The Mastering Engineer's Handbook 4th Edition

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With a shelf full of industry awards (seven Grammys, an Emmy, four Surround Music Awards, the Surround Pioneer and Tech Awards Hall Of Fame and too many total award nominations to count) from The Eagles, Steely Dan, Fleetwood Mac, Sting, John Fogerty, Van Morrison, Toto, Queen, Faith Hill, Lenny Kravitz, Natalie Cole, the Doobie Brothers, Aerosmith, Phil Collins, Aretha Franklin, Barbra Streisand and many, many others, Elliot has long been recognized for his pristine mixes.

I listen to a lot of stuff in that particular genre to get to know what the particular sound of the day is. In fact, there are some things that I mixed in the box that I listen to now and go, “Wow, that sounds really good.Audio mastering is the final step in the audio production process, polishing the recording's final mix and prepping it for release and distribution. Then devote an entire chapter to each person and you have a bit of essential reading for anyone with their eyes on the industry.

I’ll think that I really didn’t do much of anything and then I’ll look at a mix and find that I’m using 50 things on it. Not the least of its attributes is the use, where appropriate, of data and calculations in both Imperial and SI units, so that all generations of model engineers can feel at home.Because when you put the rest of the tracks up it’s totally different and they think that they can fix it by moving some faders up and down. The way it worked back then was that everybody was a staff engineer so the only way that you really made money was when you left one position and moved to another. A close partnership across these complementary roles is a key building block for organization's success. I’ve been using the M 149’s along with these old Studer valve preamps on piano, so I’m pretty happy with it lately.

If you're mixing the new Radiohead, Sigur Rós, Brian Eno or similar "unconventional" music, it might not be as helpful as you had hoped for, actually. In fact the Hendrix stuff in ’68 at the Record Plant, the Electric Ladyland album, if you listen to Voodoo Child, you can hear the way the room just resonates. Jimi politely lets him play, I think on take 20 or 21, and then excuses him by saying “No, I don’t think so Brian”. Usually it’s easy for the control room to speak with the musicians, but it’s not easy to hear the musicians speak to the control room through the open mics that are used on the session, since they’re adjusted for the louder playing levels instead of talking.

All professional engineers have a little book in which they jot down those notes of fact, figures and formulae which they feel that they are likely to need on future occasions. Determining the above before the musicians hit the studio can go a long way to a quick and easy setup and an efficient session. Now if I have a problem with a guy’s instrument where it doesn’t respond well to that mic then I’ll change it, but that happens so seldom. This allows mixes to be more intricate than ever, and take more time than ever as a result, but the pinpoint accuracy of every parameter movement during every millisecond of a mix is assured. See for yourself why The Recording Engineer’s Handbook, Fourth Edition is the book that's a standard text in college courses all over the world.

And I have to say that I’ll usually get between 24 and 48 tracks in most cases and hardly ever am I given the liberty to take some of them out. I try to set it up so I’m capturing a lot of the kit in there which makes it a little bigger sounding overall because you’re getting some ambience. Be thoughtful about your role and ongoing engagement; know when to extract yourself and be thoughtful on what you commit to.

Andrew Scheps has worked mega-hit albums for a who’s-who of superstar artists like The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Metallica, U2, Justin Timberlake, Jay Z, The Rolling Stones, Linkin Park, Jewel, Neil Diamond and Adele. They think “Tall, Deep and Wideâ€, which means to make sure that all the frequencies are represented, make sure the mix has depth, then make sure it has some stereo dimension as well. I do that while I’m finding out what everything is doing, so there’s a long discovery process where it doesn’t seem like I’m getting much done, but then everything happens really quickly after that. Leadership without management: the what, the how, the tools, and how to measure success as a Principal+ engineer.