A few weeks ago I shared a piece called 
For folks that have never been in a music studio, all of this may seem a bit tedious and slow, but this is what it takes to build a good radio ready finished product. There is a lot of banter between the crew and the artist, and a lot of takes. These days it's all done digitally, but we still make jokes about running out of tape. The reality is that on occasion we run out of drive space and have to move material around.
Here's my record producer, Mark Hallman, hard at work; plugging my music on social media. Well, that's what he said.
Here are a few tools of the trade. Each one has a specific purpose, or so I'm learning. The little guy down at the bottom is a bass ukulele. It sounds almost exactly like an upright bass fiddle. It's fret-less, and the strings are like thick rubber bands.
What you see above is what I call the birds nest. It's really a rack of what is called "Patch Bays" in the music business. Only the "Chief", Andre Moran (studio engineer) is genius enough to figure this mess out, but it routes signals all over the sound room to various pieces of equipment in "The Rack".
Here are some more of the tools that are used in the studio. There is a real smorgasbord to choose from and I've only shown a few. Mark considers the entire music studio as an instrument in and of itself.
This wall in the kitchen area of the studio is dedicated to the display of a small sampling of the records that have been produced there. I'm pretty sure that it's not complete because there are a couple of piles of them below this rack that aren't on display. I heard a rumor when I was there this month that the assistant engineer (John Pearson) was working on expanding this display.
The following clips have overdub material that we have been working on during the past few sessions over the past couple of months:
This clip recorded in early July of 2017, contains vocal overdubs were done in early July at The Congress House Studio in south Austin with Andre Moran at the controls as chief Engineer. Mark Hallman, my producer, is singing backup vocals. The subject song lyrical material for the piece that I call "Heartland" came as a result of work that I had been doing in Indiana for a railroad capacity expansion project in the late 00's.
The clip above is part two of the first clip.
This clip above was taken in early August of 2017 . The song "Songsmiths and Poets" was written as a tribute to all the artists that pour their hearts and souls into the songwriting process, with little to no reward for it. Again, Mark Hallman doing backup vocals and Andre Moran "The Chief" at the controls.
I had several other clips that I wanted to share that I took that day but I was having trouble with the camera's video recording feature and a couple of clips never got saved. Not to worry, I'll be taking more to post later.
Thanks for following me on this feed and stay tuned for more to come.
Cool post, looks like a really awesome place.
Love behind the scenes work!
Very Nice studio!That gretsch guitar looks stunning! Which model is it? I'm also curious to what guitaramplifier you're paring With the gretsch guitar?
I've recenty gotten my hands on a Two Rock Classic Reverb, paring it With a Todd Krause masterbuilt guitar, sounds superb!
Well this past week it was paired with a Vox during my session, but they have several to choose from, depending on the music that's being recorded. I don't know the model, but I'll ask Mark next time I'm there. They also have an cool looking Ibanez HB that they just got which sounds pretty awesome too. Andre has a 12 string HB, I forget the manufacturer, that we used on an over dub this week. It was the perfect tool for what we were doing at the time.
Mark did a lot of work with Carol King back in the seventies and early eighties. He's got quite a resume.
wow... the dream studio ;)
Cool I love your studio and I can feeling if I has it I will spending in there all day and I will have it one day. This is also in my goal. You can check my dj live set @changfly thank
Pretty cool post. I've been in and out of studios pretty much my whole adult life and ultimately wish to cut an album so this info is very much appreciated! Thanks, will def follow.
You have to love the art of creating and producing music, because yes, there is very little reward other than the reward that you created something beautiful to you and the people who know the process. A friend of mine likes to argue how recording in 96k as opposed to 48k would make a difference to the listener. I have personally listened to both, and to 192k and have come to the conclusion that the difference is so slight that most listeners would not even really know what they are listening to. The real difference is the art of putting sounds together and spacing them correctly to paint a picture. That is the process. All of the technical stuff, yes is really cool, is important, but does not make a good song. The production of a piece put together with the idea is what makes great recordings. Great producers who can make that happen are certainly underappreciated. How many people have ever heard of Tommy Lapuma or Bob Clearmountain for example. So long story short, ha, I share your love of creating and making music, as well as putting it altogether on to a two track medium in the end. Good job on your recordings brother. :)
Thanks for the comment. It's become my favorite thing to do.
Music is something which helps me motivate in life. Without music life is nothing.
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Super cool studio! I hope you will have some truly nice time with lots of success with and in it! :)
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Nice post 👍
Interesting post. Now following .
This dog has zero musical abilities even though I love a wide range of music. When it comes to playing I'm all paws and singing well nobody likes a howl.
Mark has worked with a lot of folks that you might think on the surface have little ability. He takes each voice as it is, and approaches it as if it's perfect. Each of us have our own character and it just has to be cajoled and developed to it's fullest potential in the world of Mark Hallman.
wow... great post brother @cactusclef ...i hope please upvote my block..
https://steemit.com/introducemyself/@academix87/hello-steemians-let-me-introducing-myself-in-an-aceh-art-culture-n-history-my-nation
Very nice man 👍🏾
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STOPAwesome place. Happy to see there is still people like this in the world!
Thank you for sharing =)
I love your studio @cactusclef, from all indications, you've been producing for a long time, way longer than I have actually.
One question though, what's your software? I'm more in tuned with ableton.
It's not my studio actually. It belongs to my Producer, Mark Hallman. I would urge you to go to his website "The Congress House Studio" for more information.
They use ProTools there but have set me up with Cubase at home that I use as a scratch pad.
The congress house eh, I'll check it out. Protools is quite annoying, especially when it comes to knowing all the shortcuts. Same can be said for cubase.
Great knowing that another music producer has been found here!
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