DPA on song for Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga
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“The audience was full of love for Tony Bennett, and it was a powerful couple of nights of music,” says Elff. “We were live on-stage at Radio City Music Hall, one of the greatest venues in the world, with a large orchestral ensemble. We also had Tony’s jazz ensemble and Lady Gaga’s rhythm section on-stage, in addition to full string and brass sections, a harp and a few woodwinds.
“We had DPA mics all over the orchestra - our older 4021 Compact Cardioid Condensers [today known as the 4011ES] on the piano, 4061 Omnidirectional Miniatures on the violins and violas, and 4099 Instrument Mics on all brass, woodwinds and strings, including harp, as well as on the soloing sax and trumpet. As expected, all the DPA mics sounded great.”
During the two performances, Elff was feeding his mixes to Harris, who was mixing the bands and vocals. “I sent my stems to John for him to blend,” explains Elff. “It was not a live broadcast, but we were making a stereo reference mix that would later be used during the video edit. I had the orchestra under my fingers with 40 or 50 channels of inputs, with DPA arranged throughout. It was fantastic to have DPA’s level of fidelity and unrivaled level of clarity and isolation in the very large hall, which had a lot of sound reinforcement and 6,000 adoring fans.
“The DPA mics allowed me to create a beautiful, clean, orchestral mix that worked really well for the recording. I also sent mixed stems of the orchestra mics back to the stage to be used in the performers’ in-ear monitors. These performances were remarkably touching, and the DPA microphones helped showcase Tony’s legacy as one of all-time greats.”
The multi-track recordings (147 channels total) were then handed off to engineer Dae Bennett (Tony Bennett’s son) for final editing and mixing for the broadcast. It was essential that what the team delivered was the best possible quality for Dae to work with, and DPA mics were central to that process.
According to Elff, the compact form-factor of the DPA mics also benefitted the production. “I’m pleased that the mics are so discreet,” he says. “When there’s a lot of people on the stage, like we had for these performances, using 4061s and 4099s gives the audience the ability to experience the music without a forest of microphone stands obscuring their view of the musicians, either in the hall or on-camera. I think it’s important for the audience not to be distracted by all the technology. They’re not thinking about the microphones, they’re just watching the musicians play, listening to the music and thinking about how good it sounds. That’s one of my favorite aspects of working with DPA mics.”
The CBS special, One Last Time: An Evening with Lady Gaga & Tony Bennett aired in November and is currently available to stream on Paramount+.
