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Pioneer Recording Engineer – Betty Cantor Jackson

 

Betty Cantor-Jackson is an audio engineer and producer and is best known for her work recording live concerts for the Grateful Dead from the late 1960s to the early 1980s.

Growing up in Martinez, California, Betty had an interest in electronics and would open up radios and other electronic devices apart and fix them. In high school, she would book shows and would go on to help with shows across the Bay Area. It was during this time that she would sound engineering and this would eventually lead to her meeting the Grateful Dead. In 1968 she would start an internship recording live sound with Bob Matthews at the Carousel which would become the Fillmore West.

Betty would work with Bob on the Grateful Dead’s second studio album and would go on to work together regularly mixing the band’s live recordings. She would go on to marry tour manager Rex Jackson and continued to record the band’s live shows with their equipment. (Jackson would die in a car crash in 1976). Betty would continue to work with the Grateful Dead helping with the stage setup and continuing to record. She would eventually stop working with Dead after a breakup with Brent Mydland (the band’s keyboardist). Her last project with the Dead was in 1981.

Betty used her own tapes and equipment to record the Dead and would keep them in her possession unless they were bought by Dead. In the mid-’80s, Betty would hit hard times having her house foreclosed and moving to Oregon to become a nursing assistant. She would end up losing her storage space and over 1000 tapes would be auctioned off. They would become known as the Betty Boards, mostly consisting of recordings of The Grateful Dead, but included bands such as Legion of Mary, Kingfish, the Jerry Garcia Band, Old & In the Way, and the New Riders of the Purple Sage.

The Grateful Dead declined to bid and three different parties would end up in possession of the tapes. One party stored them, while a second party would transfer the tapes to cassette and distribute them, and the third party kept them in a barn where over the years they would start to decay. This party would eventually start restoring the tapes; over 200 tapes have been restored and digitally archived. The Dead would offer this party $100,000 for the tapes, but they have vowed not to sell for less than a million dollars. In 2014, one of the other parties started to restore their tapes.

Several of these tapes have since been commercially released. The most notable of these is Cornell 5/8/77, a concert at Cornell University’s Barton Hall. It is widely regarded as one of the Grateful Dead’s best shows and one of the best live recordings of the band.

Betty would not record shows until 2011 when she stage managed Wavy Gravy’s 70th Birthday Benefit Concert. Chris Robinson of The Black Crowes fame was playing the benefit with his new project Chris Robinson Brotherhood. Betty loved the group and insisted on recording their future shows. These recordings turned into a series of live albums called Betty’s Blends. She also mixed and mastered for the Americana band Midnight North in 2015.

As of August 2019, she is the engineer and production and road manager for the band and the choir of Glide Memorial United Methodist Church.

She was a true pioneer, a woman defining her path in an industry that was almost exclusively male.

Fun Facts about Betty

While working at the Avalon, she decided she wanted to be a DJ, and her friend Dusty Street wanted to be a recording engineer. Dusty would go on to become a DJ and has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Betty would become a recording engineer.

She would work with McCune Sound and worked at The Monterey Pop Festival

She worked at Woodstock.

She recorded Quicksilver Holding Company at San Quentin.

She recorded Waylon Jennings at Folsom.

She was one of two women on The Grateful Dead. Candace Brightman was the lighting designer.

She once threw Alice Cooper off her stage, because he had ruined equipment at the Fillmore.

During her junior year, Cantor had written a term paper on the history of psychedelic drugs. LSD

On Sexism

In a 2018 interview with NPR Betty Cantor-Jackson also recalled having to do a certain level of social acrobatics just to get her job done right: “The only way I could get things done was to ask stupid questions that actually weren’t stupid – they were questions designed to get them to understand what they were working with. I couldn’t tell him, because that would not go, because I was a girl… [I would] play a dumb blonde and ask stupid questions and get them to understand their own self.” Cantor-Jackson took the extra time to convince venue sound engineers that her ideas were their own, and in that way, she recorded an increasingly celebrated body of work, including tapes from Radio City Music Hall, Saturday Night Live, and the now-enshrined Cornell ’77 show.

https://www.npr.org/2018/03/20/593958534/do-you-want-to-talk-to-the-man-in-charge-or-the-woman-who-knows-what-s-going-on

Betty’s Legacy

Aside from her live recordings, Betty was a pioneer as a female sound engineer. Having to hold her own in environments where people were more likely to view her as one of their buddy’s old ladies than as the asset she was to the entire Dead community. Betty helped capture not only the music but the energy and connective hypnosis of a Grateful Dead concert. Though her name is not plastered on t-shirts or albums and to some she is only an ex-girlfriend with a forgotten storage unit, Betty’s legacy highlights the powers of passion, curiosity, and adventure.

More on Betty Cantor Jackson

Betty Cantor-Jackson – Wikipedia

Betty Cantor-Jackson (born 1948) is an American audio engineer and producer. She is best known for her work recording live concerts for the Grateful Dead from the late 1960s to the early 1980s, including the Cornell 5/8/77 album. [1] She is noted for her ear for recording and her long tenure with the band. [2] [3] Contents 1 Early life

Betty Cantor-Jackson – IMDb

Betty Cantor-Jackson, Soundtrack: Bank Roll. Betty Cantor-Jackson is known for her work on Bank Roll (2012), Word Is Out (1977), and Grateful Dead: Dead Ahead (1981).

LSD, Betty Cantor-Jackson, and the Grateful Dead

Jun 10, 2021Betty Cantor-Jackson is a person who happened to experience both these phenomena simultaneously. Little did she know her teenage decision to take a capsule of LSD would soon lead her into a life-long strange trip alongside the notoriously psychedelic Grateful Dead.

EXCLUSIVE: Betty Cantor-Jackson Rekindles Her Love Of Taping … – L4LM

By now, the tale of Betty Cantor-Jackson has been told many times over. A sound engineer that caught on to the Grateful Dead phenomenon in its infancy, Betty taped hundreds of shows during the…

Betty Cantor-Jackson

Interview with Betty Cantor-Jackson 3/18/10. Can we talk about Cats Under The Stars? It’s such a nice record. I love that record. I built the studio for that record. We were at Front Street, which was our rehearsal hall. He was playing with Ron Tutt, Elvis’s drummer, and they were rehearsing to go into His Master’s Wheels, which was the …

Betty Cantor-Jackson – Home | Facebook

Betty Cantor-Jackson September 10, 2012 · Welcome to the Grateful Dead collection Here you will find both: Downloadable Shows (typically, Audience recordings), and Stream-Only Shows (typically, Soundboard recordings).

‘Do You Want To Talk To The Man-In-Charge, Or The Woman Who Knows … – NPR

Mar 20, 2018Betty Cantor-Jackson worked as the sound engineer for The Grateful Dead on official live and studio albums — and perhaps more importantly, recorded hundreds of reels of prized soundboard tape. Ed…

 

Fei Yu – Award-Winning Music Producer, Music Supervisor & Editor, and Recording Engineer

Fei Yu is a Chinese award-winning music producer, music supervisor, music editor, and recording engineer. Fei’s ability to seek education ahead of trends has helped her become a one-of-a-kind (in the world!) music & film industry professional. Fei has worked with elite Western artists and composers (Andrea Bocelli, Hans Zimmer, Lorne Balfe, Matthew Margerson, Tyler Bates, Rupert Gregson-Williams) and popular Chinese artists (Lu Han, Li Yifeng).

Fei grew up playing piano and went to Beijing Film Academy to study composition and music recording. When she graduated in 2010, she was recruited by the China Film Group. “I was really lucky because 2010 was a big, big Chinese movie year. China Film Group is a national company, and so all of the big movies at the time that they invested in were doing the post-production in our company at that time. From that year, the Chinese box office started booming – double, triple numbers,” she says.

Fei says of the three years she worked there, “I met with so many directors, so that’s how I started to build relationships with them. They used to work with me as their music editor.” But, Fei noticed communication problems between the directors and composers she worked with. Sometimes the directors would ask for creative music changes after the composer was done working, which meant it all had to be done with music editing. Fei recalls, “The director would tell me, I want this music shorter. Or, I don’t like this music. Or, could you change it a little bit? Or sometimes they told me, could you put some of the song here rather than the background music? Then it turns out, the score is not linked really well with the background music. So I noticed there were so many problems during this time. Maybe the communication is not very good, or maybe some of the industry process is not going really well.”

She recognized if a filmmaker could choose background music first (licensed music), the composer could write music that fit. But, they weren’t used to dealing with music licenses. “Everybody started to become aware how important publishing is, and to clear the license for the copyright. There were still not professional music industry people in China doing this kind of thing, so that’s why I started to see myself as a music supervisor.”

During her years at China Film Group, Dolby launched Dolby Atmos, which Fei also saw as an opportunity. She says, “Nobody knew how to record music for Atmos at the time, so that’s why I quit my job and went to McGill University (for a Masters Degree in Sound Recording). I’m trying to see how to make my career path a little bit longer, and trying to be a little bit ahead of the time.” 

While she was at McGill, she became friends with Western composers. “I started thinking about how some of my composer friends were really, really, really good. They’ve been composing for more than 20 years, so they have experience, and their rate is reasonable as well.” She started recommending Western composers for Chinese work, starting with video games. “Games are a little bit easier because a composer doesn’t need to understand the dialogue. It’s not like you have to write your music to fit the dialogue unless you’re writing for in-game animation. Writing for game music – it’s actually easier. You have more freedom. And also their budget is really good. You have the budget for recording a real orchestra, a big orchestra as well. So that’s how I started with a lot of game composers first.”

Fei’s film career was able to pick up even with her time away because she had built relationships with the filmmakers. “Some of the directors I worked with at China Film Group heard I just graduated. They knew me before, and they trusted me. They came back to me for their future movies. That’s how I built my career, as well,” Fei says.

A year after graduating from McGill, she was asked to work on a Disney film, Born in China. Fei was a natural fit because she was bilingual, had experience as a music editor, and knew the director. “They needed a Chinese expert to work on it, so they got a Chinese director. The Chinese director couldn’t communicate really well with the Disney system, so that’s why he brought me on board because I used to work with him in China Film Group.”

Fei later spent some time working in Los Angeles, where she continued pairing Western composers with Chinese filmmakers. She says of the time, “the really famous composers in China were piled up with work. At the same time, when I lived in LA, so many composers approached me and they had a really good attitude – they wanted to know more about Chinese culture, and they wanted to be involved with Chinese projects. That’s why I started thinking maybe it’s a good opportunity and started to collaborate with foreign composers.”

Fei started her company, Dream Studios, to bridge the gap between the two cultures. “Music is a universal language, so we want to use music to bridge the gap in-between. I’m having full control of the quality of the music, so I provide a really good service for the director. After one or two times trying this method, all of the directors felt comfortable. They don’t feel the language barrier because I’m speaking Chinese, and they also feel like the Western composers put in the effort. The Chinese composers were super busy, having 10 or 20 movies every year. That’s a lot. They’re working really hard and they just don’t have time,” she says.

Fei sees her ability to speak both languages as an advantage, as well as her music and audio background. “I’ve learned composition, sound editing, and all of these things that gave me more knowledge than my peers.”

There are challenges working with cultural differences. “I seldom do comedy with Western composers because I do notice they can’t understand why people are laughing here,” Fei says. “Or, sometimes suddenly, we’re having traditional Chinese music, and they don’t understand why people are laughing at that. Most of our movies are romantic movies or big action movies. The Chinese composers could understand more about the laughing points. With Western composers, there is a little bit of a language barrier, there’s a little bit of a culture difference. But especially for me, because I’m working with Western composers, we need to have a lot of communication with each other. I have to explain what a director really wants. So that’s why, for comedy, I will definitely put in more energy and more time to communicate with them.”

She says of her demeanor working with composers and filmmakers, “I’m never having a really bad attitude towards them. I’m always trying to be patient, trying to be nice, but also solving problems. I’m still trying to learn it because sometimes I’m really frustrated and sometimes you don’t get the respect that you should get. I’m still trying to keep calm, and I’m still trying to be nicer.” 

One of the challenges of her job is when a composer or filmmaker is unhappy, and she is responsible for the communication between them. “We are under pressure for work because they have deadlines approaching, especially at the very end when they need to deal with the picture changing. Sometimes directors just say, just copy the temp music, just do exactly what the temp music is doing. So the director doesn’t give the composer enough space to have freedom for the creative side.” She says of working through these situations, “They have made me get stronger. I know next time if I am working with a new composer and they are having the same reaction, I know how to deal with a situation.”

For Fei, completing the job is important even in a difficult situation. She says of quitting, “Maybe I’m also destroying my personal relationship with a director, so that’s why I like to at least finish the project. Then next time, I will have my own choice if I still want to work with them or not.”

Fei has found pros and cons to being a woman in the industry. She believes some clients show better manners towards her because of her gender. As a con, Fei says, “In this industry, especially in China, there are so many who are more experienced than me. At the very beginning, they may hesitate or have some questions from what they see of me just as a female, but once we work together, we build trust.”

Tips on being a music editor

“First of all, if you want to be a music editor, you have to have a really good music collection with many different kinds of music. Whenever you watch movies or whatever, you have to know how to classify all of the music. Like, this is funny music, or this is romantic music, or this is quirky music. You need to be really organized, and listen to as much music as you can. 

When you’re working with composers, you need to have a really positive and a good attitude and need to be super-efficient at everything.

As a music editor, you need to have a really good memory for the picture. You need to know where to put the music, you need to know where they change the music because you are helping to conform the music to picture changes. Also, you need to have a really good understanding of the music, so you could crossfade or do edits really well, like a composer.”

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Profiles of Women in Audio

 

Audrey Martinovich – Studio Owner, Recording Engineer, & Producer

 

Audrey Martinovich is a recording engineer and producer that specializes in acoustic music such as classical, jazz, and folk. She co-owns & engineers at a recording studio in Madison, Wisconsin called Audio for the Arts and produces podcasts. She has been working in audio for eight years and has been a full-time studio owner & recording engineer for three years. She has recently worked with The Madison Symphony Orchestra, the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, and Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestra, and artists Johannes Wallman & Sam Ness. She produces the Big Wild Radio Show every week, which reaches over 100,000 listeners and has engineered remote guests for podcasts such as Alan Alda’s podcast, Pod Save America, NPR’s A1, & Terrible, Thanks for Asking.

Early Career – Opera, Experimenting with Mics, & Looking the Part

Audrey has always had an interest in music and signed up for every possible music class in school. In addition to vocal lessons, she also took classes on piano, guitar, and music theory. She discovered her interest in audio engineering while studying opera in high school. She and her teacher, Alisanne Apple, would record her vocal lessons to get an audience perspective on technique, ensuring diction and tone came across well. This was her first experience with microphones & experimenting with microphone placement. She then bought her own microphone and tried plugging it straight into the mic input on her computer, no mic pre, and when it didn’t work, she wanted to learn how to get it to work. At the same time, she began researching sound design and had an epiphany that she could create and manipulate sound as a career. From there, she attended Madison Media Institute for Recording and Music Technology, Entertainment, and Media Business and received a Bachelor of Science degree with flying colors.

A Crash Course in Audio

How did you get your start?

When I was about to graduate college I started looking up studios in my area and making some calls, trying to get my foot in the door. I actually saw Audio for the Arts and tried to call, but the phone number on the website didn’t work! The owners at the time, Buzz Kemper and Steve Gotcher happened to reach out to the career advisor at my school the same week and asked for a few students to come by and interview for an internship. They liked my classical music background since Audio for the Arts works with a lot of chamber groups and the fact that I showed up looking ready for a job interview (not in “a ripped Metallica t-shirt”) so they thought I would represent the studio well.

How did your early internships or jobs help build a foundation for where you are now?

Before the internship at Audio for the Arts, I shadowed a FOH engineer at another company for a Battle of the Bands event. That day was a crash course in live sound and troubleshooting quickly. Shortly after, I started interning at Audio for the Arts. At first, I did a lot of data archiving which really laid the foundation for data management. Then, I officially became an employee and assisted on PA gigs, mostly running cables and placing microphones. They saw that I was good in that environment and introduced me to remote recording.

Did you have a mentor or someone that helped you?

Buzz Kemper and Steve Gotcher taught me so much. Kevin Guarnieri was an instructor of mine in college and he introduced me to Pro Tools which is so vital for me.

Current Career – The Importance of Being Proactive & Meeting Deadlines

What is a typical day like for you on the job?

I usually get to the studio around 9 or 10 am. If I have any sessions happening at any point that day, I always set up and test gear first, even if the session isn’t for several hours and it’s a 10-minute setup. That way, I know I’m ready and can lose myself in whatever emailing I have to do until my client arrives. Typically, this includes scheduling and coming up with estimates for gigs. Earlier hours in the day are usually radio, podcast, or commercial production with voice talent and producer in the booth or connected remotely. Then, I either reset the studio for an afternoon music recording session or dive into some mixing, either alone or attended. One day a week I bring my son to the studio with me and he does schoolwork while I edit and mix the whole day.

How do you stay organized and focused?

I try to identify my pitfalls and trick myself into avoiding them. For example, if I get an email that needs a response, but not at that second, I have to mark it unread otherwise I will forget to come back to that email. It’s the same way with texts and messages. I just can’t open the message till I can actually tackle the to-do list or I will forget. As an added bonus, having unread messages in my inbox gives me a bit of urgency to cross items off my to-do list.

What do you enjoy the most about your job?

Getting to work on a variety of projects in a day and being exposed to all sorts of amazing music.

What do you like least?

The sometimes crazy hours and stress of deadlines. It makes it hard to spend much time at home.

What’s the hardest part about your job?

The coordination that leads up to a gig such as coordinating logistics and drafting estimates. Figuring out exactly what the client wants, how to deliver it, and then assigning a dollar amount to it is something a lot of creatives struggle with and I’m no different.

What is your favorite day off activity?

Going for a hike or walk with my son or working on house renovations.

What are your long-term goals?

To work on music that really resonates with people and to feel fulfilled. I’d be thrilled to ever win a Grammy for Producer of the Year since no woman has ever won that category, but I really don’t want to be the first. That honor belongs to someone like Linda Perry.

What are your short-term goals?

I look at my short-term goals as if they are a to-do list so there are things like “revamp the studio’s website” on there, but generally, I’d like to work more on albums than singles. I like seeing how a song’s meaning can change when it’s contextualized within an album and want that to be a bigger percentage of my work in the future.

#1 tool/piece of gear you can’t live without?

Pro Tools

What’s one mistake you’ve made/bad gig you’ve had and how did you learn from it/overcome it?

It’s hard, but there are certain types of people that you have to assert yourself around or they can be abusive. I had a client come in to record a backing track of a song they had written to pitch to a potential singer. This guy came in with an attitude, looking for any reason to throw a fit. We did a first piano take and he wanted to layer it and when we did, it turned out that the base take was too short. He screamed at me for “deleting part of his performance” when he had actually counted his rests incorrectly and came in too early, resulting in a shorter song. Had this happened really early in my career, I probably would have defaulted to the “the customer is always right” perspective and let it slide. Instead, I invited him into the control room, had him sit down at my computer, and asked him to point out where any edits had been made on the track. He couldn’t find any edits, because obviously there were no edits to be found. He definitely wasn’t sunshine and rainbows after that, but he was less quick to react after that. If you don’t correct abusive behavior like that, it will continue and nobody deserves that. It doesn’t matter who the artist is.

Advice you have for other womxn who wish to enter the field?

Listen to music constantly. Make music constantly. Even if it sucks, one day it won’t. You have to go through the sucky material to get to the good stuff first! See if any friends or local bands want to record so you can practice. Then you’ll have demo material and testimonials you can take to a studio or to whoever.

Must have skills?

A proactive attitude is a must. Even if you don’t know much about recording, if you have the ability to see a problem and address it before it becomes a bigger problem, or better yet, before anyone notices, I want you to assist me.

What other skills/hobbies do you have that you feel help you in your line of work?

Playing an instrument helps with being able to communicate with the artist. It’s good to be able to understand what to do when an artist says they want to “punch in the Bm7 chord in the bridge so give me an 8 count before that chord.”

Favorite gear?

I love good analog preamps and things with tubes, whether it’s a microphone, mic pre, compressor, whatever.

How has your career been affected by Covid-19, & how have you adapted to the current situation?

We normally record quite a few choral and orchestral concerts every spring and winter, however, all of the concerts have been canceled. Most of these large ensemble groups have switched to putting together virtual events so we have been doing a lot of video production and live streaming since lockdown.

More About Audrey

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Profiles of Women in Audio

 

How to Use iPhone Synth Apps in Logic Pro X

 

Synths are one of my favourite things to use when creating a track or soundscape and they can help you experiment with different sounds. However, the downfalls are they’re not cheap and can often take up a lot of space in your studio. Luckily I have found a solution after experimenting with different synth apps designed for smartphones.

When I started playing around with the Minimoog Model D I loved the idea of a Moog Synth being able to fit in the palm of my hand. However, I wanted to record it into the tracks I was making but wasn’t sure how. But, I believe I have found the solution.

For this, I used my iPhone, the lightning to USB charging Cable, and my iMac running Logic.

To start off with I plugged my iPhone into the iMac using the lightning to USB charging cable. I then went into the Audio/Midi settings on the iMac and Enabled my iPhone to be recognised as a device.

I then opened the Minimoog app on the iPhone and configured the input and output settings to IDAM MIDI Host.

I then opened Logic and created an external MIDI track and made sure the Use External Instrument Plug-In was checked and the Audio Input device selected was ‘iPhone’. You also want the MIDI Destination to be the iPhone as well. Then hit Create.

You should now be able to hear and play your iPhone Synth app in Logic.

Using this is a great way to experiment with Synth sounds and is a fantastic solution if you want a portable Synth in your pocket. Happy creating.

 

 

Copyright in the 21st Century

 

As we know, March 2020 has been a strange time for most of the world due to the outbreak of COVID-19. Subsequently, the music industry at large has been extremely quiet, but before the outbreak and lockdown rules became widespread there were several interesting events and technological advances relating to music copyright law.

The start of March saw the current Led Zeppelin “Stairway to Heaven” legal battle rage on into its sixth year, with the band winning their latest appeal for a new trial – the group Spirit had previously won a case that ruled Zeppelin’s famous opening arpeggio riff had infringed the Spirit 1968 song “Taurus”. While it seems this particular feud may be far from being over, it was closely succeeded by another high-profile case days later.

Stairway to Heaven:

 

Taurus:

Following a previous lawsuit in 2019 that ruled Katy Perry’s song “Dark Horse” had copied the ostinato from Flame’s 2009 track “Joyful Noise”, the verdict was overturned on 17th March by federal judge Christina A Snyder. Judge Snyder stated:

“It is undisputed in this case, even viewing the evidence in the light most favourable to plaintiffs, that the signature elements of the eight-note ostinato in “Joyful Noise” is not a particularly unique or rare combination.”

While news of the judge’s decision to overturn the verdict came as a surprise, the sentiment of Snyder’s statement resonated with most musicians who had listened to the songs in question – you can read my comparison and analysis of the 2019 trial here

The latest Katy Perry development felt like a “win” for good musical sense, but where do we go from here? What might the future hold for common sequences and regularly used traditions of composition? Damien Riehl and Noah Rubin think they might have some influence on this – the duo has developed technology that is working to find the answer to the eternal question “Is the number of melodies in this world finite?” As there are only a finite number of notes, can they only be arranged in so many ways?

Rubin is a musician and programmer as is Riehl, who also happens to practice law. Together they have created an algorithm that writes 300,000 melodies per second to disc as a MIDI file, thus automatically copyrighting them. The data set parameters for measuring the melodies use a range of one octave (incorporating a major and natural minor scale), and counts up to 12 individual note values for the length of the melody line, as this range works well for the conventions of pop music.

The two big questions arising from this technology lead us to ask whether the pair have infringed on every existing song there’s ever been, and will the songs of the future infringe on them? Riehl says no to the latter – the intention of creating this technology is to put the findings into the public domain to make the world better and “keep space open for songwriters to be able to make music”. The technological parameters of the algorithms’ range are expanding and developing all the time – the pair are currently working with a pitch range of 12 chromatic notes which means that in terms of genre this covers more than pop music, such as classical and jazz melodies. Riehl is sure that one day the technology will be equipped to use “100 notes and every rhythmic and chordal variation in the future”.

From Riehl’s expert legal view the repercussions of this technology could be ground-breaking in ensuring creative freedom exists for composers; he believes the copyright system is broken and needs updating, explaining that the average legal fees for these cases are in the range of $2 million-plus a fee to the original songwriter. The consideration of whether the accused had access to hear the original song in question would still be taken into account, as would the idea of conceding that songs can be “subliminally infringed” without ill intent.

In explaining the mathematical programming element of the algorithm, Riehl borders on the metaphysical as he shares the findings that we have a finite number of melodic combinations available to us and that “melodies to a computer are just numbers – those melodies have existed since the beginning of time and we are only just discovering them”.

It’s an interesting juxtaposition that this new technology is strangely aligned with the ancient concept that we pluck or channel our ideas from an unknown aether where they have always existed. Who knows, but maybe we can find some comfort and feelings of connection with something bigger than ourselves as we work through these solitary times.

You can download all the music created by Riehl and Rubin plus the algorithm programme code at http://www.AllTheMusic.info

The Importance of Saying No

A few months ago, I wrote a blog about The Importance of Saying Yes while building a career in audio – something I am still continually practicing.  While writing that blog, I realized I wanted to include a follow-up about the importance of saying no. Practicing this discernment is almost more important than saying yes, however, can be much more difficult!

I often find myself wanting to say yes to every opportunity that comes my way. It’s easy for me to do; I’ve grown accustomed to a full schedule of projects to balance, and I tend to be energized by my work. I’ve been in a building stage of my career for long enough to know that saying yes to one thing often leads to another opportunity. Sometimes it’s frightening to say no and feel like I’m missing out on something. The downside of this, however, is that during the times I get increasingly overwhelmed with my schedule, I’m unable to take necessary breaks for myself, which is ultimately bad for both my clients and myself.

When I think about my ideal career it’s full of flexibility and also full of projects that I’m really passionate about – I want to work on a number of records every year, yet still have enough time to play drums in projects, go on the road, and experiment with making new things with new people. To make all these things happen, I have learned to be more and more selective with my time.

To be more selective, I have to be comfortable with drawing a line and saying no. This doesn’t necessarily mean just saying no to new projects, it means saying no to additional edits past the agreed limit, an extra few takes during tracking or additional unpaid time. It comes down to drawing boundaries and standing up for yourself and your work. Admittedly, I sometimes find it hard to do this in an environment that is so much about curating an atmosphere of support and trust, but it’s ultimately a disservice to everyone involved if I am making decisions from an “I can do everything” mindset. It’s important to set limits, and it’s important for artists to work within those chosen parameters. Saying no doesn’t mean that I don’t want to or can’t do something; it means that I know what’s best for me.

The tipping point comes when work is coming at a healthy pace (a result of saying yes), and I start to realize what I might not want to work on, or what might not be best for my time. This can be tricky to decide, as the answer isn’t always immediately clear. I often change my rates to meet my clients’ needs, and while I think most freelancers do this to some extent, after some time if you aren’t clear and firm about your rate, you may be undervaluing yourself. This is a concrete way to help establish what is and is not worth your time. This may come at a metaphorical price – you say yes to fewer projects, but the flipside is your work is more valued and more structured. I believe developing this skill is a key component to growing in a freelance career.

Saying no can be a scary thing – it can feel like a missed opportunity, but ultimately, learning how to say no respectfully but firmly is crucial when valuing yourself, your time, and the growth of your career. As individuals who work for ourselves, it’s our job to set limits and guidelines!

 

The Importance of Reference Tracks

While mixing and how to use them.

One of the first things I do when I schedule a time to record a band is asking them what albums, and songs they like the sound quality. I ask so I get a good idea of what they might be *subconsciously* looking for in a mix or master. Then I will ask, “What would you like your reference track for the mixing process to be?” I ask these in two separate questions because what you like and what’s right for a mix of a particular song can be two different things. I want to have options, so when I go to pick a reference track- I am picking one that’s right for the song, and that the band will like too.

Reference tracks are essential because often while mixing, your ears can lose perspective. A reference track is helpful to have this happens; you can play the track and compare it to where your mix. Once you’ve done that you can hone in on anything that isn’t where it needs to be in your mix- and with a specific goal in mind you can get it where it needs to be because of the reference track.

Now, to utilize this correctly, you have to do it right. You don’t want to just download your reference track from Youtube and upload that wav file into Pro-Tools. You also don’t want to use an MP3. When using a reference track, you want to get the rawest and uncompressed version of the track you can find (WAV file). Another thing, you need to know how your reference track translates onto different sound systems. Listen to the track in your car, at your house, on your laptop, on your headphones, in your parents’ car…you get the point. Then do the same for YOUR mix. Listen to it everywhere you can, so you know exactly what to fix when you sit back down at your computer to do revisions.

You can use plug-ins to help you compare the track to your mix. Magic AB is my favorite. It’s straightforward to use. You upload both tracks, one is A, and one is B. Then you level the two songs out, so your ears aren’t being tricked because one mix is louder than the other (Hello, Fletcher Munson), and then you just click between A and B to compare your reference track to your mix! Easy as that!

I hope this helps your mixes grow as it helped mine when I discovered how to use reference tracks! As always, you can send me examples of your mixes, or even email me just to chat about how you noticed a difference in the process after you started using reference tracks at virginia@backbeat365.com.

 

Maya Finlay – Feet in Two Worlds

Monitors for Rosanne Cash tour, 2019, credit: C. Elliott Photography

Maya Finlay is a sound engineer that works in live sound, as well as in the studio recording, editing, mixing and producing. Maya freelances and works for the SFJAZZ Center as well as Dolby Laboratories and recently has started touring with Rosanne Cash as her Monitor Engineer. She has been working in professional audio for the past 11 years.

Maya has a B.A. in Spanish and Portuguese, Language and Culture, from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and Certificates in Sound Recording and Sound Design from City College of San Francisco. She also has completed workshops offered by Women’s Audio Mission and assisted in the build of their first studio.

Maya would start her audio career at City College of San Fransisco and fortunate to study under both Terri Winston, Founder of Women’s Audio Mission, and Dana Jae Labrecque, Co-Director of SoundGirls. After that Maya would start interning at Talking House Studios, which led to an engineering position for VO talent/composer, Mark Keller, at Keller Studios in Sausalito, CA.  Shortly after she also started working at Sound Arts Studio in San Francisco. Her introduction to Live Sound would take place working with local Bay Area promoter Bay Vibes, that produced three shows per week at Yoshi’s Lounge. It was a restaurant recalls Maya,  “so I had to pull all the gear out of a closet and wire everything up from scratch each time.  That was a great learning experience and created a solid foundation. At first, after each show, I would make a note of anything that went wrong. Then the next time before I’d go to work, I’d review my notes to avoid making the same mistake twice. That was a useful method, and it didn’t take long before I stopped needing the notes and things just became second nature.”

WAM studio, 2013

With a combination of referrals and reaching out to larger venues like Boom Boom Room, Elbo Room, and The Independent Maya would have more work than she could handle. Women’s Audio Mission would refer Maya to both SFJAZZ Center and Dolby. She has been at SFJAZZ Center for six years as an Audio Mix Engineer and Dolby for three years working as a Critical Listener.

 

What’s the environment, gear, and typical day at SFJAZZ Center?

SFJAZZ Center has two concert halls: One is Miner Auditorium, which holds 700 seats, and the other is the Joe Henderson Lab (JHL), which holds 100 seats.  We have Meyer Mains (going through Galileo hardware, controlled by Compass software) and L’Acoustic (108p and 112p) Monitors for both rooms.  In Miner Auditorium, we have a 16-speaker Minna line array system for each Main L/R (divided into 4 zones with separate delay times), 5 HP500 cardioid flown Subs, JM1P Side Fills, M1D Front Fills, and UPJ Rear Fills.  We have a VENUE Profile at FOH and an SC48 at “Monitor Beach.”  In JHL we do FOH and Monitors from a Soundcraft Si Impact, and we have 2 UPJ Mains and 1 HP500 flown Sub.  We have an 8-rack patch bay (6 for Audio, 2 for Video) backstage that allows us to route signal all over the building.  We have a 4-way split that, in addition to feeding FOH and Monitors, also sends to the Truck Dock, and a ProTools Suite on the third floor, where we have a Digidesign D-Command and can capture multi-track recordings of our shows into ProTools.  We have a ton of in-house backline – various drum kits, amps, keyboards, percussion, and the stage in Miner can be various sizes/shapes depending on the event needs.  The building is only six years old, so things are still in very good condition and well-organized. 

I’ve been fortunate to work with many fantastic artists there including Esperanza Spalding, Booker T, Robert Townsend, Snarky Puppy, Ravi Coltrane, Anoushka Shankar, Chick Corea, Hermeto Pascoal, and facilitated the touring crews of Van Morrison, Herb Alpert, Sergio Mendes, En Vogue, Kid Koala, Taj Mahal, among many others.  That’s how I met Rosanne Cash.  She was an SFJAZZ Resident Artistic Director the past two years, and I did Monitors for her weekends there, which were collaborations with Emmy Lou Harris and Lucinda Williams the first year, and Ry Cooder the second.

A typical day at SFJAZZ Center is a call time in the early afternoon, set up the backline, patch ins/outs, and do a line check.  Then the band comes in, we set up and soundcheck for an hour or two, then dinner, show, and strike.  Shows range from 60-120 minutes, and in JHL we have two shows per night.  We rarely have openers, and we often do 4-night runs of the same artist.  We also have a fair amount of rental companies, individuals, or organizations renting out space for private events, which involve a lot more wireless, and we have two “off-site” rigs (Soundcraft Si Impact consoles and QSC speakers).  We use these for our free outdoor concerts and for our middle school program in which we’re working with local musicians to bring concerts to all middle schools in San Francisco and Oakland, thanks to our awesome Education department.  So a “typical day” there can have a lot of variety in the audio department.

What is a Critical Listener?

As a Critical Listener, I participate in various audio tests that provide feedback to Dolby on current and developing audio technology.  Often the tests involve listening to multiple versions of the same audio and either choosing a preferred version or finding a hidden reference.  We go into acoustically tuned listening labs and listen to audio on headphones or over loudspeakers, sometimes with video too, and complete whatever test we have that day.  Basically, they want to know if people with critical hearing and listening skills can distinguish a perceptible difference between raw, uncompressed audio, and audio that has been digitally compressed using specific algorithms.  It’s only a few hours a month, more or less, and it’s very flexible.

What is your set up for Roseanne? Gear, Work Flow: Are you touring with production.  Challenges? How are you dealing with them?

There are two different setups for Rosanne: the Duo with her husband, Guitarist/Producer John Leventhal, and the Band setup, which adds Drum Kit, Bass, Guitar, and Keys to the Duo.  John sets up Downstage Right and gets a single wedge.  Rosanne is always Downstage Center with a mono pair of wedges and wireless IEM.  In the Duo configuration, she has another wedge on her left side, almost a side fill, for just John’s channels.  They both need healthy amounts of their vocals in their wedges, so the first thing I do is ring out their wedges and make the vocals sound as clear as possible with enough headroom before feedback.  After a couple shows on the road, I started doubling Rosanne’s vocal channel so that I could have completely separate control over her vocal channel going to her wedges vs. in-ear.  That’s been helpful.  We carry the wireless IEM unit and a couple of Beta58s for vocals.  In addition to Monitors, I also take care of the tour merchandise.  David Mann is the Tour Manager and FOH Engineer, and there are a couple of other Monitor Engineers they work with based in New York. 

As for challenges, a couple of times, the IEM audio was cutting in and out or sounded “underwater.”  I dealt with it by replacing some parts of the kit like the cable that goes between the earpiece and the belt pack and the desiccant pod that absorbs moisture.  I also started storing her earpiece differently to reduce strain on the connector since doing that it’s been working great.  Once, the earpiece filter got loose and was making clicking sounds only Rosanne could hear.  I now prevent that by making sure it’s tightly pushed in before each soundcheck and show. Another challenge is working on unfamiliar consoles. When I know, that’s the case; I do some prep work before I get to the venue, like watching tutorials and reading manuals, to head off any potential questions or obstacles I anticipate.

In between all of this, Maya still works in the studio and in 2017 released an EP with her band, Gringa called “Letters From A. Broad.”  Maya produced the album and engineered most of it, as well as playing several instruments and writing three of the songs. Maya says it reflects her “style as a Producer, blending organic recordings with sound effects and pop and dub mixing techniques.  It was a labor of love that took several years and involved many different musicians in various studio spaces. It was a challenge making it all come together, and at times, I thought it would never be finished, so it felt great to finally release it.” She is looking forward to putting out more records in 2019.

Bedulu, Bali during the International Body Music Festival, 2015

Give us a little background on what other tours you’ve done and what your position was on them

In July 2016, I spent two weeks in Bali as part of the International Body Music Festival, doing both FOH and Monitors. The annual Festival, led by master body percussionist Keith Terry, takes place in a different country each year and invites participants and artists from all over the world to come together for body percussion workshops and performances in collaboration with local communities.  We stayed in Ubud as our home base and traveled to different places each show day.  The first show was in a theater in Denpasar, but the rest of the time we rented gear from a local sound company and worked with their crew to load in and set up in different villages.  The gear was very basic; a 32-channel Yamaha analog console, a rack of graphic EQs, and passive mains and monitors. Most of the stages were outside, open-air but covered community spaces, and I used a combination of a shotgun, PZM, and overhead mics to get subtle body percussion sounds over motorcycles and other loud street noise.  It was challenging, but I had a blast and got to meet so many wonderful people.

What do you like best about touring?

I love seeing different places and meeting/working with different people. I’m used to being a House Engineer, so it’s been fun to do the opposite and be the Guest Engineer, with all the different challenges and perks that come with it.  I feel more like an asset, not just an expense. I’m also really liking the simplicity of living out of a suitcase.

What do you like least?

Flying and spending time in airports.  Not being able to cook my own meals.

What is your favorite day off activity?

On tour – Sleeping in.

At home – Writing, playing, and producing music.

What do you like best about the Studio?

I love the creative possibilities in the studio.  There’s more time to play around and come up with unique sounds and effects and to use panning and mic positioning that I can’t necessarily do in live sound.  I’m fortunate that live sound is my bread-and-butter, so any studio stuff I do is on my terms and for pleasure. 

What do you like better Live or Studio?

That’s a really tough question and probably changes from day-to-day.  I enjoy the immediacy and social aspects of Live, as well as being part of an event that brings joy or release for others.  However, I also love being able to experiment in the Studio and being part of the magic that will be immortalized on a record.  In the long run, I’d like to get back to doing more Studio work, and in particular trading, out some of the grunt work, I do in live sound for more creative studio work.

What if any obstacles or barriers have you faced?

Although initially, I loved the lack of routine, over the years, I’ve experienced how hard it is on the body to work inconsistent hours and to eat and sleep at irregular times.  My circadian rhythm is all off, and my health and social life have suffered for it.

Also, I wanna be real about the fact that the industry is still primarily a (White) Boys Club. As a woman, I’ve experienced microaggressions, objectification, and everyday sexism all throughout my career (such as being told to smile while I work, getting patted on the head for doing a good job, being asked to wear a skirt at a job interview, overhearing musicians ask “Where’s the Sound Guy?” while I’m on stage doing my job…I could go on).  I hesitate to call it an obstacle because it never really held me back. In fact, it probably propelled me forward in some ways. But it’s annoying at best, and exhausting over time. I do see that women, non-binary folks, and people of color have to work much harder for the same recognition and advancement opportunities as white men.

How have you dealt with them?

In terms of my health, I started prioritizing jobs that didn’t end so late, in an attempt to sleep regular hours each night.  I still don’t, but it’s less erratic than before. I also started cooking more on my days off and meal planning, so I could bring healthier food to work and not skip meals.  I’ve had to develop a discipline around resisting free booze and junk food, which is a work-in-progress.

As for the Boys Club, I’ve had to just ignore a lot of shit, figure out who my true allies are and which battles are worth fighting, and ultimately prove myself in my work.  I have learned to find the joy in smashing stereotypes and the humor in witnessing that my existence cause squirming or heads exploding. I enjoy poking holes in the patriarchy every time I go to work, and I try to stay involved in networks like WAM and SoundGirls, where we can share experiences, knowledge, and resources.

The advice you have for other women and young women who wish to enter the field?

Don’t let your insecurities limit you.  Take as many opportunities to learn and gain experience as you can.  If you’re unsure of the equipment, you’re using or the type of gig you’re doing, do some homework.  Read some manuals, watch some tutorials, get yourself prepared, and then jump in.

Don’t let others intimidate you out of it.  It may seem like there’s a way you’re supposed to look and act, but that’s because the job has been portrayed a certain way for so long.

Embrace your skills and what makes you unique.

Have a sense of humor, drop the ego, be professional, humble, and kind.  There’s nothing more refreshing than a friendly engineer and a crew that’s having fun.  There are plenty of grumpy sound people out there…don’t be one of them!

Must have skills?

I think the best sound engineers have a trifecta of interpersonal, technical, and musical skills: I treat it like a customer service job.  I’m there to serve the needs of the Artist, the audience, and the venue, not my ego. I do my best to communicate well and try to make everyone happy.  It’s important to be able to adapt quickly to new technology and have strong attention-to-detail. It helps to have a musical background, to be able to relate to musicians and know musical terms and genres and to have an ear for music.

Favorite gear?

To be honest, I’m not really a “gear head.”  On tour, I request an Avid SC48 or Profile console, because I’m quickest on those.  I love my vintage Telefunken 421 and UA 710 Twinfinity preamp that I have in my home studio.  But ultimately I’d say my ears are my favorite gear. They’re more important than anything I could buy, and it’s been a process learning to trust them and understand them better.

Visit Maya’s website

 

Recording a Four Piece Band – Vocals

For this month’s blog, we are going to finish recording our awesome 4-piece band, with vocals! I love recording vocals. Probably because I am a singer first before anything else, I find it interesting how there are so many ways you can make a vocal sound.

Let’s say the song we’ve been tracking with our band is a pop/rock song. I’ll go over what I’d do differently for a male and female vocal in this scenario. I wouldn’t do anything different between the two singers until we start EQ’ing. When we get there, I’ll specify what I’d do differently. To start, let’s pick a mic. For vocals, it’s usually smart to do a mic “shootout” if you have the time. A mic “shootout” is when you line up 3 (or more) different microphones, and you have the singer sing into each of them the same part of the same song into each mic. Record a snippet of each vocal on each mic. Listen back, and decide which one sounded best for that vocalist. We do this because every voice if different. Sure, you can have a favorite or a “go-to” when you’re running low on time- but I suggest if you have the time and the mic selection to do a shootout, do it. You never know, you could capture some magic with a microphone that you never would’ve thought to use before!

Since we can’t actually do a mic shootout, let’s just do a theoretical one. Let’s say we used a CM7 (Wunder), Neumann U67, and a Sony C-800G. Each of these mics are known for their specific sound. Also, another thing to note is that all of these mics are tube mics. Now, for our female and male singer- to avoid this blog being two pages long, we will decide to pick the same microphone for both of them. I think the microphone that would work for both a female and male vocalist without too many differences is the Sony.

Now that we’ve picked a mic let’s go over placement. First off, don’t ever forget your pop filter. The pop filter will catch those harsh P’s and some S’s. Paired with a good compressor, those P’s and S’s shouldn’t be a problem if you have a pop filter. How far does the singer stand away from the mic, you ask? A couple of inches back should be fine. Now for mic placement. You never want the singer singing UP into the mic. You want to place the mic in line with their lips, and then SLIGHTLY below. This is so you can capture the top end and low end of their voice.

The signal chain I like to use for vocals is usually a Voxbox for the pre-amp, followed by an EQ (if there is an EQ on the pre I am using, I’ll use that), and then slight compression either from the ELOP, or the CL1B. I’ve had great success with both of these compressors. Regarding the pre-amps, if I’m not using the Voxbox- I am probably going to be using some sort of Neve pre. Let’s say we are using the Voxbox as the pre and the ELOP as the compressor. Now what I would do differently between a male and female vocal is simple, but I still want to point it out. For a male vocalist, I would boost extra in the 1k-3k area and take out around 150 if his voice is a little boomy. I do like to do the typical, boost a little at 200 and 2k though. It usually evens out nicely. He is using the Sony, which is a very bright, and “polished” mic if I had to describe it. For a female vocalist, I would take out a little in the 1k-2k if it sounds a bit harsh, but if not I’ll leave the top end where it is. Boost around 3k if need be. I like to boost around 200 for a female vocalist, to round out the sound. Again, since we are using the Sony, we shouldn’t have to boost TOO much in the top end.

After EQ, I compress. I compress either (like I said earlier), with an ELOP, or the CL1B. Both compressors are amazing. In this scenario, we are using the ELOP. I don’t compress too heavily during tracking unless our goal is to have an apparent compressed vocal, or maybe if we are layering and wanted that sound underneath the main vocal. Since I’m not compressing heavily, I set my threshold at -2db, Ratio at 4:1, Attack can be a little fast because you can catch some of those P’s and S’s that way, Release- quick (I know that isn’t specific, but I want you to use your discretion because every vocal is different), and gain you would want to adjust so it can match your input level.

A couple of tips/tricks for getting a great vocal that aren’t technical.

Below is the finished mic sheet from our 4-piece band recording session.

 

Instrument Mic Wall Input Pre-amp Compressor Eq Pro-Tools Input
Kick In D112 1 API 1 DBX 1
Kick Out Fet47 2 API 2 2
Snare T Sm57 3 API 3 Chandler Little Devil 3
Snare B Km84 4 API 4 4
Rack Tom V421 5 Vintech 1 5
Floor Tom V421 6 Vintech 2 6
H.H SM7B 7 TubeTech 1 7
O.H Hat Coles 8 Gamma 1 (shadow hills) 8
O.H Ride Coles 9 Gamma 2 (shadow hills) 9
Room L Royer 121 10 UA 610 Distressor 10
Room R Royer 121 11 UA 610 Distressor 11
Bass DI J48 DI 12 Voxbox 12
Elec Dynamic SM57 13 Gamma 1 (shadow hills) 13
Elec Ribbon Royer 121 14 Neve 1073 14
Vox Sony 15 Voxbox ELOP Voxbox Eq 15

 

Alright, SoundGirls! That concludes our 4-piece recording session. I hope this gave you a couple of new ideas for recording that you may not have done before. If you use any of these techniques- email me! I’d love to hear about your results. My email is virginia@backbeat365.com. See you next month! 🙂

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