Sunday, June 17, 2012
Saturday, June 16, 2012
Should we clean up old recordings, or keep their noise and distortion in all their glory?
We think we know everything these days. But are we getting a little too clever? Perhaps people in an earlier age of recording knew something that we don't.
Back in the 1930's and 40's my great-uncle, Robert MacGimsey, recorded hundreds of Negro spirituals on his Louisiana plantation, using a portable disc recorder and lacquered aluminum discs. I had the recordings dubbed off on 1/4" reel-to-reel tape in 1968 to preserve them, and of course today none of the old discs are playable.
About twelve years ago I began digitizing these recordings and cleaning them up with PC software: All of the clicks, over 90% of the turntable rumble and other background noise, etc., were removed successfully, and I went further to do "micro-surgery" on all other aspects of the songs, including diction and articulation, EQ, time-stretching, even adding a stereo effect, until the recordings were just sparkling clean and clear.
It was my intention to release a series of CD's which would be suitable for radio broadcast and would play well in home stereo units and car CD players. Well, they weren't very well received. Many folks didn't believe that they were actually old recordings, because they sounded so clean and sparkling, so modern. Others were incensed that I had in any way changed the musical content, or the medium by which it was created. These were VINTAGE recordings, and people wanted to hear them they way they would have sounded on a Victrola!
The project still resides on my old hard drive and on numerous DVD's. And in all of this, I re-learned a valuable life lesson: People love antiques, whether they be visual, physical, or audio; and I seemed to have destroyed that illusion for them, in my quest for "perfection."
There are stories of well-intentioned individuals who have taken a genuine old Stradivarius apart, scooped out the back and top much thinner than it was originally, or maybe even made a new top for it and threw the original away, and actually re-varnished the whole, thinking they had done a great service of some sort. What they did was to destroy almost the entire value of that priceless artwork, when leaving it in its now imperfect, but original, condition would have today brought perhaps two or three million dollars at the auction block at Sotheby's.
Can we improve upon Leonarda da Vinci's Mona Lisa by adding mascara, eye shadow, highlighted cheeks and perhaps some nice earrings and a gold necklace to her? Or could we 'correct' Michaelangelo's David or Madonna and Child with a little chipping here, and a little grinding there? Maybe rewriting Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet to read, "Romeo, dude, where the **ll are ya?!" Reworking an original, vintage work rarely results in any kind of an improvement, just like using modern mastering on an old (or maybe even bad) song to produce a 'Masteringpiece.
Consider what modern electronics have done to 'improve' the great studio recordings of the past, when played on an MP3 or an iPod. If you can't hear the sonic difference, then my point is well stated: We have lost the 'golden ears' of our parents and grandparents, who listened to all genres of music on their big, stereo music systems, whether they were reel-to-reel tape or LP's.
I well remember my old uncle's Fisher machine, which consisted of separate, heavy cabinets for each of the channels, housing high-quality 15" woofers and various other sized, and warming the house with too many tubes to remember. And the sound was out of this world: Operatic singers were present in your living room, violinists and string quartets were alive and breathing, symphony orchestras surrounded you and blasted out their might on those forte passages, and Elvis Presley and John Gary and Bing Crosby sounded better then than I have ever heard them sound on digital equipment.
So, perhaps in summation, my thoughts would be, if it's vintage, leave it vintage. It it's poor, old or new, modern mastering isn't going to make it wonderful. Great music isn't created in the mastering room, it's created in the recording studio. I'm 65, by the way, and my hearing is still worlds ahead of any young person I know today.
Perhaps we're even doing a great disservice to our younger generation by giving them super-loud music that grievously lacks in quality? When I dine, I have to admit that, sometimes, quantity is quality. But not so with music. Forget 'in with the new and out with the old'. That works great for New Year's celebrations, but not always for music.
We should leave vintage recordings the way they were originally, and let the historians of future generations have something to enjoy in its purity.
Friday, June 15, 2012
A very unusual tape recorder used for mastering
If you look at the photo carefully, you will see that this Studer A80 analog tape recorder has several more tape guides than the norm. It's used for mastering. But why?
At the time of writing (June 13, 2012), this tape recorder is up for auction on Ebay. It is a Studer A80 and, as analog tape recorders go, this is one of the very best. But this isn't a normal A80, it is the mastering version. So the question is, why is there a special mastering version, and what makes it different from a normal A80?
If you look closely at this pic, you will see that the heads are arranged differently to a normal tape recorder...
Usually, you would expect to see three heads - erase, record and play - set very close together underneath a head cover that makes everything look neat and tidy. But here there are two playback heads, separated quite widely.
So this machine can't even record, so it isn't even a tape recorder - it is a tape playback machine. So how does that make it suitable for mastering?
The answer is that this machine was used for mastering to vinyl. It is only ever used to play back signal to a vinyl cutting lathe. It is not capable of recording and that never was the intention of the machine.
So now the question arises why a special version of the A80 was desirable for mastering? Why wouldn't a standard A80 do?
The answer to this is that to maximize the duration of playback of each side of a vinyl record, the turns of the groove should be spaced so that they never take up any more width than necessary. Loud signals make the groove wiggle a lot. For quiet signals the groove is much more nearly a smooth curve. Lathes were designed so that they could automatically modify the pitch of the groove according to the level of the signal. However, since a quiet section in one turn of the groove might be followed by a loud section in the next, the lathe had to be able to 'look into the future' to see what is coming next.
This is the purpose of the second 'preview' playback head on the left, which sends signal to the lathe's control mechanism a little ahead of the signal sent to the lathe's cutter head. The extra tape guides are there to extend the time interval between the preview head and the main playback head. The tape is looped around these heads according to the diagram attached to the top plate of the machine.
Of course you could say, "Why not use a normal tape recorder and delay the signal to the lathe's cutter head digitally?"
Tell this to a vinyl junkie and see what happens...
Thursday, June 14, 2012
Do acoustic instruments need compression?
A recording of a group of acoustic instruments will have a dynamic range that is too wide for home listening. What should be done?
Yesterday's Record Producer Daily on mastering brought up a couple of interesting comments.
One from Remy Ann David remarked, "I've been told numerous times that my mixes already sound mastered".
This is of course exactly how things should be. When the mix leaves the studio it should already be the very best it can be. If there is the merest inkling in the engineer's mind that mastering will be able to improve it, then the mix simply isn't finished.
Another from Alcohol of Massachusetts commented, in relation to recordings of acoustic isntruments, that, "To make the recording more suitable to listening, some compression is necessary to tame the dynamic range."
Yes, I agree with this. If you record a group of acoustic instruments with just one stereo pair of mics, then the dynamic range that is captured will be uncomfortably wide for domestic listening. And iPod/in-car listening too for that matter.
Without disagreeing with this point in the slightest, it does raise for me a couple of issues that I would like to talk about.
The first is what happens when you add more mics on top of the simple stereo pair.
As you know, if a group of acoustic instruments or voices sounds good in the natural acoustic of a room, then it is possible to make an excellent recording using just two mics in the coincident crossed pair, near-coincident crossed pair, ORTF or spaced omni configurations, according to your preference.
All it takes is to find the right position for the mics. ("All it takes"! - it can take ages of trial, error and adjustment to get this right.)
But there are reasons why you might want to add more mics, even in a good acoustic.
One is if you are in a hurry.
Is there such a thing as a hurried recording engineer?
Well there shouldn't be. Enough time should be booked to do the job properly. But in broadcasting there often isn't so much time. And in television recording there are the requirements of the cameras to consider too.
To get a good balance more quickly, you can set the stereo pair closer than you normally would. Then add two spaced ambience mics towards the rear of the auditorium.
The outputs of the pairs of mics can be balanced on the faders to give the optimum blend of direct sound and reverberation.
Many would say that this isn't the best way to work, and indeed it can result in the reveration not sounding entirely 'connected' with the instruments.
However, I for one rather like it and I would sometimes choose it for preference over the simple stereo pair.
Another reason for adding more mics is if the ensemble is large. What can happen here is that the instruments that are remote from the stereo pair sound dull and distant in comparison with those at the front.
One solution that is often employed is to add more mics for the rear instruments. You can go further than this and mic every section of instruments individually, plus the main stereo pair.
This will solve the perspective problem, at the expense of possibly a more confused sound.
But something else happens too...
The dynamic range is reduced.
I remember when I first became aware of this when it was demonstrated to me some time ago by Mike Beville of Audio & Design.
In my own recordings since then I found that it was most definitely true. And the more mics you add, the more the dynamic range is reduced.
We are not talking about major differences here - around 6 dB at the most I would say. Still, this is enough to make an audible difference and make a recording more listenable at home.
There is another point I would like to make...
I believe with a passion that compression is not the best way of controlling dynamic range.
This may seem odd since that is the whole reasoning behind compressors in the first place.
The fact though is that compressors were invented for the broadcast industry. And as I have said already, the broadcast industry works at a fast pace - they need compressors. But recording engineers outside of broadcast should look at another option first.
And that option is to control the dynamic range manually. It is as simple as this - raise the level when it gets too quiet. Lower it when the level comes back up again.
This used to be done completely manually on the faders, but now it can be done more conveniently with fader automation.
When a musically-aware engineer adjusts the dynamic range of a recording manually, the result is far better and more natural than can be achieved with a compressor.
Compressors do of course have their place. Reducing dynamic range on a very short-term, tens of milliseconds, basis is one. This is useful for enhancing a popular music vocal.
Going back to the original comment. Yes I do agree that an acoustic recording will need some reduction in its dynamic range. The engineer should choose whichever method gives the most natural sound.
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
How technology is killing music
Don't we have great music-making technology these days? But what happened to the great music we were going to make with it?
This article is inspired by a recent conversation with someone who knows, I mean really knows, about the business of songwriting.
A lot of people will say that songs today are nowhere near as good as the best songs from the 1970s and earlier, thinking back as far even as the 1940s and 1930s too.
Well, that would be a matter of opinion that you might not share. Even so, as an opinion it is a very popular one, if not universal.
But what about your songs? You have studio technology right there in your home that is technically way in advance of anything in even the best studios of the 1970s or earlier.
So how come you are not writing great songs? I mean really great songs that would challenge the best, of any decade.
You have the technology, so why isn't it helping you turn your dreams into reality?
Great gear equals great recording. Right?
Unless you have made some stunningly bad equipment and software choices, you have a home studio that is perfectly capable of turning out work that is every bit as good as you hear in commercial releases.
So technically, there is nothing holding you back from having a hit record.
So if you wrote a good enough song, you would be able to make a recording that would propel your name, as writer and producer, right to the top of the charts.
The problem is, of course, writing that 'good enough' song. If you haven't done that yet, you need to figure out what it is that is holding you back.
Let's look at the process of writing and recording a song...
First you need to write the song. Perhaps you'll do it with a guitar, a pencil and a notebook. Perhaps you'll do it with a master keyboard, software instrument and word processor. Perhaps you'll do it entirely in your head! Any way is fine.
Next you need to make a recording. So call your singer, create an arrangement, record it, mix it and master it. Job done!
Ah, but here is a problem. Although you have the equipment and software to make a recording of professional quality, you don't quite have the necessary skills in production to pull it off. As brilliant as your song is, your finished recording sounds just a little bit... well, amateur.
Now I would say there's nothing wrong with this. Firstly I don't subscribe to the idea that the professionals 'own' music in any way. Music is the property of the people, in the words of Magic Michael that have resonated down the years. Secondly, it isn't reasonable to expect that anyone working at home in their spare time can compete as an absolute equal with seasoned studio professionals who have done nothing but make records twelve or more hours a day since they were seventeen years old.
Oddly enough, a part-time songwriter can compete with a professional, because writing songs comes more from inspiration than experience and time-honed slickness.
So although you might have the ability to write a great song, in all probability you don't have the ability to produce a finished recording of truly professional quality.
(OK, maybe you do, but stick with me...)
Can't make a master? Then make a demo!
Let's suppose that you have written a great song, but realistically you don't believe that you can take it all the way to becoming a commercially-successful recording. But there's nothing stopping you making a demo!
All you have to do is make a recording that puts the song across well, so that a publisher, producer or A&R manager might take a liking to it and take it on to the next stage. This is how the industry has worked for decades, although in an earlier era the demo would have been a live performance at the piano in a publisher's office rather than a recording.
Here comes my point...
The problem is now that so many people have home recording studios, and many of them are able to make recordings that are close to professional standards. So to make the grade with a demo, you have to arrange, record, mix and master your song to a similar near-professional standard. Otherwise no-one, literally no-one, in the industry will be prepared to spend any of their valuable time listening to it. They will consider that you haven't put enough effort in, so why should they?
So rather than putting all of your energy into your writing and knocking out a quick demo on a Revox or Portastudio, you're burning the midnight oil trying to make a great-sounding production. In all likelihood, whatever magic there was in your song will become diluted or hidden. If it is a truly great song, then it should sound great just with voice and guitar, and that should be all that is necessary for a demo.
In conclusion
My conclusion is that many of us are spending far too much time and effort trying to make professional-sounding recordings, which is sapping time and energy from what is really important, which is the songwriting process.
Rather than spending hour after hour building up layer after layer of virtual instrument tracks, checking out plug-in after plug-in to get the compression exactly right, it would be better to work with just a singer and a guitarist to get a really, really good performance of your song. A really good performance. And that means spending time on the music, not the equipment and software.
You know, in an era characterized by over-production, that might just be the way to make your song stand out!
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