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Houston Grand Opera Selects Sennheiser & Neumann For Recording

Sennheiser MKH 8020 and Neumann KM 140s were favored in the orchestral recording chain, especially in the orchestra pit.

The Houston Grand Opera (HGO) is one of the largest opera companies in North America.

Since 1973, it has presented 41 world premieres and six American premieres; today, the HGO continues to attract the opera world’s leading talent, regularly hosting international superstars such as soprano Renée Fleming, bass-baritone Bryn Terfel, mezzo-soprano Joyce Di Donato and many others.

For all of its orchestral recordings—which include about 30 performances per year—the HGO relies exclusively on Neumann and Sennheiser microphones.

Almost all of HGO’s productions are held in the Brown Auditorium, which is part of the Houston’s Wortham Theater Center.

The theater, which was built in 1987 and funded entirely through private donations, en-compasses 17,000 square feet and seats 2,423 patrons.

The Wortham Theater Center is home to both the Houston Ballet and the HGO, and since its opening has entertained more than 5 million people.

Marlan Barry was hired in 1997 as HGO’s engineer and lead audio consultant. Since then, his Brooklyn, NY-based company, Marlan Barry Audio, has been recording HGO’s performances—many of which have been broadcast and nationally syndicated by WFMT radio.

For each of these recordings, Barry has consistently turned to Sennheiser and Neumann microphones, and now uses them exclusively throughout his orchestral audio chain.

“For me, opera is the most challenging genre of all to record,” Barry said.

“Not only are you dealing with recording on a massive scale with respect to space, but you are very often limited in microphone selection because audience sightlines are very important.”

“There is a very strong visual aspect to opera that you might not find in archival or sym-phonic type recordings; therefore, the physical footprint of the microphone can be a major consideration.”

“An opera pit is a very tight set up—you turn your head, and sometimes there’s woodwind about two feet away from you,” said Barry.

“It is easy to clip the Sennheiser MKH 8000 series or the Neumann KM 100 series on a small stand so you can get in and out of these tight spaces without any trouble.”

“A microphone for opera needs to be incredibly accurate.”

“Oftentimes there is a need to choose microphones based on their unique sonic character and the color they bring.”

“But because I am capturing sound sources closer than normal—for example, within the confined spaces of an orchestra pit—I prefer Sennheiser MKH and Neumann KM series microphones due to their transparent sound and ability to handle a wide dynamic range.”

“Also, they can handle high sound pressure levels; this is important in opera because you can have incredibly quiet sections and then all of a sudden have 100 musicians playing at full volume.”

“One of the things that I love about the 8020 is that as open and clean as they are, they also uncharacteristically warm for a small condenser microphone,” he said.

“I have often preferred the sound of strategically placing the MKH 8000 series in sections of the orchestra to pick up strings as an ensemble rather than going stand-to-stand with cardioids.”

“Once I’ve got the string sound in place, I’ll use cardioids like the KM 140s if I need to pinpoint specific instruments like woodwinds, harps or solos or something like that,” Barry adds.

“For the last 13 years, our main vocal mics have been Neumann KM 140s and we used to use Sennheiser’s MKH 40s on woodwinds and brass. We always got fantastic results.”

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Linea Research is a leading designer and manufacturer of high performance power amplifiers and DSP controllers for the entertainment, live sound, installed sound and commercial sound markets.