Swan: It all depends on how much money you can spend. The recorder I bought is a Tascam 4 track. It recrods at twice the speed of regular tape recorder. That will make a great difference in the quality of the recording. After I bought it, the music store that I pop in to had another 4 track Tascam that has two speeds... the high speed and the regular speed, so I picked it up to carry around with me and record concerts. I paid $300 something for the new Tascam, after an almost 40% discount, and picked up the used one for a couple of hundred dollars. They both do a great job. As Rick pointed out, the mikes are almost as important as the tape recorder. I invested in near top-of-the-line mikes, discounted at $100 a piece. But, I made good sounding tapes on an old four track machine years ago, using mid-price Radio Shack mikes that cost more like $40 or $50. Of course, you can go all the way up from here, or all the way down. I didn't get into digital because of the cost, and I'm extremely pleased with the quality of the recordings that we're getting in analog. Good advice about working the mikes. Two of the guys in my group were mike shy when we first started the group, and it took endless reminders and many months before they were confident to really approach the mike. Now, they just about put the mike in their mouth. That's fine when you're using the mike to send a signal, but not when you're recording. It took the first two recording sessions (and playing back the results) before I could get the guys to pull back from the mike. There's a line in one of the first songs we taped, "The one who PPPPaid the PPPrice," and there was a very noticeable "pop" on the p's. We're going to have to do it over.
I'm really pleased to see this discussion going on. I'm happy to share what I've learned, but there are many others who know far more than I do, so I expect I'll learn much more than I can share.
Jerry