Ed’s Music Blog

Great music theory 101 tutorial website for Songwriters:

ChordMaps.com

GRADO SR-80’s

Find them and Buy these, actually buy several of these, there are the BEST headphones for the money(~$99), they are like fine wine, they get better with age, and constantly give you a clear flat honest frequency response (something you absolutely need when recording/mixing/mastering audio) Keep in mind though these are open-backed headphones, meaning the audio leaks out a bit, so be mindful of this when using condenser mics to record.

The best $100 bucks you’ll ever spend on headphones (tip: get the add-on soft pads, they are not exactly the most comfortable in the world

1. Don’t fret about not having top shelf expensive recording gear… Its better to know the equipment & software you already have Expertly.

2. You can create amazing things with the bear minimum of a mic (Shure sm57 anyone?)

, a small mixer with preamps and phantom power(mackie402-vlz3)

, and a digital recorder(either a computer, field recorder, etc) that can record at 44.1khz 24-bit.  Now record you parts into your software, or on your field recorder then import them into your Digital Audio Workstation.

3. Don’t Cheat, Don’t use samples, loops for hand percussion(hand claps, clave, tambourine, shakers, etc.), guitars, pianos, record everything in front of a mic, be sure your recording signal chain is a nice clean(no noise) signal. The only exception would be to use a drum loop as your metronome to start off with, but with the intention of eventually replacing it with real recorded drums

4. You don’t really have to be able to play anything these days(although it certainly helps), playing in time and having rhythm are most important, can’t play the drum set all at once?, no problem, play/record each drum individually in front of the mic and piece your beats together that way! its a very rewarding process, because you can actually come up with drum parts that a real drummer could potentially have a challenging time playing(especially if you are changing time signatures on him from part to part, just don’t make the beats impossible, drummers only have two hands and feet! keep it realistic.) This process can take care of your verse/chorus/bridge beats, but what about drum fills? I suggest you go to your local drum store and ask for some there! (ha-ha, just kidding, but seriously for fills, hire a drummer to come in and play some!)

5. Don’t make the incoming recording level too hot, back off the trim level, doing this on everything you record into that mic gives you better overall headroom! (which helps tremendously when mixing and mastering later on)

6. Even though you can fix things non-destructively by editing it later these days, pretend like you can’t do that, and always try to get the best take instead. (hint: its usually the first one!)

Most importantly:

7. Work on writing the music/song first!, then practice recording: go through the process of creating the recording of it, then do it all again going through that same recording process of the same song 3 more times!!!(the song’s arrangement, parts, instruments, and process grows better with each draft.)  Its like writing a paper, authors write many drafts before they get to their final one! Do the same thing, it gets the creative juices flowing and you’ll find yourself coming up with ideas you never had with the first recording. So each song has 3-4 takes, pick the best one, or take the best parts from each draft and make them into a 5th final draft and put this one on your album!

8. Get 3 mics: a small condenser mic: for recording acoustic guitar, a large condenser mic: for vocals, hand percussion, and a Dynamic mic: for electric guitars, & drums.

In our western tonal music there are 12 keys:

C Db D Db E F Gb G Ab A Bb B

that means their are 12 diatonic blues harmonicas(mouth harp, toe pickle, Dylanizer, whatever you wanna call em’)  you can buy…

1. Hohner Special 20’s each one is $30 (I suggest buying one per month, if you cant afford buying all 12 at one time)  It doesn’t matter what order you buy them in, I suggest starting with D E G A C …and so on.

2. Buy a neck holder for $15, (and Optional: Hohner sells a great case to hold all 12 for $35)

3. Sit down with your guitar and start strummin chords and blowing/sucking air through that harp and you’ll know right away which chords fit and which ones don’t.  Tip: The minor chords sound especially good, so be sure to try the 3 in each major key(for example in the key of C they would be your Dm, Em, & Am chords)

4. Sit down at a piano and do the same thing

5.  Have Fun!

Play this game daily:  (you should be able to achieve 100% when setting the speed at 70)

http://www.emusictheory.com/practice/speedNoteNames.html

1. Get Organized! Separate and label all of your extra cables/accessories/adapters into different ‘tupper-ware’ shoe box/fish tackle sized containers.

2. Be able to turn everything on in your project recording ’studio’ space with only one power switch!  This also eliminates any possibility of those very noisy ground loops. So get everything plugged into one outlet, have surge and backup battery protection on the line as well!!! (APC’s Backup-UPS ES 750 is great!)

3. Have everything already setup to record(mic cords on stands for vocals, guitars, etc. 1/4″ cords into your direct boxes, mixer, interface, etc.) and plugged in or close to the plugs.

4. Create Templates in your Digital Audio Workstation for each type of recording setup

5.Use fast 7200rpm external usb 2.0 hard drives, and BACKUP the project/session data onto CD-R or DVD-R’s(depending on how large the session is) very OFTEN, do it every time you finish recording a song!!!

6. Bonus Tip! record at 44.1khz 24bit!!! (96khz takes up way too much HD space, some people swear by it, honestly, good luck hearing the difference, use 24bit though!)