Nov 18, 2023 / guitar ~ music ~ mount
Top 5 Acoustic Guitar Microphone Clamps and Mounts

In my never-ending quest to record acoustic guitar and sing at the same time, I've been looking at different ways to mic up the guitar. The problem I have is that my home studio is small and I can't really leave mic stands and cables everywhere, so I wanted something discrete yet very quick to pick up and play.

A few years ago, a bit of Googling revealed the DPA4099G - an condenser microphone that clips onto the guitar body. Despite that £400+ price tag, I decided to buy it. It's been "pretty good" and just lives on my guitar in the studio. I can pick it up and record immediately, which I love.

However, I've realised there are a few things that bugged me:

  • It's a sensitive capacitor mic with cardioid a pattern, so it picks up quite a lot of vocal bleed
  • My acoustic space is treated, but the dynamics fare better than condensers with my room and skills
  • It's quite hard to point the mic away from your singing gob, whilst also being in the recording sweet spot where the neck joins the body
  • The mic is a little close to the guitar. I'd usually have it 6"-12" away.
  • I frequently knock the mic into a different position, or off the guitar altogether.

How to solve these problems?

  1. Well, I'm thinkng I might be better with a dynamic mic to record the guitar. But nobody seems to make something like the DPA 4099G but with a dynamic mic.
  2. A longer arm would also be useful, to get a little more distance and have more control over the sweet spot

So, I'm now on the hunt for alternatives. Since they're not easy to find at all, I've listed them here.

Exploraudio Liveguitar H-clamp

H-clamp

I really like the look of this one because it allow the mic to be further away, and it can hold an SM57 with excellent room rejection. It gets good reviews on SoundOnSound

More information here.


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