Balkan Balkan Balkaaan!

[Balkan Wars]

Hell everybody. I am very very new here and I can't wait to start meeting the community and expanding my knowledge on self recording. I am a drummer, born and raised in the jazzzzzzzy fields for 15 years. I discovered Balkan folk (beirut, A hawk and a hacksaw, kocani orkestar) a while ago and that was it, I was in love. I don't know if this is the place for a introduction, and if its not I apologize, so ill just jump to it.
My question is...
I am trying to record a simple 5 to 6 track demo to ease my urges and I am playing every instrument (because nobody around here seems to be interested in playing anything other than death metal. Not saying I hate it, its just not my style of playing.). I am using some brass, percussion, and some winds. My problem is...I don't know what to record first to lay all the other instruments over. Trumpet? snare and bass? Accordion?? Sorry for this being so long but how do you guys figure out what to lay down first if you are doing everything on your own?
Thanks! Alex

 

[moresound]

Hey Alex, welcome to the ZOO!
You would normally want to put down the percussion tracks first, then the rhythm/bass tracks followed by all of the rest.
That is what I would do to make it simple and easy for myself but there are no rules just do what you feel is the right way for you.

Where are you from? You should put that in your bio line.
What is your set up like? recording soft ware, interface, computer, microphones, mic preamps etc..

 

[gecko zzed]

Put down something, anything, that will provide the framework for the song. You don't need to keep this; you can throw it away after you've recorded all the other tracks. Use what you are most comfortable with. For exampe, you could play the accordian, and at the same time, say aloud what comes in, or what goes out, or where there is a change.

 

[stevieb]

At first, I was thinking "What's a political thread doing in the "Newbies" forum?

 

[miroslav]

I pick an instrument that ill normally play throughout the entire song, like rhythm guitar (99% of the time), and play/record it to a tempo click for a scratch track.
That way I have both tempo and song structure I can follow for the real tracks. Once I have a couple of real tracks down, I get rid of the scratch track.
Usually the drums would be the first real track that gets recorded to the click/scratch...and then everything else follows.

 

[Supercreep]

Record the instrument you wrote the song on first. Then add accompaniment.

 

[gecko zzed]

Record the instrument you wrote the song on first. Then add accompaniment.

Then delete the that instrument and redo it with everything else in place

 

[gcolbert]

I pick an instrument that ill normally play throughout the entire song, like rhythm guitar (99% of the time), and play/record it to a tempo click for a scratch track.
That way I have both tempo and song structure I can follow for the real tracks. Once I have a couple of real tracks down, I get rid of the scratch track.
Usually the drums would be the first real track that gets recorded to the click/scratch...and then everything else follows.

I don't have a clue what I'm doing, but I use the approach presented by miroslav. It is important to me to record with a tempo click (metronome) from the DAW so that I can add MIDI instruments after the audio is right. if you fail to do this you may be ruling out MIDI as an option later on.

 

[Captain Ego]

I don't play balkaan, but when I record I start with the root instrument, be it guitar or bass, because that's the thing I use to sing along to and figure out the nuances of the other stuff around it. I put percussion last (well, drums in my case) because I get lost counting just playing a rhythm over and over, and it's easier to know where the changes are coming if I can hear the melody.

 

[grimtraveller]

And there you have the beauty of recording ~ five different approaches to the same task. And all totally worthy.