The Shure KSM44 Lage Diaphragm Condenser Mic is a pro quality microphone which is available at a reasonable price (about $800 new.)

The reason I think this mic is such a great choice for those with a home recording studio is not only that it’s of extremely high quality at a somewhat affordable price (although your definition of affordable my be different than mine) but because it’s a very versatile mic which means it can be used to record many different types of sound sources in many different circumstances.

This versatility is very important when you don’t have a large amount of mics to choose from.

Why is it so versatile? There are two principle reasons.

The first is that it has a very neutral frequency response. This is unlike a lot of other mics that “hype” a certain area in order to sound more “sexy.” That kind of thing can be good in some circumstances but not in others. The KSM44’s flat response makes it a great all purpose mic.

The second is that it can be switched between three different recording patterns. It can record in a cardioid pattern, a figure-8 pattern, or an omni-directional pattern. It’s beyond the scope of this post to discuss in detail what this means (if you don’t know then I recommend Home Recording For Musicians to learn the basics of recording music) but suffice to say it allows the mic to be used for many different ways.

By the way, the aforementioned book highly recommends the KSM44 condenser mic as one of the best large diaphragm mics available.

You’ll get the best results by combining this mic with a high quality mic preamp. You can go high end if you can afford it (Grace Design Lunatec) or you’ve got limited funds you could go with the ART MPA Gold.