Recording Techniques

This course aims are to help students make informed choices regarding the right mics for their recording situations and get the best from their equipment and live rooms. Students will receive many hints and tips from a practical perspective from industry professionals who specialise in live band and acoustic recordings. There will also be a demonstration of a full drum kit multi miced recording.

Structure & Content: Day 1
Session 1: 10:00 - 11:45
• Introduction, interconnections, basic requirements for recording (cables, preamps,phantom power, audio interfaces, some simple setups e.g. vocals, drums, acoustic guitar, 4 piece band in one room etc.
Session 2: 12:00 - 13:45
• Theory of sound as relevant to digital recording (especially A-D converters,
sample rate, bit depth, clock source), live room design and making the best of the acoustic space you have.
Session 3: 14:30 - 16:15
• Microphone design: Dynamic - moving coil, ribbon. Condenser/capacitor,
valve, electret. Basic electronics as applied in microphone design.
• Microphone directional characteristics: Omni, figure of 8, cardioid,
hypercardioid, pressure zone/gun
• Choosing the right mic: Design types compared, understanding mic specs e.g. frequency responses graphs/sensitivity
Session 4: 16:30 - 18:00
• Approaches to recording: Session preparation, click tracks, count off, pre and post roll, punching in and out, destructive and non-destructive recording, creating a tempo map prior to recording. Laying one performance at a time and overdubbing (takes and playlists, and comping). Input only monitoring and auto-input monitoring. Recording whole performances or in sections and loops. Dealing with performers, recording the perfect take or knowing what to "fix in the mix".

Recording Techniques Structure & Content: Day 2
Session 5: 10.00 - 11.45
• Microphone techniques: close, stereo (AB, XY, ORTF, MS, Blumlein,
Binaural/Dummy head), ambient/room micing, multi-micing.
• Microphone manufacturers, their current ranges, classic mics and their
applications
Session 6: 12.00 - 13.45
• Mic techniques for specific instruments: vocals, acoustic guitars, drums,
amped guitars, pianos, bass, percussion, strings, brass.
• Headphone monitoring, setting up separate cue mixes for different
performers, solo modes when recording.
• I/O setups, latency, CPU, DSP and buffer sizes. Monitoring with plug-ins
active (e.g. Elec guitar to DI input with amp plug-in, and effects on)
Session 7: 14:30 - 16:15
• Practical demo: acoustic guitar and vocal, multi-miced drums
Session 8 : 16:30 - 18:00
• Practical demo: multi-miced drums (cont.)
Course Times:
Saturday & Sunday 10am to 6pm
Price
£400 (includes course notes)
Prerequisites
A basic understanding of music technology is desirable. If in doubt you may wish to think about taking our "1-day Music Technology Crash Course."