Mastering houses

[masteringhouse]

I send out quite a number of discs per year to be mastered, and I usually recommend going to a place where you can attend, as sometimes there are artistic decisions (like timing between tracks or crossfades) that could only be known by the mastering engineer if they were a mind reader.

Littledog -

The producers and clients that I have dealt with let me know this in advance by either letting me know a specific time, or by saying things like "when the guitar/drums do ...". It's not rocket science or psychic ability. If they are unsure I send a test CD for them to listen to and work from there.

Also I have had clients come if they liked for editing and assembly. Its sitting through 5-8 hours of things like listening to .5 DB incremental changes in frequencies and watching an ME work with a device that they have no knowledge about that usually bores people to distraction. Getting them involved in the editing and assembly is usually less of an issue.