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Neumann RSM 191 is being retired!


Ty Ford

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I reached out to Neumann this morning and have heard back that there are only 14 RSM 191 stereo shotgun mics left and they aren't planning to make any more. Sad to see it go.  It's a pretty amazing mic.

 

Here's my review of it from 1990.

 

Neumann RSM 191 High-end Stereo Shotgun Mic

 

Ty Ford

Baltimore, MD

 

Recording in the field is always a challenge. You hope to come back with the good stuff. The stuff you go out with normally determines how good the stuff is that you bring back. In this case, the good stuff is the Neumann RSM 191 stereo/shotgun ($4,550 for mic, power supply, road case and cables). The gig was to record "Larksong", a madrigal group, in several churches and in a recording studio. Getting six members of a madrigal group together is a logistical feat within itself, so I also looked for other opportunities to find the "boundaries" of the mic.

 

The RSM 191 is two mics in one; a stereo mic and a mono shotgun mic. There are three capsules mounted within an inch of each other; a small-diaphragm front-directed cardioid capsule with a short interference tube and two small side-directed cardioid capsules. A multi-pin cable connects the mic to the MTX191A power supply/pattern box. The MTX191A is a sophisticated and powerful part of the system. Two rotary switches on the front allow for the selection of -M/S, M/S, -X/Y and X/Y operation. When in the M/S modes, the second rotary switch adjusts the Side gain across a range of -9dB to +6dB. When in X/Y modes, the second switch adjusts the width of the pattern for 60 degrees to 170 degrees. Other details include a battery test/battery on switch and a small door which covers the receptacle for a standard 9 VDC battery. The RSM 191 will run on battery or from Phantom Power. On the back of the box are the multi-pin jack for the mic cable, a 5-pin XLR for the output, a 10dB pad and a switch offering two bass roll-offs. A Y-cable attaches to the 5-pin XLR, splitting the side and front capsules. 

 

I had recorded "Larksong" before, using a beyer MC833 stereo mic and a pair of Audio Technica 4050s in Blumlein array. All the early recordings were done in churches. One of the RSM 191 sessions was recorded in one of the same churches we had recorded in before. In all cases, I used GML mic preamps and recorded directly to a Panasonic SV-3900 DAT. While the early recordings were always technically very good, the RSM 191 brought something to the table that the others didn't. I would describe this a coloration or a finish. Normally I steer clear of coloration as much as possible, but this was different. Except for minor pan adjustments, the RSM 191 sessions sounded more like a finished production when I played them back over the studio monitors. 

 

Our best venue was St. John's Church in Ellicott City, MD. We set up in the empty church with the singers standing on parquet flooring in the chancery, facing out to the pews. Choosing the X/Y pattern, I adjusted the MTX191A to get the right angle based on the distance of 8-10 feet from the group. The distance was determined by the tempo of the song and the natural reverberation of the room. I moved back a bit on slower pieces to let more room in and moved up on quicker pieces to keep the room from muddying the phrasing. Decisions were made using an old pair of AKG 240 headphones; designed before they put in a big low-end hump.

 

In the past, I had pretty much let the singers arrange themselves in an arc, in whatever order they were comfortable with. There was a member change since those sessions and it seemed to throw the balance off. I ended up putting the two most powerful voices -- a soprano and baritone/bass -- at the ends, and moving the others around a bit until the voices started to gel. In further experiments, I moved the singers with the most prominent parts of a song to more centered positions. Finally, for "The Little Drummer Boy", I moved the men and their forceful "rum, rum, rum" behind the women, who were singing the lyric. In all cases, the "finished" quality of the recordings was apparent. 

 

Next was a stop at Flite 3 in Baltimore. As expected, the singers didn't enjoy the experience of singing in an acoustically-damped room. We tried a pair of KM 86s and U 89s in X/Y and coincident omni, but found the RSM 191 to be more open on the top. In a return visit to Flite 3, engineers Louis Mills and Mark Patey and I found the stereo spread of the RSM191 to work extremely well in the studio as a single-source mic for stereo drama. Set at 170 degrees, the stereo image was extremely smooth and stable. In one test, two of us walked around in the studio while a third in the control room, with closed eyes, listened to the control room monitors and pointed out our positions with a great degree of accuracy. In another test, we crumpled up a plastic bag and tossed it across the room. The crinkle made by the bag in flight as it expanded was captured in remarkable detail. After adjusting distances from the mic for individual voice power, we were able to record a very acceptable stereo commercial voice track.

 

In Studio B, Flite 3 has a Yamaha grand piano. On this particular occasion, I used Great River mic pres and an API lunchbox.With the top open "full stick", I positioned The RSM 191 about three inches inside the piano case, in the middle of the curve and over the longest spoke of the metal frame. I angled the mic slightly to the left, so that the stereo spread would cover both ends of the keyboard. The Great Rivers yielded a very natural, full sound. The API preamps were edgier. Next I tried micing a Martin D28S. Placing the RSM 191 about a foot to two feet out and shooting it right into the sound hole resulted in a large natural sounding acoustic guitar sound that filled the stereo spectrum without being so wide as to be fakey or contrived. It should also be noted that, through all of the stereo applications, there were no mono compatibility problems.  

 

SHOTGUN

For shotgun operation, you just use the front-mounted cardioid capsule. That capsule is related to Neumann's KMR 81 shotgun. It has a 4dB peak at 8kHz that starts at 3.5kHz and returns to zero at 12kHz. The RSM 191 has about the same output as a Sennheiser 416. The capsule in a 416 is in the middle of the tube. In the RSM 191, it's at the bottom of the tube. If you're close-working the mic, that can make a difference. The 416 self noise was more noticeable partly because it was higher in frequency than that of the RSM 191. The actual level of self noise  of the RSM 191 was slightly less. The RSM 191 was more natural sounding, with not as much low end sensitivity and not the upper midrange peak of the 416. The 416 had a tighter pattern and more reach.

 

IN CONCLUSION

I keep coming back to the "finished" sound of the RSM 191. It's not so apparent when listening to a single voice or simple instrument, but when listening to a group of voices or a more complex instrument such as a piano, the resulting sound is very musical. Although that 4dB rise at 8kHz might suggest some undue brightness, I never heard any while using the Great River or GML mic pres. If you're tired of fussing around with a pair of mics for stereo field or studio recording, you owe it to yourself to hear the RSM 191.

 

Ty Ford can be reached at http://www.tyford.com.

Technique, Inc. © Copyright 1990 All Rights Reserved

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I've had one forever, took it all over the world, and worked it on probably every music recording I've ever done: studio, live, whatever.  It was pretty great for SFX.  Not the quietest mic anymore, but amazing resolution of detail.  But--very expensive, heavy and sucks a huge gulp of p48 when it fires up--I found that many preamps etc would not power it reliably.  For new mics it seems like people have mostly moved on to the Sennheiser and Sankens, but the RSM is and has been a good friend to me--will be using it on a job tmw.

 

philp

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I was so glad to see the back of mine some 10 years ago. It was the most unreliable preamp/decoder box I ever had the misfortune to work with. At one point Neumann gave me 2 x spare boxes, and a spare mic, in order that I could have some kind of reliability. Awful system for me.....

Kindest regards,

Simon B

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Interesting--I beat mine up on several continents, high Alps/snow-really cold to the jungles of New Guinea and a billion percent humidty and everything in between.  It did a lot of air travelling, in baggage.  I took a couple of splashes and some rain with it--opened up the box, dried off the circuit boards, and on we went.  Lucky I guess.   Fab stereo "hall" mic for concerts and a stereo drum overhead mic too!

 

philp

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Interesting indeed Philip, I cant tell you what a total disaster mine was. Over about three years all components were replaced by Sennheiser UK (the distributor in UK) who were most helpful, but dealing with an absolute dog of a problem. I worked through numerous control boxes, either replacements or loaners, and the mic was replaced a few times. All were unreliable, and exhibited thunder storm noises and bangs and splats. Most unreiable mic experience I have ever had, including when I owned 8 x AKG C451s. I really was so glad to see the back of it and move on to a Schoeps MS pair.

On another note, I noticed that there were all sorts of comb filter FX produced by the M capsule and the tube. The Schoeps sounds SSSSOOOO smooth by comparison.

I am so glad to hear that yours has worked well for you, maybe I really was just plain unlucky!!

Did you know that Neumann made a special version for the BBC, who asked for less directionality from the M capsule? I believe it was slightly shorter, and frontal pickup was a bit wider.

Kindest regards,

Simon B

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I have had a RSM191 for years.I used to record M&S dialogue on it in the early 90's...........

 

I only use it rarely now but it is still going strong.

 

This is my homage to my 191 at 15 seconds with the mic set X-Y with no low pass filters anywhere in the chain.

(my crew couldn't understand why i wanted to get it out of the truck in the middle of a big dialogue scene for a 'drive by'

until they heard this!)

 

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I have had a RSM191 for years.I used to record M&S dialogue on it in the early 90's...........

 

I only use it rarely now but it is still going strong.

 

This is my homage to my 191 at 15 seconds with the mic set X-Y with no low pass filters anywhere in the chain.

(my crew couldn't understand why i wanted to get it out of the truck in the middle of a big dialogue scene for a 'drive by'

until they heard this!)

 

That drive by does sound fantastic! Thanks for sharing! :)

Also, this movie looks great, looking forward to seeing it in the theater!

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  • 5 years later...

Hi. I have the predecessor to the 191, the RSM190. I have used it in multitudinous situations From the noise of Def Leppard in concert to the subtle sound of a lute solo. I last used it a couple of weeks ago to record this. I think that the main difference between the 190 and 191 is that the body of the 190 is metal and the 121 it's plastic. There may be others I don't know.  It has been out in all weathers survived numerous airport security cheeks. I had to ditch the flight case it came with as it  had printed in big letters on the side "Shotgun Microphone"  They took great exception to this and gave me the third degree when trying to get through security. The archbishop of York's dog peed on it once, it was in a Rycote thank goodness and a $50.000.000 racehorse decided to try it out as an aperitif. I won't bore you any further with this tale and suffice to say, I just love this bit of kit. Thanks Neumann.

 

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Great mike. Even just using the M capsule for mono dialogue sounds wonderful.

 

But not enough shielded against RF, especially that digital RF and mobile phones that are all around us today. Had too much issues with RF so I don't use it any more. I was always in fear that something could bleed in unintentionally.

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