Slau takes you behind the scenes at BeSharp, a recording studio in New York City. Listen to excerpts from sessions, gear reviews and equipment shootouts.

I received an audio comment from James Clausen with some questions about microphone preamps. James inquired about my recent purchase of several Grace Design M101s and wonders how they compare with the Millennia Media HV-3D. As I mentioned in the previous episode, I won a bid on the M101s in an auction of gear from a studio going out of business. I wouldn't have gone out of my way to look for the M101s but they are very nice for the price and especially at the auction price at which I purchased them. I would have probably preferred the John Hardy pres that were originally housed in the studio's racks but, alas, they were gone before the auction even began… I sent the pres to Grace Designs for a +10 dB gain modification so I didn't have time to do a proper shootout. However, when I did bring the pres to the studio, I plugged them in just to make sure they were in working order. I did viagra a very brief comparison to the HV-3D just to see if they were at least as clean. I have to say, they were awfully close. I detected only a perceivably higher noise floor, perhaps 3 dB or so. Otherwise, they really were comparable. The front panel Hi–Z input and high pass filter are welcomed features not available on the HV-3D. I do wish they had an easier option for rack mounting but, with a rack shelf, a drill and two #10 machine screws, it's not a big deal. James asks about how the Grace and Millennia pres compare with some other offerings from Focusrite, Manley and Avalon. The thing is, some of the pres he mentions are more along the lines of channel strips that include compression and/or equalization in addition to amplification. Rather than comparing them to the HV-3D, I'd sooner compare them to something like the Millennia Media Origin STT-1. The Origin is a full recording channel although it also has a feature not found in too many preamps which is a twin topology design that allows for discrete solid–state and tube paths for the preamp, compressor and EQ sections of the unit. I had to break the news to James that, when recording a drum kit, one could, indeed, easily use tens of thousands of dollars in preamp channels. Of course, one probably wouldn't find that kind of arsenal in a home studio but it's par for the course in commercial facilities and higher–end project studios. Think about using 8 channels of a vintage Neve console to mic a drum kit—with a price tag of several hundreds of thousands of dollars, what would you say is the per–channel cost of the signal chain? Yeah, I know, it seems almost depressing, doesn't it? But why? It shouldn't be depressing at all! One can get fantastic results with simple, straight amplification of signals right into a DAW. In fact, that's what some engineers began doing in the 80s and 90s with preamps going straight into analog multitrack recorders and bypassing the console altogether. These days, it's possible to find great multichannel preamps with plenty of clean gain to help get several tracks of high–quality audio into your recording platform of choice without totally breaking the bank. If you do a little searching, you'll find that Rob Hunter (Branford Marsalis's engineer/producer) often uses Millennia preamps. What you probably won't find out is that, depending on the client with whom he's working and their budget, he sometimes uses the PreSonus DigiMAX. The DigiMAX is a wonderful 8–channel preamp with plenty of nice, clean gain. I've used it on a couple of projects as well and I think it's great. I've also used the preamps on the Focusrite Control|24 as well as the OctoPre. Apart from lacking a little extra gain for the many ribbon mics I often use, they're perfectly fine preamps for a wide range of applications. A recent episode of Ronan's Recording Show featured a review of several preamps in the $500 range. Among the contenders, Ronan appears to like the True Systems P-Solo which, incidentally, my buddy, Allen (Big Al) Wagner, just won in a Sweetwater Sound Twitter promotion.

Direct download: SWS015-Pre_Post.mp3
Category:Podcast -- posted at: 7:17pm EDT

Yeah, I know, I know—it's been a long time. Trust me, it bothers me more than it might bother you. Thing is, I could either cancel sessions and work less often, make less money and then I'd have more time to podcast! Oh, wait… maybe not. I did have a last minute cancellation which was quite welcomed, given my cold and so I did have an unexpected window in which to record this episode—a kind of "catch up" in the studio. I have to say, when I started this podcast series, I figured that I would do a few such "catching up" episodes but now I'm thinking I might rather do it in blog form. Hmm… maybe I will. We'll see. Sooooooo– since last time, I did go to Atlanta for Dragon*Con which was a complete blast. I met so, so many people who were so friendly and were fans of the podcast. It didn't hurt that I was hanging with George Hrab (http://www.georgehrab.com) and Donna Mugavero (@MsInformation) most of the weekend. I was invited to be on two panels in the podcasting track. It was so nice to finally meet derek & Swoopy from the Skepticality podcast. (http://www.skepticality.com I couldn't visit Atlanta and not give my friend, Brian Stevens (http://www.brianstevens.com) a call. We went to lunch at one of those Brazilian steak joints. Wow! I like to call our little meet up a "meat up" because, man—bacon-wrapped chicken, bacon-wrapped beef, bacon-wrapped bacon… It was fabulous to meet Brian in person and I really enjoyed the conversation. Hey, Brian: c'mon, let's have another episode of the Music Pro Show! (Like I should speak about getting a show out…) A couple of weeks ago, I flew out to San Francisco for a meeting at Digidesign. I've been working with them over the course of a few years to make Pro Tools compatible with the VoiceOver feature of Mac OS X. It's been a long road and we still have a little way to go but we can definitely see the finish line. For more information on the accessibility of Pro Tools for blind users, please visit http://www.protoolspetition.org As usual, I did attend the AES show in New York. I must say, although they tried to spin it in a positive light, the show is so much smaller than it used to be. Hey, I'm glad it's still around and I'm confident that it'll grow once again but it really did seem quite a bit smaller than in previous years. I tried to attend as many workshops as I could. Of course, there are so many good ones that are scheduled at the same time—it's impossible to see everything one wants to see at these conventions. One of the panelists with which I was quite impressed was David Josephson of Josephson Engineering. (http://www.josephson.com) David was so thorough in his explanations and so confident that it made me want to just go out and buy a Josephson microphone. David's an impressive and knowledgeable man with high standards. . No wonder he's chair of the AES Standards Committee. I did get to see a bunch of friends and colleagues—some old, some new. I met Sydney Galbraith who came down from Toronto for the show. I know Sydney through Twitter (@sydneygalbraith)—really nice guy with, I'm sure, a bright career in front of him. Speaking of bright careers, I got to meet the legendary Bruce Swedien. Wow, what a warm and gracious person he is. I think of him as the Walter Cronkite of the audio world. Man, what a giant in the industry and he couldn't be nicer. There were a couple of people I didn't get to see in person and I was bummed about that. I stopped in at the A–Designs booth to see Ronan Chris Murphy of Ronan's Recording Show (http://www.ronansrecordingshow.com) but he wasn't around. I stopped in again the next day and missed him again and it appeared that he wasn't checking Twitter so I didn't get to meet up with him this time. Also, John Grant of Granelli Audio Labs (http://www.granelliaudiolabs.com) had a whirlwind of a day on Sunday (his only day at the show) but I had to leave early and missed him. Next time…

Direct download: SWS014-The_Didge.mp3
Category:Podcast -- posted at: 7:10am EDT

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Header Photograph by Roman Iwasiwka
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