My Take on Music Recording with Doug Fearn

Send us Fan Mail The art of producing a record requires knowledge of music, mastering the technical aspects of the recording process, and an ability to work with people. This is the first of a three-part series about producing. In this episode, I talk about the role of the producer, using a typical album project for Corrie Lynn Green as an example. Not all productions will follow this example, sin...

Send us Fan Mail Our perception of frequency balance varies with loudness, a fact documented by Harvey Fletcher and Wilden A. Munson, two scientists at Bell Laboratories. In 1933, they published a paper called, “Loudness, its definition, measurement and calculation.” It was groundbreaking science in the field of human hearing, and has implications today for how we perceive music. This is especiall...

Send us Fan Mail Almost all pop music features someone singing. Getting the best vocal performance is crucial, since most listeners respond to the words of a song and need to be able to hear them. In this episode, I first discuss the human factors involved in getting a great performance from singers, mostly from a producer’s viewpoint. And then I focus on the technical requirements of capturing th...

Send us Fan Mail There are many things that are important to create the proper studio environment for creative success. Most of these things are pretty mundane, but they do make a difference. Examples I cover in this episode include microphone stands and accessories, music stands and instrument stands, chairs, headphones, studio lighting and climate control, and mic and other cables. It’s not the...

Send us Fan Mail Ever since its announcement, I have been interested in learning more about Dolby Atmos. I was skeptical at first, primarily because of my experience with “Quad” back in the 1970s. That 4-channel concept never gain any popularity with either the listening public nor in the recording community. I presumed that Atmos would be similar, just more speakers. The early demo sessions I att...

Send us Fan Mail Compression and limiting are tools we use to modify the dynamic range of the music we record. In this episode, I present a brief history of where this technique came from, how it evolved over the years since the 1930s. I discuss the various ways that compression circuits work, from the variable-mu vacuum tube, to the optical compressor, the FET, the VCA, the PWM, and the digital l...

Send us Fan Mail This is part 2 of the Audiophiles Guide to Music Recording. You can listen to part 1 at https://www.buzzsprout.com/942952/14335456 Or you can access part 1 wherever you listen to podcasts. My Take on Music Recording is primarily aimed at people in the professional recording world, but there are a significant number of listeners who are music lovers and audiophiles. This episode pr...

Send us Fan Mail My Take on Music Recording is primarily aimed at people in the professional recording world, but there are a significant number of listeners who are music lovers and audiophiles. This episode provides an overview of the recording process for them. However, I think even people in our profession might enjoy how I attempt to explain the recording studio process in layman’s terms. Thi...

Send us Fan Mail Music is meant to be heard in an appropriate acoustical environment. But many times, we have to record in a space that does not have the right sound to it. Artificial reverb is often the solution. In this episode, I talk about good room sound in a studio, and the earliest methods of creating a reverberation sound. That started with spring reverb, then acoustic echo chambers, tape...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, I talk about software plug-ins vs hardware. It is a question that I get frequently from listeners. It is relatively short. Can a plug-in perfectly emulate a hardware device? What are the tradeoffs a plug-in designer needs to consider? What about a plug-in that has no hardware antecedent, but it something out of the mind of the designer? These are some of the topic...

Send us Fan Mail Every recording is made is some sort of space. It might be a room, and studio, a church, a concert hall, or even outside. The space where the music is performed, and where the microphones pick up the music always influences the sound of the recording. You might think that close-mic’ing in a dead room eliminates the contribution of the room, but it is still there, for better or wor...

Send us Fan Mail How do we make our recordings better? I have thought about this for over 50 years and in this episode, I have tried to distill what I learned into a dozen general rules. The best way to make great recordings is to start with great performers. But even if you aren’t recording the best talent in the world, there are still ways to improve what you get. email: dwfearn@dwfearn.com www....

Send us Fan Mail What if you were suddenly confronted with recording an instrument you had never had in the studio before? Or one you never heard before? Or one you never knew existed? How do you figure out how to capture its sound? Where do you place a microphone? What microphone will you use? In this episode I suggest various ways to evaluate an unfamiliar instrument or sound, using some example...

Send us Fan Mail After three and a half years of producing the “My Take on Music Recording” podcast, I thought it would be useful to review the 80+ episodes and point out some of the interesting topics you might have overlooked. You might have missed some of the earlier episodes, or skipped over them because they did not interest you at the time. The most popular episode of all is the very first o...

Send us Fan Mail My conversation with musician, producer, mixer, and mastering engineer Justin Gray continues, in this second of two parts. In this episode, Justin discusses how to provide optimum tracks for an immersive mix. He also talks about the minimum immersive monitoring system needed and why it will improve your tracks for remix into Atmos or another format. We explore loudness and how it...

Send us Fan Mail Justin Gray is a musician, producer, mixer, and mastering engineer based in Toronto. His credits include many major artists. He was fascinated by immersive formats long before they became mainstream. In this first part of a two-part series, we talk about the various immersive formats, of which Dolby Atmos is best known. Justin explains how they differ and what they have in common....

Send us Fan Mail Most people have time conflicts between what they do for a living and the rest of their lives. That includes time for family and friends, hobbies, obligations, and exploring new directions. Musicians also must confront these same issues. It is often more difficult for a creative person because music and any art not generally lucrative, especially for those starting out. In this ep...

Send us Fan Mail Studios are complex technological environments and it is common for problems to arise. But a problem in the equipment might be a minor inconvenience if you have the skills to quicky determine where the trouble lies and understand how to fix it. Most problems in a studio are human errors. There are often ways to work around the problem. That keeps the session going and you may be a...

Send us Fan Mail Most of you in the professional audio world have learned that Dave Hill, founder of Crane Song, died in February. Dave and I were friends for over 30 years. In this episode I tell some stories about our interactions over the decades. Not only was Dave an amazing engineer and designer, but he was also a wonderful human being. There is a terrific documentary about Dave, made by Fren...

Send us Fan Mail How do you decide what microphone to use for any instrument or voice you will be recording? All microphones sound different from one another, which is a wonderful tool at our disposal. Making the right choice will improve your recording, eliminate many problems at the mixing stage, and minimize the amount of processing you need. In this episode, I talk about why I chose the mics I...

Send us Fan Mail The typical music consumer these days is listening on earbuds or headphones. Or maybe on the tiny speakers in their smartphone. Few are listening on speakers, at least none of any reasonable quality. It makes sense for us to take this into consideration when we mix a song. Engineers have always had to make adjustments and compromises in order for their mixes to translate well for...

Send us Fan Mail Recording is a technological endeavor, but it also invariably involves people. The psychology of recording sessions has always fascinated me, so when a listener suggested that I have Terri Bright on an episode, I was intrigued by Terri’s dual career as a singer-songwriter, as well as a someone with a PhD in Applied Behavior. In this interview, we discuss how behavioral science can...

Send us Fan Mail What makes one piece of studio electronic gear sound different from another, similar piece? When it comes to the physical gear we need to record, there are only a few basic categories. You probably use microphones, mic preamps, equalizers, compressors, converters, reverb devices, delays, monitor amps and speakers. And for each of those categories, there could be dozens of manufact...

Send us Fan Mail If you have listened to this podcast for any length of time, you probably know that I am a big fan of ribbon microphones. In this episode, I talk about my introduction to ribbon mics while I was in high school, and how over the years I tried to make them work for me. Eventually, ribbon mics became my favorite, and now I often do sessions that use only ribbon mics. I explain the ch...

Send us Fan Mail For this 70th podcast episode, things are reversed and I am interviewed by singer-songwriter Corrie Lynn Green. Corrie was curious about how I got into recording, and later into studio equipment manufacturing. We also talk about my views on what makes a successful recording, and what I look for in a recording artist. You may recall Corrie from the 3-part series we did earlier this...