Vocalist.org archive


From:  "Tako Oda" <toda@m...>
"Tako Oda" <toda@m...>
Date:  Wed Jun 27, 2001  6:26 pm
Subject:  Re: Home Studios was:Recording


rtpeacoc@e... wrote:
rtpeacoc@e... wrote:
> What are some of the pros and cons you might have seen with the
"home
> studio"? What would you see as the advantages and disadvantages
> compared to the "usual" studio session? (never having done either,
> I'm totally ignorant here.)

It depends :-) Some home studios are better, but not usually.
Soundproofing is really pretty important. It might not be as much of
an issue in Heavy Metal, which has a much narrower dynamic range than
most vocal classical music, but there is only so much you can do with
editing. You can remove ambient noise using digital filters, but it
always takes away something of the original sound. You can patch
together takes at the millisecond level, but the music no longer
sounds like a single performance anymore when you do that.

It is also a lot more work to have to record 18 takes so the engineer
has enough raw material to create a "professional" sounding whole.
This may be just my own prejudice, but I prefer making a recording as
"live" as possible, at least for classical music, where the audience
expects to hear as live and unplugged an experience as possible.

My absolute preference is to record in a native performance space.
Studios *kill* your singers formant and hall reverberation.
Those artifacts must be recreated electronicially. Singing in a booth
makes singers nervous - it is unfamiliar, and all the soundproofing
erases any aural feedback.

Just my opinion, take with a grain of salt!

Tako


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