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Quote of the Day:

Every tomorrow has two handles. We can take hold of it with the handle of anxiety or the handle of faith.
- Henry Ward Beecher
Jun 02

My Equipment – 10 Years Ago!

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I was cleaning out a closet this weekend (one of my most favorite activites!) and I came across a CD that one of my co-writers Andres made for me in Orange County over a weekend when we holed up in my house for a weekend. He had snapped a bunch of pictures and some of them were of the gear we were using. This is from about 10 years ago! Yes, I was using Cakewalk back then – it was Cakewalk Pro Audio then and I was still using a Yamaha DX7. That keyboard took a beating but I never had a problem with it – it just kept going and going. However, as time passed I used less and less of the ROM patches and more and more of the outboard modules and just triggered them. I had rackmounted modules – a Roland U-110, an Alesis D4 drum module and a Roland Piano Module and I believe that I even had a Roland SoundBrush! We had a bunch of outboard gear in racks including guitar effects and other outdated equipment. Granted, the guitar racks are still great but my stuff for studio work is way different these days.

Geez, those were painful days – so much is simplified now! Anyway, I had to post some of this stuff. I started looking through these pictures and it just brought back memories, mostly memories about how painful it was to produce music this way.

The Setup – Here is a picture of the setup. It was fairly archaic. We would do a lot of the recording here and do rough vocal takes and then take our stuff to a studio to do our main vocal takes. Midi tracks were laid down, we’d do SMPTE lock at the studio and do 1/4″ TRS outputs to the board in the studio. Look at this stuff!

The old faithful DX7

My old rack – brings back a lot of memories. Look at the My Studio Page for a comparison between then and now!

Finally, the side by side shot of the two racks full of junk I don’t even have any more! Good riddance! :-)

Memories! (somewhat painful) :-)

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Cheers,

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Jun 01

Christian Songwriter’s Network – Song of the Month

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“The Messenger” Selected as Song of the Month on CSN” – I’ve been active on a site for about a month now called the Christian Songwriter’s Network. It’s a great site consisting of a lot of great songwriters, amazing people and the founder, James Moore who has done just an outstanding job in developing/evolving this site into a resource that songwriters in this genre can tap for many different reasons.

I was humbled to learn that one of my cuts, “The Messenger”, was selected as the Song of the Month for June, 2007. Information can be found on the Christian Songwriter’s Network home page. You can hear the song either on my site via the mp3 player or CSN has posted it to the CSN SoundClick Site. I’d like to thank James and the team there for selecting the song. The song was inspired and written out of my own recent trials related to the diagnosis of a primary brain tumor. It’s an uplifting song about strength, hope, moving forward and finding/garnering these traits through God. “The Messenger” in the song is Godsent and is placed upon the listener’s path to protect them as much as to remind them that He gives everyone strength and hope – but you have to have faith, so hold on to it. I hope others can find the same inspiration and hope in the song that I did when writing it.

As I said, I’m truly humbled that they saw fit to select this track. Here’s a snapshot of the CSN home page as of June 1, 2007:

CSN June 2007 Home Page

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Jun 01

Wireless DAW Transport

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One of the key pieces of hardware I have picked up over the years (and I’ve had this for about a year now) is the Frontier Designs Tranzport. I use this in my recording studio as well as at work for video editing. It’s a great device and is an absolute joy to work with and once you have one, you will wonder how you EVER got by working without it. To provide some background, I had already “unwired” myself to some degree by way of a wireless mouse and keyboard but as we all know, that still required clicks and mousing to arm tracks in Sonar, dragging scroll bars left and right, up and down to either advance the time line or scroll through the tracks in a project, etc. etc. And, when recording vocals, guitars or any other type of track other than keys when I wasn’t sitting right in front of my producer desk, I was constantly walking over to the mouse (or to the makeshift location I had set it down) and having to click to stop the recording, or loop it and re-record. NOT very productive. Enter the Tranzport. Behold the tranzport!

I will not write down on my own its capabilities. Here they are taken straight from the Frontier site. It functions with all of the major DAW packages and is very affordable. I would encourage you to check it out. I use mine each and every time I am working.

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Frontier Design Group’s new TranzPort™ represents a revolutionary way to interact with your Windows® or Mac® digital audio workstation (DAW). Instead of being stuck in front of your computer to compose, record, and produce music/audio, TranzPort gives you the freedom to control DAW functions from anywhere in your studio.

TranzPort is easy to set up and use. Right out of the box, it’s compatible with popular DAW software such as Pro Tools®, Sonar™, Logic®, Cubase®, Digital Performer® and others. You can arm tracks, use transport controls, set markers, control pans, punch in/out, start loops, and more from TranzPort’s simple and intuitive interface. TranzPort is a bi-directional controller, so it also provides feedback to you on signal levels, timecode position, track names and more, via a backlit LCD display and LED indicators.

Unlike infrared remotes, you don’t need line-of-sight between the TranzPort and your computer. TranzPort uses high frequency radio waves (RF) to send and receive control data, and uses advanced coding and frequency-hopping techniques to operate without causing interference, even in the presence of other wireless devices.

Using TranzPort, you can…

  • Adjust monitor mix settings from inside an iso booth, or easily record instruments that are physically incompatible with your workspace (piano, drums, etc.)
  • Get creative in an environment away from the computer (living room, lounge, etc.) without having to run back and forth to the workstation
  • Control your recording while physically removing yourself from unwanted computer noise and monitor hum
  • Add a set of basic DAW controls to a second location in a studio (producer’s desk, separate room, etc.)
  • Remotely control your computer from onstage in live performance without messy cable runs

TranzPort is small and lightweight, runs on standard AA batteries, is mountable to a mic stand (using optional adaptor), and even has a footswitch input. As a very affordable alternative to keyboard/mouse DAW control, TranzPort offers control tools that will speed up your workflow.

Compatible with Windows 2000/XP and Mac OS X (10.2.8 and above), and requiring only one USB port for the small receiver, TranzPort is the remote DAW control solution for everyone from personal/project studios to large commercial recording facilities.

Cheers,

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