I've been a member of this site for a few years (more inactive than active sadly), and have reached the point where I'd like to share my story. Recording prior to this year has always been primarily a hobby of mine that I fell in love with. A little background: I went to college and graduated in 2010. I stayed a year after that to get a Masters degree for teaching mathematics and that is what I currently do.
There were two instances that gave me exposure to the art of audio engineering while I was in highschool: 1) I ended up taking the lead sound tech position for several drama performances for my school. I really did not know what I was doing, however I made sound come out and I had the wireless mics working for a period of time. During one performance, the Shure mics we were using were interfering and dropping out. I had no idea what was going on, but I made it look like I was fixing the problem when everyone in the audience turned back to see what the issue was. It was a large audience. One of the leads in the performance cried because her solo was messed up, and I was traumatized
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2) I took an independent study Electronic Music class senior year. In other words, I had an hour to sit in a soundproof booth and mess around with Fruity Loops and a MIDI keyboard. Me and some friends made ridiculous mixes of themes (like the Mortal Kombat theme) and I made some original electronic stuff. It was great.
College came around and I wanted to get into communications or audio engineering. At the small liberal arts school where I felt so at home, hey naturally did not have either program. They had an old, unmonitored school radio station that had seen better days and a small recording studio on the third floor of the library. The radio station ran on a 150 CD changer, and no longer had FM or even AM transmission privileges. I took it as whatever and continued making low quality tunes from my Alienware laptop and MAudio MBox. The songs were okay enough to impress my girlfriend at the time, but the quality was terribly muddy and...well...here - (see:
https://soundcloud.com/brobront/crimson-gold-and-brown).
Then I met Brooks. The man who would revitalize the school radio station to internet streaming, an active library of automatically rotating music, an ATTEMPT at getting an FM license, and plenty of equipment to bring it back to life. He literally rebuilt it from the ground up, and I was along to learn. We ran CAT5 cable, audio cable, installed XLR faceplates in the walls, recycled numerous computers that the college did not need and installed Linux on all of them. The radio station is still up and running, with the website that Brooks designed and created himself. Here it is:
The Hawk Radio. You may also notice that the radio station is named after him now (The Brooks A. Whiteford Studio). The guy is the most resourceful engineer I have ever met, and I learned uncountable things while I was there.
Around the same time I became a Media Technician on campus to make some cash. At first, I would run simple projector/Laptop setups for presentations, or I would use a little Mackie for Jazz concerts. My confidence grew exponentially as there were numerous stressful setups and concerts throughout my years there. Brooks and our good friend Yost had numerous stories that they would share about being a media tech. We loved it. Eventually I would go on to run Coffeehouses live and other concerts on campus. My new experience with live sound grew into a true passion.
I once dumped a girlfriend because between spending time with her and spending time in the school radio station, I chose the radio station.
While working as a media tech I also got to know the guy who came to pull a "Brooks" and develop the recording studio on the third floor of the library. His name is Andy, and he should have moved to the city earlier than he eventually did. He was an art student through and through, who worked the media as his primary income. Most of his job was receiving new software or hardware and figuring out how to work it, then installing it for the library and student body to use. He invited me numerous times to sit in when recording student artists however, and this where I got my first true taste of audio recording.
As I graduated and moved on to study for my 'real job', I lost touch with recording due to lack of ANY equipment, debt to the federal government, and yet another girlfriend to take up my time (this one didn't work out either). I worked my ass off to get a Master's degree in one year, and got hired as a public school teacher. Me and that girlfriend broke up because she wanted to get married and move to an area in Maryland that sucks terribly. I wanted to live a little.
The bug kept biting. I found my way into helping run sound for theatre productions at my highschool, and helped build a small group of students who now run the sound for me. I recorded a slightly higher quality album based on an adventurous trip abroad I took to teach and study during my Master's (see:
https://soundcloud.com/brobront/sets/maturo). All the while I accumulated little bits of equipment at the time. Up until this past year my primary projects were done with a Yamaha AW1600 and Reaper on a homebuilt PC for mixing (though the Yamaha does that well too).
Recently, it has appeared that I may want this to be more than a hobby. Brooks works for an automation company, however now is in the process of becoming head of an AV company in southern maryland. I have worked professionally with him on a couple large events for colleges that his company was hired for. I am consistently seeing opportunities to practice recording and mixing, however I am still insecure about the quality of my recordings. I have bought several pieces of equipment to get me going for awhile. Don't worry, they aren't because I think the quality of my recordings will get better because of the equipment, but at least now I have the stuff I need to streamline my gear and work efficiently.
The bug just keeps biting, and I want to keep learning. Needless to say, more recordings will come. This is my latest one, recorded on the AW1600 and mixed in Reaper, (spontaneously purely to try out a new pre-amp I bought for my condenser mics). Mastered with Ozone with a default preset, a slight change to the compression was made. Each track has basic EQ and Compression, no other effects. (
https://soundcloud.com/brobront/hey-man-yamaha-aw1600-recording). The beginning has some room ambience because that mic was recording the melody guitar at the headstock and I normalized it. I felt it worked well with the body mic for the melody guitar and I did't want to turn it down.
I would apologize for the length of my story, however I think I've wanted to get it out and tell someone for sometime now. Thanks!
