University of Minnesota Row Team

One of the things I like to do with a few friends is ride bikes to a spot along the Mississippi river, light a fire, and have a few beers. It’s the best happy hour in town. At this particular spot it is not uncommon to catch the University of Minnesota row team practicing. Anticipating this possibility I decided to put a field recorder and microphone in my bag.

Unfortunately I did not have the foresight to bring extra batteries so all I was able to capture was this short section of a four man team going by followed by their coach in a motor boat with a megaphone. At this time of the evening the river is like glass, so shortly afterward you can hear their wake splashing on the beach.

Forgetting the batteries was not the only mistake I made. I also set the levels too low and although I was using a wind screen the recording was dominated by a low frequency wind rumble that would not have been there had I enabled the bass roll-off on the mic. I did my best to fix it by boosting the levels and running it through a high pass filter.

Row Team

 

One thought on “University of Minnesota Row Team

  1. That is a wicked cool recording man. I rowed for 3 years in college, and I cannot communicate just how memorizing the drum of the oars against the shell is during a race or practice. For hours on end we’d listen to this sound in a deep athletic meditation on the water.

    Thanks for sharing

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