “high definition” diffuse field omnidirectional microphones. I was promised a review sample as soon as it was ready for sale. Now usually, when something seems too good to be true, it is … but in this case, everything the Earthworks sales guys were telling me about their Piano Mic System has turned out to be true. It sets up in a jiffy, and sounds really good. FEATURES The PM40 arrives in a long silvery metal flight case that includes the telescoping bar with the two attached mic heads (adjustable from 46 to 64 inches), the (phantom powered) microphone electronics box, a leather pouch for mounting the electronics box to the leg of a grand piano with Velcro, a mic stand mounting bracket for the electronics box, and various rack ears, screws and other pieces of hardware and felt. The PM40 puts Earthworks PM40 On A Mason and Hamlin Model 50 Upright Piano out standard condenser mic level (36dBv/Pa) and, although its self-noise spec doesn’t seem impressive (at 22dB), once one realizes that the mic capsules are placed very close to the piano strings and soundboard — and the system has 148dB SPL input capabilities — the actual perceived noise level from the PM40 is extremely low. In fact, the noise specification is quite good for a measurement-type microphone of the PM40’s tiny diaphragm diameter. The lightweight telescoping bar spans across the piano over the strings and is supported at its ends by the piano case. It’s easier to position it on large grands than on a baby grand where there’s really only one place it will fit; closing the lid on a small piano with the PM40 in there is a bit of a challenge. The mics are placed about onethird of the way in from each side of the piano, three inches in front of the hammers, and three inches above the strings. However, the telescoping bar has two clutches that can be loosened, allowing the center section to move up to eight inches in either horizontal direction; as a result, the engineer can move the mics to favor either the low or the high strings. Furthermore, the flexible arms attached to the mic heads may be wiggled about four inches in almost any direction. Finally, the bar may be put onto the piano from either the left or the right so that the mics can be positioned facing towards the hammers or away from them. With smaller grands, I learned that only one of these choices is feasible. IN USE I used two grand pianos for my tests: the aforementioned Kawai baby grand at the North Hadley Congregational Church where I am Music Director and a full nine-foot Steinway on stage at one of the local colleges. I made my location recordings using an Apogee Mini-MP mic preamp feeding a pair of line inputs in an M-Audio FireWire 1814 interface into Peak Pro 6.0.3 at 96kHz. The first test I made was to play an 88-note chromatic scale from bottom to top. Playback revealed an incredible evenness of the scale, irrespective of whether the lid was up, EARTHWORKS continues on page 18 ® APPLICATIONS Sound reinforcement, houses of worship, concert and session recording KEY FEATURES Invisible from outside the piano; good sound with piano lid down; very little leakage from instruments outside the piano. PRICE $4,495 list CONTACT Earthworks | ¤ 603-654-2433 | · www.earthworksaudio.com 16 | ProAudio Review | September 2008 www.proaudioreview.com http://www.earthworksaudio.com http://www.proaudioreview.com

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ProAudio Review - September 2008 Contents Publisher’s Page: It's A Hard Drive World Broadcast News and New Products Lawo mc256 Digital Production Console Studio News and New Products Earthworks PM40 Piano Mic System Onkyo Professional PR-SC885 HDMI 1.3a Surround Sound Processor Developments and Trends: Instrument Microphones Benchmark Media DAC1 Pre Focal Twin6 Be Studio Reference Monitors Cascade FAT HEAD II Blumlein Package Studio Projects CS5 Microphone M-Audio Pulsar II Small-Diaphragm Condenser Live News and New Products JBL MRX512M Live Monitor QSC: Behind The Scenes Contracting News and New Products Primacoustic Broadway Professional Acoustic Solutions Buyer's Guide: Contracting Amplifiers/Mixers Buyer's Guide: Contracting Speakers Single Slice: pc muñoz "Chatter & Buzz"

ProAudio Review - September 2008

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