Urgent - live performance recording advice sought

I have a small affair booked for this Thursday night, three hours or so of dinner music. Today the client calls me up and asks if the performance can be recorded. "Sure", I say.

My setup is just a PSR-3000 going into a Motion-Sound PA-80 speaker/amp.

Basically, I need some way to record this Thursday night that
1) Will work with my current setup (give or take wires and connectors)
2) Will record in stereo and with at least half-decent audio quality
3) Will not be a major expense (most of the modern, digital field recorders seem to be in the $200+ range)
4) Will be in my hands by Thursday.... (best would be something I could readily buy locally, but if need be I will order online Tuesday with 2nd-day shipping)

The best I can come up with is the Sony Pressman® Portable Cassette Recorder TCS-30D. However I cannot really tell whether or not the mic-in jack will properly handle a line coming from the PSR (say, from the headphone jack, or a split from the main line out) or a line coming from my amp (it has an XLR-out but I have a wide variety of adapters so I could probably "convert" it to a small mic-jack size). Does anyone know if this will work?

Thanks for your help!

If you have a Stereo Hi-Fi VCR recorder around, it will work great. Just run a cable from the RCA outputs on the 3000 into proper connections to the Audio Inputs on the VCR.
You can then transfer the recordings to line-in on CD Recorder, Computer, Cassette Recorder or whatever.
I used one for several years and the quality is outstanding.
DonM

That's an interesting idea. However I would certainly prefer something closer to pocket-sized.

You can use a minidisk recorder. That gives a good quality and will take all the sound live

Marc,

You really don't need a digital recorder. The signal coming from the RCA outputs of the 3000 are analog. Any analog recorder will do the job. Then you can copy and edit the recording on your PC, save it to a CD or post it on Youtube.

Good Luck,

Gary

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Travlin' Easy

I use Zoom H4. Previously used Creative Labs Nomad Jukebox (no longer made), and before that minidisk and even earlier cassettes. You can get good recordings with any of them.
The advantage to digital is easy upload to computer and easy to change formats from wav to MP3.
DonM

Hi Group,

I use a Zoom H4 as well. I just bought it, and it took about 30 minutes to learn how to record.

I used it this weekend at the National Accordion Assoc. festival. I didn't eveen use line-ins, just used the built in mics. Of course, using this procedure, I picked up room noise and people talking during the performances, nevertheless, the quality of the H4 recording proved to be very good.

Look on Ebay,or Amazon

Don P

I'm just curious why the client wants it recorded.....

You need to be careful that their intent is not to have you play the engagement one time, then play back your recording for future events. Don't laugh... it happens!

If you need to go out and buy equipment, and spend time to make sure this gets recorded well, you should probably be in a position to ask something from the client as recompense. Possibly (if you can get them to admit they want to use it for entertainment purposes) even enough to cover the cost of the recorder, if inexpensive. Why should YOU lose money over this?

And, finally, there's nothing wrong with a good old fashioned cassette recorder if you get your levels right....!

Diki ... you stole my question ... that was the first thing that came to mind when I read the post ... ??? ... I was surprised there were 6 responses before the question was asked ...
t.

Good point. For now I'm going with a $30 Sony cassette recorder, recording in mono, and the sound quality probably will not be all that great so I'm not really worried about it being useful in that sense. If I start doing weddings regularly (I am doing my first big one in a week and a half....), I will probably invest in a good digital recorder and either offer a 'professional-quality' recording of the music for a fee (say, extra $75?) or include it free and use it as a competitive bonus.

Marck, I would not offer my entire night's performance to anyone for any price. If your intent is to offer portions of the service or event as a keepsake, then I would be selective of what I give them. To make a recording of a wedding service is one thing, but to provide 3 hours of dinner music makes me wonder.

Also, any type of video recorder would give you some decent quality sound, with or without video. I think your cassette idea is good enough for this first try. you could attach the RCA line outs from your amp directly to the cassette to reduce room noise. Good luck.

For the record I settled on a Sony TCM-210DV. The second-closest Staples to me had it in stock, so I picked one up tonight. For about $45 it seems like a nice piece, and the AC adaptor is included. I've already tested it out recording directly from the PSR-3000. The sound quality is what I would call "perfectly mediocre". It has automatic level-limiting which basically adjusts the recording level to the sound input, so if I play loud it will take it down a notch, and if I play low it will amplify it. In effect it behaves like a compressor more or less. The recording sounds good enough to present to the client as what they asked for, but not good enough to replace my live performance. Thanks Sony, and thanks for all the advice everyone.

Well the deed is done. The tapes I gave them probably sound like horse excrement but on two days' notice (and at no extra fee) they got what they wanted. I'll probably never use the Sony for this purpose again; if I start to do weddings on a regular basis I'll invest in a Zoom H4 or the like and produce proper recordings either as a bonus or for an extra fee.