Recording Connection

It's been about two months since starting the Recording Connection and I must say it has been a really intense and worthwhile experience for me. I am learning something new every time I'm with my mentor and actually absorbing the information. It is always a challenge keeping up with my mentor. However, I have now become more accustomed to the way he teaches me. If I don't understand something, I do not act like I do. I have learned to just admit that I don't understand, then I learn from it. It's better to fully understand something my mentor teaches me, than to partially have an idea about it. Even the minor details, such as a mixing project, must be strictly followed or else the levels will suffer and the sound will not produce the best quality. So, it is always best to speak up and ask my mentor questions. To make things even better in the Recording Connection, my mentor always more than just encourages me to speak up; it's practically a requirement. This week my mentor and I went over the mixing board and the sections of a channel strip from top to bottom. The channel input establishes the signal's gain level before it is processed and routed. It is always all a bit confusing to me until I end up actually getting to watch an engineer at my mentors' studio utilize the mixer during a live recording session. I also got to sit-in on a recording session this week and I definitely received a solid understanding about recording vocals, and other very important deta

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I start my first official lesson with my mentor this week. There was plenty of reading that was assigned to me by the Recording Connection, that have a there was a lot of information including stats and charts at the reading. I was quick to see that most of the information has not been crucial, just provided a background of how sound and digital recording work. My mentor showed me just what exactly I need to to know and what info is the most crucial. I was excited to know that the upcoming lessons with my mentor is often more hands-on, where I will be understading about microphones. Started the lesson on microphones. My mentor and I reviewed the very first chapter of reading my mentor assigned me, and mentioned patterns and different kinds of microphones and how they are used. He then demonstrated his various types of microphones and ways in which they all are employed in different scenarios. The microphones were very unique and extremely nice looking. I was surprised as how much gear my mentor had in his studio. Since the beginning of the course, I have definitely improved on my skills with the production and recording of music. I have got a better ear now for how things are meant to sound, and a better idea on how signal flow works. My mentor and I have gotten to know one another and now we get along really well.

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Today I began to be told from my mentor about the basics of Digital Audio. My mentor proceeded to show me about how precisely sound is recorded and played back by samples. I also ought to discover the different file types for audio, along with teaching me concerning the kinds of noise that can go into a recording. The list really goes on and on. It's only been two days since I have been in the Recording Connection with my mentor and I've already taken what I've learned and put it to good use with my own, personal recordings, where I have significantly increased my recording qualities. Next week with my mentor I get to learn about microphones. I do like working with my mentor rather a lot. He is a very funny and care-free mentor, which makes it easy for me to work alongside him.

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My session with my mentor this week was really a fun one for me because of my hip hop background. I've done many sampling and have observed the variations in sample rates in the past, and ways in which it affects the audio quality and the overall feel of the track. So I was intrigued to hear with regards to the Nyquist theorem and low pass filters and to discover them represented graphically. This training with my mentor has grown my understanding of these subject manners a great deal. Also now I managed to get to help mic the drums for a recording session in my mentors' studio. This, however, was a bit overwhelming since I have know next to nothing about microphones. However, I realize this is coming in the following session with my mentor so it was great to secure a preview and find out what I know and what I have to know.

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For this lesson my mentor showed me how various Mic combinations produce different sounds as well as the various ways of stereo recording. First we tried using two sets of two different mics on a grand piano. His assistant played while we listened in the control room and compared the many recordings to determine exactly how they stand up against each other. Though it was hard to hear a difference at first, eventually the accentuated frequencies started to shine through. Then we went over M/S micing, that has been an ingenious, yet a bizarre way of obtaining a fake stereo recording. After exhausting the methods of stereo, we tried an omni-directional mic on the piano to find out how it organized against the wide range of frequencies but it didn't do too badly. The next day I went in to see my mentor again and then we tried a guitar amp, micing it with two different mics and putting it by way of a DI box, then blending it all to get the best sound. My mentor was recording some of his own work so I was able to get behind the console and punch him in when he needed, so I got a bit of lessons behind the desk. He showed me a large volume of how Pro Tools work and the way to bring up new tracks and playlists. I also worked a bit with the patch bay, connecting external preamps to the EQ and so forth. Things are actually going great, I'm learning a lot in the Recording Connection program.

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Things are getting a lot interesting every day at the studio with my mentor. For example, on Monday on this week I had been the only person there other than the engineer, so I nearly set up the studio space by just myself for this 4-piece, multi-effects band which was arriving to record a podcast. After that, my mentor did a lesson that the Recording Connection had assigned me. I now have the protocol down: What means what, where every part Mic is kept around the studio, which inputs that Mics, how to space the gobo boards, and the list goes on. I'm really getting the feel for the spot and my tasks are increasing by the day, it's a blast.

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Since starting the Recording Connection program, a lot of my mindset is different about the audio engineering field. I now have a better knowledge of not only the technical issues with the way things work in the audio industry, but the aspects involving dealing with clients and artists. The techniques I have discovered that deal with mixing and general audio engineering practices has greatly improved my chance to work with, not only my own personal music, but others' music as well. It's also much simpler for me to identify difficulty with mixes and the right ways to go about correcting them. Furthermore, my attitude towards professionalism has become greatly enhanced as a result of working with essential persons in the business, and also upcoming artists and clientele. My mentor has told me that I possess the right attitude for the business, which motivates me to be more outgoing in terms of meeting new customers and artists to work with. All in all, this program has really helped me feel confident in my decision to attend, and makes me feel that my future in audio production will be really rewarding.

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When I came to my mentors' studio my mentor was actually fixing wires inside of the equipment so I was able to see what goes into making the machines in his studio work upfront. After that we sat down and discussed the first lesson in the book the Recording Connection assigned me. He showed me how sound energy travels, what phase gives the sound of things recorded, and ways in which sound is measured. After explaining everything to me we then attended use the computers and actually hear and see the sound, as well as the alternative ways it can be changed. I also got to go into a booth and try out the microphones to see if they were wired properly, that is a very fun experience for me. I am going to be stopping in for two sessions in the next week to see how drums are set up and see a hip hop group record.

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This was my first day with the Recording Connection. I figured that going through the basics of sound was going to be boring. Learning all kinds of vocabulary words and other technical stuff involving numbers is admittedly not my strong suit, but my mentor managed to get it fun and interesting for me to learn. I have been checking pages in my books the Recording Connection assigned me for many hours the night before and wasn't getting any of it. It was all Greek for me, but my mentor was able to translate it into words that I could understand. Now I know exactly what the books are telling me and the things I had been trying to understand. It was also cool to find out that a lot of the ideas that I was learning were stuffs that I was using all along in my own small home studio setup without even realizing it, or even more, without even being aware of what it truly did. I learned the basic principles of sound itself. All I knew about before I went in for my training with my mentor was how to plug a guitar into my interface, start playing, then add effects, and refer to it as a recording. My mentor also showed me a number of small things in Pro Tools that has helped me understand sound better. Even just understanding about the basics of sound has already improved my very own recording quality. It makes me would like to go to the studio for my next lesson much more. I cannot wait around for my next lesson, where I get to start understanding about Digital Audio next.

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I set up a mic because my mentors' Company was starting
an internet radio station and had to record radio spots. I
immediately was interested because I went to school for
promotion and advertisement so I acquired knowledge on
how to write spots for TV, magazines, internet ads, and
radio. I made use of a few of my editorial skills to go over
the spots, making sure the correct terms were used. I also
was helping to come up with ideas as to how to make sure
the correct timing was employed per spot and how to add
additional seconds to the ad if required. When my mentor
realized how engrossed I was, he asked if I just wished to
take over and run the show. I replied YES. That had me
tremendously happy.

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As soon as I started my classes, I couldn't have been more happy. I was put in a rather prominent recording studio, which is located right in the heart of Times Square (penthouse level!) and is located in a building with a remarkable amount of recording history (Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, and Tupac to name some). My mentor was exceedingly learned and accommodating from the start and gave me a very cozy and individual learning environment.

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