Exactly what I Learned in the Recording Studio

A buddy of mine who was an audio engineer once offered me what could easily be every aspiring musician’s desire. My friend stated: ” Why don’t you visit recording studio and let us make a record.” “We’ll tackle on it until you’re satisfied with it. Take all the studio time you need.” In return, we decided that after I printed the record, I’d give him a part of the sales. This incredible gift was partly due to friendship, and partly because he wanted to gather some experience in the studio he’d built.

For 2 days at a month every month I spend two hours driving to his studio and spend my evenings there sleeping on his makeshift bed while I record during the day. During the off times in the studio, I used it writing songs for the record. During those recording periods, I’d watch how he set up the microphones, how he would try different things, and switch gears if they didn’t work. I observed him during the mixing procedure, and I watched him resolve problems on the fly. As he toiled with the recording he would describe to me the whole process and patiently answered my questions.

Unfortunately, the record didn’t do well in the market. However, what I mastered during that experience and others like it has carried me through many different jobs and projects since that time. At times when a sound technician isn’t available, I no longer worry because I know I can handle the equipment personally and get the results that I want. Additionally, my ear was prepared during that experience to hear when a set of recorded tracks is not blended well, and even more significantly, what I can do about it. At present I am now capable of detecting what is really wrong with the track rather than just knowing that something is wrong.

Wanting to be a sound engineer is the last thing on my mind and I have no desire to become one. What is important though is the truth that I mastered both from experience and from mentorship in a recording studio. The reason lies on the facts that in order to learn and comprehend audio engineering you need someone who will show and clarify to you the whole process along with practice and experience.

My friend with the recording studio had in fact been to school, and he had learned a lot of methods he probably would not have picked up on his own. Nonetheless, I found his motion of offering me unlimited studio time in order to gain more experience on how to run his studio compelling because this is regardless of the fact that he spent years studying this particular line of work. He benefited from his scholastic experience, but he didn’t trust it enough to carry him after; he wanted more.

Whether you gain your education through schooling, through mentoring, through practice or through a combination of these, what really matters in this industry is whether you can generate results. That is what I learned from my encounter in the recording studio.