Click the image to hear samples

I sat down with Elad Fish, one of the drummers at DrumsForYou.com, to talk a little bit about what goes into recording a drum part for the site.

In order to record drum tracks that suite a wide variety of styles and tastes, you must have a pretty big collection of drums. How many snares do you have?

In my personal collection, I have nine snare drums (listen to seven snare samples). The collection includes maple, birch, brass, and chrome snares. The woods have different thicknesses and sizes.

Can you describe the difference in sound between a wood and a metal snare?

The metal snares are louder and brighter. The brightest is the brass snare, then the chrome. If it really needs to stand out, I would go for a metal snare. But if I’m looking for a more unique and natural sound, I’ll go for a wood snare. Maple is a little softer, while birch is punchier.

So how do you pick which snare to use for a song?

First I picture the sound in my head, then sometimes I’ll check YouTube for some reference videos.

Besides material, what are some other ways to adjust the sound of a snare?

You can change a lot about the sound just by tuning it differently. Another way to play around with the sound is by muting overtones. I often use a silicon pad called “MoonGel.” But I’m very careful with it–overusing it can make the snare sound dull and lifeless.

Tell me about miking techniques you use.

I usually go for the standard technique: one SM57 on the top, one on the bottom, both at a 45-degree angle toward the center of the snare. I recently replaced the SM57 with two Sennheiser e604 microphones. These tend to have a more direct sound that picks up less hi-hat sound. They’re also small so they don’t interfere with my playing. But when I’m mixing, I’m always taking a lot of the snare sound from the overheads, room mics, and even a bit from the hi-hat mic.

What happens after you’ve recorded a part?

The audio processing is the secret to turning a good snare sound into a really good, “hit song” snare sound!

Do you have a standard method, or does it vary from song to song?

It changes constantly, but mostly I will use a gate that doesn’t sound too harsh, an EQ to remove unwanted overtones and provide an overall shape to the sound, compression to make it sound punchier, and finally another EQ for any final touches. When I’m forced to record in small studios, I always use more of the close miking techniques and add a Room reverb, plus any other reverbs to give it some more balls.