Classical Recording: A Practical Guide in the Decca Tradition
410
Classical Recording: A Practical Guide in the Decca Tradition
410Paperback
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Overview
Classical Recording: A Practical Guide in the Decca Tradition is the authoritative guide to all aspects of recording acoustic classical music. Offering detailed descriptions, diagrams, and photographs of fundamental recording techniques such as the Decca tree, this book offers a comprehensive overview of the essential skills involved in successfully producing a classical recording. Written by engineers with years of experience working for Decca and Abbey Road Studios and as freelancers, Classical Recording equips the student, the interested amateur, and the practising professional with the required knowledge and confidence to tackle everything from solo piano to opera.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780367312800 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Taylor & Francis |
| Publication date: | 10/27/2020 |
| Series: | Audio Engineering Society Presents |
| Pages: | 410 |
| Sales rank: | 338,968 |
| Product dimensions: | 7.50(w) x 9.25(h) x (d) |
About the Author
Caroline Haigh grew up with equal love for music, maths, and physics and combined study of all of them on the Tonmeister course at the University of Surrey. She began her career in classical post-production working for Decca during her final year at University, and stayed there for several years before moving around the corner to Abbey Road Studios (EMI) in 1996. At both Decca and EMI, she gained experience with countless major classical artists and became a sought-after and skilful editor, working on several Grammy award-winning albums, including Les Troyens (Decca - OSM/Dutoit) Best Opera 1995. Having enjoyed giving guest seminars at the University of Surrey during her time at Abbey Road, Caroline was recruited to teach on the Tonmeister course on a permanent basis from 2009. She currently teaches recording techniques, production/post-production skills and electro-acoustics (microphones), and she continues to work as a freelance classical editor.
John Dunkerley is one of the world's most highly respected and emulated classical recording engineers. Throughout a long career at Decca and then as a freelancer, his recordings have been renowned for their ravishingly beautiful sound and attention to detail. He has worked with almost all the major artists of the last 40 years, has made over a thousand CDs, and his recordings have earned over 15 Grammy awards. John is one of the last engineers alive to have learnt his craft from the great Kenneth Wilkinson, the inventor of many of the techniques that underpin the classical recording art. John teaches workshops at the University of Surrey, at the Banff Centre, and at the Abbey Road Institute.
Mark Rogers studied on the Tonmeister course at the University of Surrey. He began his career working with John Dunkerley at Decca, and then spent nine years around the corner at EMI's Abbey Road Studios, where he was the chief technical engineer for Studio One, famous for its orchestral and film score recordings. Here he worked with hundreds of different producers and engineers and gained a unique insight into the huge variety of techniques used in classical recording. In 2000 he moved to a management role at Warner Music, and after four years left to become a freelance recording producer, engineer, and musician. Since then he has worked for a wide variety of clients, including the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, and back where he started at Decca, and his recordings have won many accolades, including a Grammy award in 2009. Mark is a visiting lecturer at the University of Surrey.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements xii
Introduction xiii
Glossary of terms, acronyms, and abbreviations xvi
Glossary of recording attributes xviii
Part I Before recording 1
1 Acoustics and the recording venue 3
1.1 Brief introduction to room acoustics 3
1.2 What to be aware of when looking at a venue 8
1.3 What can you do to help with poor acoustics? 10
2 Studio techniques and working on location 13
2.1 Equipment 13
2.2 Practicalities at the recording venue 15
2.3 Rigging microphones and running cables 18
2.4 The control room 20
2.5 Studio communications: talkback, telephones, and cue lights 23
2.6 Optimising recording workflow 25
2.7 Running the session 28
Part II Recording 35
3 Basic two-microphone stereo techniques 37
3.1 Co-incident microphone techniques 37
3.2 Spaced omnis 39
3.3 Spaced and angled cardioids 40
4 Solo instruments 43
4.1 Classical guitar and flamenco guitar 44
4.2 Harp 48
4.3 Violin 51
4.4 Cello 56
4.5 Woodwinds 59
4.6 Harpsichord 63
5 The piano 66
5.1 The nature of the sound of a piano 66
5.2 The physical layout of a grand piano 68
5.3 The piano lid 68
5.4 Recording aims 72
5.5 Recording a solo piano: the spaced pair 73
5.6 The Decca piano technique 79
5.7 Techniques for other scenarios 83
5.8 Practical issues when recording pianos 86
6 Voice: solo and accompanied 90
6.1 'The singer in a recording session 90
6.2 The classical voice and microphone placement 90
6.3 Using two microphones on the voice 92
6.4 Microphone choice 95
6.5 Use of ambient pairs 96
6.6 Concert recording layout 97
6.7 Studio recording and reverse concert positions 99
6.8 Classical voice and lute/theorbo/guitar 103
6.9 Mixing and fader riding for a singer 108
7 Solo instruments and piano 109
7.1 Violin and piano in concert 110
7.2 Violin and piano: studio layout 113
7.3 Cello and piano in concert 117
7.4 Cello and piano: studio layout 119
7.5 Woodwind and piano 123
7.6 Brass and piano 125
8 The Decca Tree 128
8.1 What is the Decca Tree? 128
8.2 The three- and five-microphone trees 129
8.3 The four-microphone Decca Tree 136
8.4 Microphones for the Decca Tree 137
8.5 Mounting the tree 142
8.6 Notes on the evolution of the Decca Tree 145
9 Ancillary microphones 150
9.1 What do we mean by 'ancillary'? 150
9.2 Perception of orchestral depth and perspective 150
9.3 General notes on placement of ancillary microphones 152
9.4 Panning and levels of ancillary microphones 154
9.5 Woodwinds 155
9.6 Brass 161
9.7 Percussion 168
9.8 Double bass section 173
9.9 Other string sectional microphones 175
9.10 Harp 178
9.11 Celeste 180
10 Surround sound techniques 182
10.1 Purpose of surround sound in classical music recording 182
10.2 Panning a Decca Tree in 5.1 surround 183
10.3 Natural reverberation: additional microphones for 5.1 surround 185
10.4 Artificial reverberation in 5.1 surround 189
10.5 Offstage effects in surround: location of sources behind the listener 190
10.6 Object-based audio: Dolby Atmos 190
11 Solo instruments and orchestra 193
11.1 Piano concerto: studio layouts 193
11.2 Single piano concerto: concert layout 199
11.3 Piano concerto conducted from the keyboard 200
11.4 A note on the size of the grand piano 203
11.5 Violin concerto: studio layouts 203
11.6 Violin concerto: concert layout 205
11.7 Wind concertos: studio and concert layouts 205
11.8 Cello concerto: studio and concert layouts 206
11.9 Guitar concerto: studio layout 207
11.10 Brass concertos: studio and concert layouts 208
11.11 Percussion concertos 210
12 Chamber ensembles 211
12.1 String quartet in studio layout 211
12.2 String quartet in concert 217
12.3 Piano quintet; studio and concert techniques 217
12.4 Piano quintet: reverse-seated studio position 221
12.5 Piano trio: studio and concert techniques 221
12.6 Small wind ensembles: studio or concert layout 225
13 Wind, brass, and percussion hands 230
13.1 A note about dynamic range and ear protection 230
13.2 Large wind ensembles 230
13.3 Classical brass ensemble 232
13.4 Brass band 237
13.5 Percussion ensembles 240
14 Organ 241
14.1 Brief introduction to the pipe organ 241
14.2 Doing a venue reconnoitre 242
14.3 Microphone choices, stands, and cable runs 242
14.4 Basic technique: straightforward organ layout 243
14.5 Organs with pipe divisions in several locations 244
14.6 Interesting acoustic effects and other awkward corners 246
14.7 Monitoring limitations 247
14.8 Communication: talk microphone 247
14.9 Noise 248
14.10 Electronic organs 248
14.11 Organ with orchestra: overdubbing or simultaneous recording 249
14.12 Organ pitch 250
14.13 Sampled organs 250
15 Choirs 252
15.1 General notes on microphone choice and placement 252
15.2 Choir spacing 252
15.3 Small choir 252
15.4 The choral society 259
15.5 Choral society with soloists and organ in concert 265
15.6 Antiphonal church choir 268
16 Solo voice, orchestra, and choir 274
16.1 Orchestra and choir 274
16.2 Orchestra and choir with stationary soloists 279
16.3 Recording live opera for cinema, DVD, TV, radio, or CD 288
16.4 Recording live opera at the Royal Opera House: microphone set-ups 289
16.5 Mixing opera to 5.1 surround for cinema 293
Part III After the recording session 299
17 Mixing 301
17.1 Choosing and blending microphone sources into a static balance 301
17.2 Riding levels on ancillary microphones 304
17.3 Use of EQ and high-pass filters 305
17.4 Use of delays 306
17.5 Reverb: natural and artificial 307
17.6 Riding overall levels 311
18 Editing and post-production 313
18.1 Aims and philosophy of editing 313
18.2 Requirements of a classical editing system 314
18.3 Source-destination editing 315
18.4 Classical post-production workflow 318
18.5 Refining edits: how to solve problems and maintain musical flow 319
18.6 Notes on working with different instruments 329
18.7 Overdubbing scenarios 331
18.8 Emergency measures: sampling piano notes and note removal 332
18.9 Professional finish: joining into room tone 334
19 Mastering 335
19.1 Noise removal 335
19.2 Changing the sound 336
19.3 Tops and tails: room tone, breaths, noises, and fades 337
19.4 Levels between tracks, compression, and loudness meters 342
19.5 Placing track markers for CD mastering 344
Appendices 347
Appendix 1 Opera recording: practices at Decca from the 1950s to the 1990s 349
Appendix 2 Cheaper alternatives to classic microphones 360
Appendix 3 Original session set-up sheets 365
Appendix 4 Orchestral layout notation 383
Bibliography and further reading 385
Index 387