Project Proposal
Production Project Files (80%)
Progress and Management Records (20%)
Project Overview
For my specialist study project, I decided to collaborate with one of my flatmates who is a singer songwriter studying popular music performance at the conservatoire. As we had worked together previously, we believed that the decision to undertake this project was a logical one allowing us to split work between us with him writing and performing the tracks and myself producing and arranging them. The project I proposed for this assignment is that of a mixed genre album which will allow the artist more creative freedom to work within an array of styles rather than being limited to tracks of a similar nature. The Genres featured within this album and portfolio range from piano ballads to acoustic pop and even covering some light indie rock.
Portfolio Structure
Track 1: Remember me – Piano Ballad
Track 2: Breathe – Piano Ballad
Track 3: Seasons Change – Piano Ballad
Track 4: At the End – Acoustic/singer songwriter
Track 5: Can I say I’m in love with you now – Singer songwriter/folk pop
Track 6: Something more – Indie
Track 7: Here We Are – Indie Rock
I have decided to structure my portfolio in the way as shown above as I believe that this order provides the best flow between each genre featured within the album. In addition to this, songs were split between both myself and the artist in order to best provide a wide range of styles for both parties to use with other factors such as marking criteria being taken into account.
Planning and communication
A major benefit of living with the artist that I am working with was the ease of communication and planning as these could all be done in person before each studio session. At the start of the academic year, we laid out a basic weekly studio plan detailing that we would work on a minimum of one song every two weeks and each week would have a minimum of two studio sessions with a length of approximately six hours each. On top of this, we would have one night per week dedicated to songwriting and another night dedicated towards planning the studio sessions for the upcoming week. Examples of notes from planning sessions can be seen below (See appendix 1). During each of our studio sessions we tried to make the most use of the facilities and the equipment within often using some of the earlier sessions to experiment with different microphones, tones and micing techniques, with the ones I have chosen to use being discussed later on. Unfortunately, one communication problem we faced came in early March of the second term, where we were informed that we would not be allowed to submit the same tracks as each other despite being both on seperate courses and in separate years. The more we inquired about this sudden snag the more varied the responses became with half of the lecturers we spoke to providing a different response. Ultimately, we decided that despite only having three months till deadlines, it would be safer to write and record additional songs so as to avoid any risk of plagiarism.
Recording
Apart from the use of samples and Midi instruments, all elements of this portfolio were recorded within the studios in university, namely 104, 113, 115 and 422. Each live instrument heard will be broken down into the recording technique and microphones used and why:
Vocals:
Having worked with my artist for more than a year, I have found my preferred choice of microphones which I feel are best suited to his voice. My standard vocal setup is a Phantom C and a WA 87 using the two mics to capture and blend the tones of the vocals. I use the Phantom C as it is a very natural and detailed microphone which when paired with the warmth of the WA 87 compliments the tonality of the artist I am working with. On top of this, the detail found in the Phantom C paired with the low warmth of the WA 87 is well suited to the low vocal range and large dynamic range of my artist. This mic set up can be found below (See Appendix 2) and has been used for all seven of the tracks in my portfolio.
Acoustic Guitar:
My most commonly used setup for recording acoustic guitar is a mid-side pair typically using a TLM 102 as the central mic with a rode K2 as the figure of 8 (See Appendix 3) which provides a warm and controlled stereo guitar recording as can be heard in my fifth track in my portfolio. For the other acoustic track however, I was required to change my microphones due to the dynamic range of the acoustic in the track and so chose to use a pair of directional pencil mics (AKG 451Bs) in a spaced pair (See Appendix 4).
Piano:
For my piano recordings I used a pair of KM 184s as the close mics as well as a Delta 2 for an underside mic, on top of this I used a pair of shoeps omnis in an XY setup as well as two AKG 414s as room mics. My aim with this setup is to capture as much of the natural tone of the piano as possible including the natural sound of the room that were recording in (Typicaly 113 for piano).
Electric Guitar:
For the two indie tracks I used two different amp setups depending on which tone I was wanting to achieve. I chose to use the fender amp (See Appendix 7) for my clean tone heard in track six. Whereas for the heavier indie song (track 7) I used a two-amp setup as well as a set of pedals (See appendices 5 and 6) and blended the crunchy tone of an orange amp with the warm distortion of a vox.
Bass:
For the bass in each track, I used an amp and a D6 to capture it due to the D6s incredible low end.
Drums:
My go to drum setup is as follows:
Kick in: DM1B
Kick out: D6
Snare top: Sm57
Snare bottom: Shure classic 545SD
Toms: Senheiser e604
Over heads: Sontronics STC-1S
HI Hat: Beyerdynamic M160
I tend to lean towards this setup as I feel that it captures a clear image of the whole kit and I have used it on five of the tracks in my portfolio. For examples see appendix 8.
Mixing
When mixing each track, I follow the same basic mix process for each before adding slight variation when appropriate. I start by lowering all the faders to negative infinity before levelling the track instrument by instrument starting with the lead instrument and vocals and following from there. I then proceed to use EQ where needed to amplify certain characteristics of instruments as well as to make room for each instrument to pop through the mix. I then move on to compression typically using parallel compression so as to maintain as much of the natural dynamics as possible. I lastly use reverb automation and panning to create width and depth within my mix. Each track in my portfolio has been mixed and mastered to an integrated Luf value between –16 to –18, and a list of the plugins used can be found below. On track 3 I used two ambient samples as background noise for the song to reflect the lyrical content. I also used a Midi kit on tracks four and five as these tracks were originally just acoustic tracks however I decided to arrange drum parts using a plugin called MODO drums to provide more rhythmic elements to the tracks. Similarly, I used the BBC symphony orchestra plugin to arrange string parts to add more layers to track two.
Plugins used:
Manley Massive Passive EQ
Empherical labs EL8 Distressor – Compressor
Telitronix LA 2A Grey – Limiter and/or compressor
Pure plate reverb
Hits Ville Reverb chamber
Lexicon 244 digital reverb
Stereo spreader
Modo Drum
BBC Symphony orchestra
Conclusion
In conclusion, I believe that my portfolio meets the criteria and points outlined within my original proposal and has met my aim of recording a multi genre album. Upon reflection I think that despite planning sessions in advance and reviewing progress after each week we still ended up with less time than first thought due to unforeseen circumstances, meaning that I was left with less time than I would have preferred to mix all of the tracks, especially with the two indie tracks which is a genre that I am relatively new to mixing and so would have rathered had more time to do so if given the option. Despite this however, between myself and the artist I worked with we managed to write and record a total of 16 tracks, seven of which feature in my submission, which I do believe to be a success and have adhered to my project proposal.
Appendix 1 – Planning evidence
Vocal mic setup (Appendix 2)
Acoustic guitar setup (Appendix 3 and 4)
Electric guitar setup (Appendices 5,6 and 7)
Drum setup (Appendix 8)
