Re: recording methods - what's your approach?

[Per Boysen <perboysen@gmail.com>]

On Fri, Jul 9, 2010 at 9:07 AM, Gareth Whittock
<buddhamachine@live.co.uk> wrote:
> I'm about to make a start on an album of expanded looping guitar 
>and I've
> been wondering how to go about making recordings that are fresh and
> spontaneous with hopefully a reasonably high level of playing 
>proficiency. I
> normally make recordings by rehearsing ideas that have spontaneously
> occurred out of looping jam sessions but when I work this way, it simply
> doesn't feel the same as when there's no pressure to get it "right" -
> whatever that means. I've compared rough but spontaneous recordings with
> more precise, technically superior recordings and I nearly always prefer 
>the
> former.
> So I've decided to informally record a lot of my "jams" and treat the
> editing of them together as another part of the compositional process.
> Does anyone else work this way here? I'm curious..


Yes, when I do solo recordings (not in collaboration) I work exactly
in the way you hint at. The major strategy is to set up your
performance rig/instrument in a way that also doubles as "recorder".

How to get there technically is of course a matter of what gear you
play and at what stage of pre-production/refinement you want to snag
your spontaneous recordings. Here are a couple of methods I have been
using:

- External stereo recorder, like the Zoom H4, for acoustic stereo
field recording.

- A DAT tape recorder for a line stereo recording of the master output
(digitally of analog line out depending on what gives). I used this
method a lot with the Electrixpro Repeater/EDP/Filterbank rig I had
five years ago.

- A computer dedicated for recording. This was very powerful when I
put an optical ADAT cable between the performance laptop and the
recording computer, because I was using the software Plogue Bidule in
wich it is easy to route signals. Then I recorded eight simultaneous
channels from my performance and got eight stereo audio files to mix.
That's great odds to get a good sound.

- Recording by rendering multiple files from a bunch of channels
running on the performance computer. This is the most simple methode -
"just pusch a button and record". I use Bidule for this and set up a
multi channel recorder object as part of my looping rig hosted by
Bidule (i.e. Mobius + effects).

- The absolutely simplest method is when I use Mainstage as the
looper/effects host because Mainstage only allows you to render one
stereo audio file of the main output. As much "you get what you here"
as you may get. This is the method I favor and pick first if there is
a choice. A good praxis is to record when practicing and just delete
the rendered files if not good (you should practice "being good" not
practice playing technique or obscure effect techniques).

- Finally a method I use if composing the music before playing it:
then I record into Logic and put all my normal live effects (that I
use on stage with Mainstage) as play-through-effect-chains on the
different logic audio track channel strips. This means I hear my
playing through these effects and adjust phrasing etc to the effect
sound but the recorded audio files on the drive will not have the
effect sound - only my dry line-in instrument sound. With this
recording approach you have the best chances to tweak the mix in the
best way after having recorded it. But it only works if you already
have learned a bit about how to produce a recording - with the other
methods you get great results if your playing sounds great in the
first plays. This method does not work if deciding the tempo is part
of the performance/playing - only if tempo is part of the composition
pre recording. For all other methods above the tempo is being defined
as I start playing (recording).

Sorry for the long post, but I thought I should just list what
different approaches I generally chose from. Only one is to be used of
course ;-)))

Greetings from Sweden

Per Boysen
www.boysen.se
www.perboysen.com
www.looproom.com internet music hub