The Studio

At the beginning of this year I started researching recording options. There are many studios to choose from and they vary greatly in price, equipment and experience. If you've never looked into this before, let me assure you that it is no cheap exercise to have your music recorded.

After months of trawling through gumtree ads I decided that the best long term option would be to set up my own recording studio. With that decision made it was on to researching equipment. All I really wanted was to plug a keyboard and a microphone into my pc and record live. Nothing major; no competing with Abbey Road studio, just a very simple set-up.

I'll spare you the boredom of this research process and the hours spent finding definitions for sound engineering terms completely foreign and reams of internet based info and just skip straight to the exciting bit: The Purchase and The Set-up.

I decided that, since I'm a struggling musician, my equipment was going to have to err toward the cheap and functionable side and I found the solution in a recording package offered by Behringer called the Podcast Studio and consisting of a pair of headphones, a condenser mic, a small mixer, an audio interface (firewire) and some free / open source software.

You can check out the Behringer Podcast Studio (firewire) here http://www.behringer.com/EN/Products/PODCASTUDIO-FIREWIRE.aspx

Look how happy the lady looks on the box...that in itself should tell you just how super duper it is ;) In truth it is VERY humble equipment - all totally entry level and, some engineers would laugh at it and dismiss it like a blown speaker cone. But I believe you have to a) start somewhere b) keep in accordance with your budget and c) find the equipment that suits your current needs with a view to improving upon it in the future when you're feeling more flush.

On to the set-up....
This was more challenging than finding the right equipment! Firstly, I had no table big enough to carry my pc, a midi-keyboard (which I already owned) and all this sound equipment. So off I went on a mission to find the perfect table, and would you believe that it ended up being a trusty trestle table? Simple and clean. I don't mind admitting that buying this table sent me off into a little day dream about owning an industrial-style loft in downtown New York (my inner-city dream home).

Back to reality....I set up all the equipment, installed the software etc and stood back to admire it all:



When I studied Sound Technology at university I had this one teacher who was completely paranoid about her sound equipment. She used to carry this paint brush with her all the time and would obsessively brush away imaginary dust molecules off her sound desk every couple of minutes. I used to think she was a little cooked, but now I'm starting to see her point! When you fork out the cash for this type of equipment it comes with a guarantee and an in-built sense of paranoia! No one else can touch it let alone breath near it! ;)

Once I had the equipment set-up I could see what else I needed - it's amazing how these things creep up on you - suddenly I need: a pop filter for the mic and a shock mount, a D.I. box for my guitar, and a music stand would be nice too. *sigh* it never ends.

I'm busy learning to use the software which is all open source (call me a hippie but free software just makes great sense!).