darryl k. - Posted - 05/03/2012:  16:55:30

Yesterday I tried micing my banjo into a Fishman Loudbox mini. This is their acoustic guitar amp, and it is a beauty. Makes my Larivee acoustic sound just like a Larivee acoustic of all things. Finally someone got it figured out. 

Anyways, with the banjo after about an hour I noticed that I was playing much softer and getting a much nicer sound. I tend to play to hard, to the point of buzzing. So now I'm wondering, how about the Fishman banjo pickup. What are your experiences with this. I do not want an ' electric banjo ' sound ! I want pure amplification, nothing else. 

I also noticed on a video that Allison Brown used a clip on condenser mic for a concert. Maybe this is the way to go? 

darryl

Edited by - banjomikey on 05/03/2012 18:23:42

Mike Buchman - Posted - 05/03/2012:  17:46:51

Darryl:  I don't have experience with the Fishman pup but can recommend the K&K banjo pup which I run (through a DI for impedance matching) to a Fishman Soloamp. My Fielding open back sounds very natural with this rig!

banjomikey - Posted - 05/03/2012:  18:24:04

Moved the thread to tech talk.

Joe the banjo guy - Posted - 05/03/2012:  18:50:29

My fishman sounds best with no preamp, run into my Crate Taos Acoustic 30 Watt amp.  Not quite as loud without the preamp, but the tone is more natural.  I generally have to keep the treble almost completely off on the amp to avoid shrillness.  Usually crank the mids, keep the bass somewhere in between.

I feel like the preamps make it a lot harder to get the natural tone.  Part of that is just pushing the amp closer to the feedback point, but part is also that the preamps have their own EQ's, and getting the EQ's balanced right across the preamp and amp is tough for me (not to mention if I line-out to the PA). 

The placement on the fishman is really important too.  You gotta spend some time getting it in the sweet spot.

banjologist - Posted - 05/03/2012:  19:57:36

I use a Passac EC100 line-pre-amp; (with a Fishman fiddle pickup (head centre spot,) I have'nt heard one since, any more natural. Such a bummer the Mfg'rs fizzled & morphed. Just hope it lasts a few more years. I also run the fiddle thru that via a similar pickup.

hum - Posted - 05/04/2012:  03:08:42

I use to have a Fishman pick up but it never quite sounded right for me ...

Nowadays I prefer the ambient sound I get using a Shure beta 98D mic - with an A98D microphone drum mount  going through a

and run it through the XLR channel of an AER Compact 60 amp.

A lot of my videos here at the hangout where I'm playing outside demonstrate the sound if it helps ..

Edited by - hum on 05/04/2012 03:10:53

SHURE BETA 98d mic with the drum clamp

VIDEO: Dave Hum - Southern Flavour (2) (click to view)

PeterJ - Posted - 05/04/2012:  06:42:03

A Fishman pre-Rare Earth model for me -- no built in preamp, so I use a stomp box clean boost pedal. I'll either use a DI to run it straight to the PA board, or run it into my lap steel amp, which gets a mic -- sounds pretty good! I need the volume to keep up with the drums and electric instruments, and this works, plus I don't have any feedback issues.

darryl k. - Posted - 05/04/2012:  11:33:02

thanks all. I'm leaning towards a clamp on mic. Still suspicious of transducers.