This week we are going to look at using acoustic aux percussion for your songs. Just to get a little perspective, this would be in contrast to using a sample library for your percussion sounds. Although sample libraries sound great and can give you the sounds of some very expensive (and BIG) instruments, there are also advantages of using acoustic instruments to. We are going to look at room sound, musicians preference, and variety this week.

One of the advantages (and disadvantages) of tracking acoustic aux percussion is utilizing room sound. Since aux percussion is typically mixed in the background, it makes sense to adjust how close the mics are and get a little more “room” or “air” in your aux percussion recordings. This is real easy to do if you are recording acoustic aux instruments… just move away from the mic. Historically, most sample libraries would only give you a close mic option and then you would need to use reverb to “create space”. However, now room convolution has brought new life into using sample libraries. Still, there is something special about placing a musician in a room, with a mic, and a percussion instrument and seeing where they feel comfortable. Additionally, as I alluded to, this is only a benefit if you have a good recording space. Recording acoustic aux percussion can be a terrible idea if you are not adequately prepared for it.

Another big benefit to recording acoustic aux percussion is simply using actual percussionist to make the recording. No matter how great the sound library is and no matter how great of a programer you have… nothing beats using an actual musician to make actual music… sorry. There is a certain amount of magic that happens when you put a shaker in a percussionist’s hand and that magic just doesn’t happen the same way with programed shakers. I love using sampled percussion, but when you mix an actual percussionist in with some sampled tracks the overall sound just becomes alive.

Another great benefit to using acoustic aux percussion is the variety that is available. This may sound counter intuitive since sample libraries can give you dozens of sounds for very low cost. However, you are typically stuck with one sound, using one mallet type, using one style, etc… When you have a percussionist playing your aux percussion tracks you also get their style. This is typically accompanied by a large variety of mallets to choose from, different ways of playing an instrument, the ability to experiment, etc… You get a lot more with a percussionist than just extra expense.

Overall, there are a lot of benefits to using acoustic percussion. One of the benefits (and disadvantages) can be your room sound and use of space that is available with acoustic percussion. Other benefits are also utilizing the magic that happens and variety that you get with using actual musicians. I have found that there really is no one solution that fits all, but getting actual percussionists on your tracks can help.