Cajon Micing Tips

This past weekend, I did a recording session and we had to mic a Cajon. For those who don't know what a cajon is, it's basically a wooden box with a port hole about 5" in diameter in the back center. The player sits on the box and hits the front and sides. The front panel has snares attached. (I think they are sandwiched between the front/sound board and another piece on the inside.

First, the cajon is rad. It basically sounds like a snare drum when played on the front and a kick when played else where.

OK...on to micing it.

I did a search on the internet prior to the session and people basically said toss a SM57 in the hole and then place a large diaphragm condenser about 2-3 feet away from the front at cajon level (so about 1 foot off the floor).

This micing technique is pretty spot on. What we did differently is used a Heil PR20 for the port and a U47 Fet for the front. PR20ss are awesome (so is the FET 47 but were talking budget here). For $150 MSRP they are full and nice sounding. We used it on vocals once for a scratch track, and decided to keep the mic for the overdubs because it sounded great (male voice, not too deep). I'm thinking I'm going to pick one of these things up.

For placement, when the cajon was sitting flat, we placed the PR20 so the grill was just outside of the hole. That way when the player sat on it and leans back, the mic actually goes into the hole about 2-3 inches. We then placed the U47 FET about 3 feet in front and hand slap level.

This combination gave the cajon a rich sound quality with out distortion. Mind you, we were using NEVE outboard pres. Just blend the two signals to taste. If anyone wants to hear the recording, let me know and I'll post it. The rough sounds incredible.