It has been many years since I have done recording work so I am a little unsure about what to expect. I am going in to listen to some samples of what they are currently doing. I won’t be scheduling the studio time until the first two weeks of January.
So, for those that are in the know, what should I ask or expect? I know general pricings, hiring off studio musicians, extra hours outside of the initial block, and that type of thing. Is there anything else I should expect?
I’d need more context, dmm (sorry, but I am too lazy to type your full name - which of course I just negated by typing this parenthetical phrase - sigh).
Are you hiring the studio for your use or the use of someone you are playing with? (i.e., are you the decision maker?)
Or are you a “hired gun” - being brought in to play or sing, but not a decision maker?
Depending on which you are, the types of questions you would need to ask can vary widely. If you are in control - then over and above costs, you need to be able to describe what musicians you already have or want to use and ask them about how they approach recording. If you are a hired gun, you want to know what process they use to record and how you can best fit into that.
In terms of recording, man is the devil in the details. You might want to understand things like what instruments do they record together in the same room, what instruments do they record at the same time but with the players in different rooms and what instruments/tracks do they record separately? Where do they place mic’s - up close is very very different from a mic far away or combo’s of mics throughout the room? How much do they record the analog, old-fashioned way, vs. using computers, direct-input into the board and using PC-based Protools-type of software?
That is only the very beginning. Bottom line - what do you want the end result to sound like and what do you and they both need to do to make that happen - and how much does doing that cost?
Lots and lots to discuss. By the same token - if this is just to get a song down for posterity, it could be as simple as you and a guitar or piano with mic in a room, wam-bam-thank you ma’am…
I am the decision maker. I kept putting it off because I got nervous about the cost. I have been the hired gun before but I have never been heading my own project. When I was the hired gun I was hired out with sheet music in hand to record specific classical songs. This is not the case now since the music I am recording will be more like folk/flamenco/celtic in style. So, generally the music isn’t as detailed. I know the people remotely and a simple lead sheet is enough to get this done so that won’t be an issue.
I am hiring a conga player and an upright bass player. I play classical guitar. The music will all be acoustic. Will I have to worry about effects or other things? The studio is digital but I don’t really know much about the recording end of the spectrum. What else do you need to know?
Go to the Digidesign website, navigate to ->support->user conference and post this in the ‘General Discussions’ section. Even if you aren’t using their product or doing digital project, I’ve seen topics just like yours covered there. It’s a well run board with a good mix of users with varied and useful experience. You can also search for this topic on the site to find your answer.
Again, the devil is in the details, dmm. You could do this the “easy” way - go in with your musicians (make sure you have practices a LOT beforehand), do one or two takes live together in the studio with a mic or two amongst you, add a little eq and reverb and you are done. Many, many great recordings have been done this way.
By the same token, you can ask yourself how exactly you want it to sound coming out:
if you aren’t sure which instrument/vocal you want to display most prominently in the mix, or you think you may want to vary how much eq/reverb/chorus you want on each instrument or track, it may make sense to isolate some or all instruments and vocals. Takes time and money, but leaves more flexibility during the mix down.
as for effects and things - it all depends. If the room is “live” - meaning it has a natural reverb and things sound better just because of how the walls reverberate (kind of like singing in the shower or “down in a tunnel tryin’ to make it play” if you will) then you may be fine with no effects. If the room is “dead” - purposely or not, it imparts little or no natural reverb to the sounds being recorded, then you may want to punch it up with some reverb, chorus, flanging or echo (in simplest terms, these are all the same effect - a form of delayed repetition of the original sounds - with an increasing amount of delay - i.e., reverb = barely any delay; echo = a clear gap of delay followed by a repeat of the original sounds; chorus and flanging are in the middle of the delay spectrum)…
you may also want some compression = a narrowing of the dynamics of the sound. This is key if one instrument or vocal is naturally much louder and another sound is relatively much softer - it evens out the balance.
We haven’t even started to discuss whether any of the players need “compensation” i.e., if they aren’t as good and need help with pitch, rhythm, cleaning up extraneous sounds (studio playing is extra clean and some great players are just naturally a little more noisy - the studio catches all of that).
Bottom line - you need to be able to:
a) articulate what you want the result to sound like, either by describing it in non-ambiguous terms a studio tech can clearly understand or by bringing in a sample (“hear that? I want our instruments to sound like they blend together like that, and it sounds like we are playing in a church, auditorium, arena/whatever just like this recording” (it can be very helpful to bring sound samples like that)).
b) you need to be able to quickly play a run of your music as a group in the studio, so the studio tech can hear what you can do, then
c) they should be able to help you (that is their job, whether they know it or not) understand exactly what is needed to make your baseline run-thru sound as close as possible to your sample (e.g., record together or separately, add effects, etc.) . At that point, when you understand what they are recommending to fill the sonic gaps (and how much it will cost) you can make decisions.
Sounds good Wordman. The compression thing and getting an even sound at the very end is a good deal. I am hiring professional studio musicians for the other parts. Let’s hope that they are worth it. I think I can explain exactly how I want the sound. I was asked to bring in a rough copy of my songs on a cassette (not a problem), and lead sheet (and sheet music if I have it…i have only written about half of my songs out longhand) and then we can go from there.
Beware of ear burn when mixing. After listening to the songs 75 times while mixing the kick drum or while the engineer twiddles with stuff, you’ll then have to make important mixing decisions based on listens 76-100. Also, even if you don’t know the jargon, stand firm in your convictions.
I won’t have a kick drum but I think I know what you are talking about. Don’t let myself get burned out on it or get stuck in a rut and let everything sound the same?
A big thing that I did when recording was schedule recording time and the final mix time a couple of days/weeks apart. I’d take home a couple rough mixes and listen to them some on different stereos. I like to have some time because when I rushed to mixing I was usually too close to know what I really wanted. By giving it some time I had a better perspective.
Also, if you are going to be using alot of tracks have the track sheets ready ahead of time. From what you explained it sounds as though you won’t have a whole lot of tracks (I once had triple tracked rhythm guitar- triple tracked fill guitar and triple tracked solo for a total of 9 guitar tracks. That’s when I found tracksheets to be really valuable)
That is great information sleestak! I liked the guy (not only because he was hot) because he was knowledgeable. I found him through a person I know who has used him before to record acoustical music. I listened to several of his samples which all came out really clear with lots of sounds from the spectrum from lows to highs. I won’t be doing a lot of multi tracking really. I will have some production things put in at the very end but other than that it will probably be around 8-10 tracks generally speaking.