It would be and has been the producer's job to discuss pitch
correction but the vast majority of my clients produce themselves so
it falls to me to suggest the possibility of fixing out of tune
notes. I usually don't mind. The people who make me crazy are the
ones who won't even try to get it right and then it's MY job to make
them sound good and MY fault if they don't. I don't tune without
telling the client what I'm doing.

On Mar 2, 12:19*pm, Mark <makol...@yahoo.com> wrote:

> the orignal question asked by the op is a good one..
>
> if you just tracked a performance that "needs a little help" how do
> you bring up the subject..
>
> 1) suggest we try autotune and review the results with the singer
> 2) don't say anything critical but use autotune later during mixing to
> fix *it up
> 3) don't say or do anything unless the 'talent' asks for it
> 4) *other?
>
> We routinly use compressors to improve dynamics after the fact without
> mentioning it. *That is a simlar situation ...but not exactly the
> same.....
>
> After writing this and thinking for a minute, my guess is that "it's
> the producers job" to decide/discuss the use of autotune with the
> talent...
>
> Mark

I think that the thing that most disturbs me about all this amazing
pitch correction capability that we engineers and producers have is
that budding artists don't get the same sense of where they are in
their development that recording once provided. I just recorded a
band of teenage girls. The producer is a music teacher and we made the
decision NOT to fix pitch so the girls would be able to listen and
learn. In this era of cheap recording it's hard to remember that there
was once a time when a singer didn't set foot in a professional studio
if he/she couldn't deliver. Many years ago I had a girlfriend who was
offered an opportunity to audition for an off-Broadway musical in
NYC. The audition tune was "Clang, Clang, Clang Went The Trolley"
from "Meet Me In Saint Louis", as sung by Judy Garland. We rented the
movie so she could learn the song. While watching that movie I had a
bit of an epiphany. Judy Garland was never really my musical cuppa
tea but I had to admit that she sang pretty darned well. "Meet Me In
St. Louis" was released in 1944. Think about how they recorded music
back then. The singer stood in front of the band/orchestra, the
engineer set up some mics and they RECORDED THE PERFORMANCE. If they
didn't get it right the first time they did it again. No overdubs.
No fixes. If a singer or musician wasn't good enough to pull that off
THEY DIDN'T GET IN THE DOOR! You had to have attained a certain level
of professional proficiency to be a part of the process or you simply
were not. It ain't like that any more. By a long shot. Think about
this - in the '40's and '50's the singer in front of a big band didn't
have a big sound system out front and a bunch of floor monitors
blasting back at them. How did they get heard out front? They sang!
Billie Holiday, with that amazing, fragile sounding voice was most
likely loud enough to be heard above a a 4 or 5 piece jazz band. They
had sound systems back then but they were nothin' like what we're used
to now! And in the cat houses and jazz clubs where Billie got her
start there was probably nothing - just a piano and a bunch of people
sitting listening. Different times.

I obviously have too much time on my hands. Back to work...

Gantt

Laurence Payne <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

> On Wed, 3 Mar 2010 06:45:07 -0800 (PST), ganttmann
> <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>
> >I think that the thing that most disturbs me about all this amazing
> >pitch correction capability that we engineers and producers have is
> >that budding artists don't get the same sense of where they are in
> >their development that recording once provided. I just recorded a
> >band of teenage girls. The producer is a music teacher and we made the
> >decision NOT to fix pitch so the girls would be able to listen and
> >learn.
>
> Well, that's (sorta) fine as long as the girls were in on the
> decision, agreed that the session should be merely a training
> exercise, and weren't funding it themselves. Otherwise they could
> well consider you'd cheated them by not giving the job your best
> efforts.

Interesting that "best efforts" might now equate with "making fake ****
that sounds real (if you don't listen to closely".

--
ha
shut up and play your guitar
http://hankalrich.com/
http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/hsadharma

You're joking, right? As a recording engineer my "best efforts"
involve accurately representing the music that gets played in the
studio. Using digital trickery to create an event that never happened
falls into a different job description. Which is OK, and I can do
that job too, but to insinuate that I'm shortchanging them by not
offering to make them sound like Brittany Spears is silly.

Gantt

On Mar 3, 12:01*pm, Laurence Payne <l...@laurencepayne.co.uk> wrote:
> Well, that's (sorta) fine as long as the girls were in on the
> decision, agreed that the session should be merely a training
> exercise, and weren't funding it themselves. *Otherwise they could
> well consider you'd cheated them by not giving the job your best
> efforts.
> On Wed, 3 Mar 2010 06:45:07 -0800 (PST), ganttmann
>
> <ganttm...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >I think that the thing that most disturbs me about all this amazing
> >pitch correction capability that we engineers and producers have is
> >that budding artists don't get the same sense of where they are in
> >their development that recording once provided. *I just recorded a
> >band of teenage girls. The producer is a music teacher and we made the
> >decision NOT to fix pitch so the girls would be able to listen and
> >learn.
>

On Mar 3, 9:45*am, ganttmann <ganttm...@gmail.com> wrote:

> In this era of cheap recording it's hard to remember that there
> was once a time when a singer didn't set foot in a professional studio
> if he/she couldn't deliver. *


What puzzles me is why mediocre talent - Miley Cyrus, Britney Spears,
Josh Groban, etc. - ever gets marketed when there are so many talented
performers out there. You can find fantastic and perfectly photogenic
talent all day on YouTube.

On Mar 2, 11:26*am, Frank Stearns <franks.pacifier....@pacifier.net>
wrote:

> Mostly bad training and/or technique, it seems.


But doesn't the signature sound of many come from technique that would
send a voice coach into convulsions? Steven Tyler, Janis Joplin, ,
Rod Stewart, Bryan Adams etc.

ganttmann wrote:
> You're joking, right? As a recording engineer my "best efforts"
> involve accurately representing the music that gets played in the
> studio. Using digital trickery to create an event that never happened
> falls into a different job description. Which is OK, and I can do
> that job too, but to insinuate that I'm shortchanging them by not
> offering to make them sound like Brittany Spears is silly.

In the classic sense of "recording engineer," you're correct. But these
days there are few recording engineers in lab coats who only operate
the equipment and make sure that what comes out the speakers is
as much as possible like what went into the microphone. Today, as
an engineer, most clients expect you to be a producer and an artist
(and an ego-smoother) as well. It's in this capacity that it's OK, and
even desirable, to suggest ways in which the performance can be
improved upon with some technical tweaks.

Of course it's up to you how much you can, or want to do. But it's
unrealistic to feel guilty about fooling the public or the artist by
creating
a better-than-life production.


--
"Today's production equipment is IT based and cannot be operated without
a passing knowledge of computing, although it seems that it can be
operated without a passing knowledge of audio." - John Watkinson

brassplyer wrote:

> What puzzles me is why mediocre talent - Miley Cyrus, Britney Spears,
> Josh Groban, etc. - ever gets marketed when there are so many talented
> performers out there. You can find fantastic and perfectly photogenic
> talent all day on YouTube.

Because nobody cares about undiscovered artists on YouTube except a
small number of people who aren't spending any money. It's a business.
You have to package and market the product in order to sell it. That's what
record labels do.


--
"Today's production equipment is IT based and cannot be operated without
a passing knowledge of computing, although it seems that it can be
operated without a passing knowledge of audio." - John Watkinson

In article 6f628bf9-82a2-4f8b-b246-803b2d18b792...oglegroups.com,
"brassplyer" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

> What puzzles me is why mediocre talent - Miley Cyrus, Britney Spears,
> Josh Groban, etc. - ever gets marketed when there are so many talented
> performers out there. You can find fantastic and perfectly photogenic
> talent all day on YouTube.

Those amateurs on You Tube don't give blowjobs. That's how you make it in
the music industry. Blowjobs.

I used to do a lot of recording in NYC. I recorded buskers in the subway.
They wouldn't give me a blowjob, either.




Robert Morein
Dresher, PA
(310) 237-6511
(215) 646-4894


FAILED STUDENT
FAILED MOVIE MAKER
FAILED SCREENWRITER
FAILED INVESTOR
FAILED DRIVER
FAILED SON
FAILED PARENTS
FAILED INVENTOR
FAILED PLAINTIFF
FAILED HOMOSEXUAL
FAILED HUMAN
FAILED
FAILED

Fair enough!

On Mar 4, 5:43*am, Laurence Payne <l...@laurencepayne.co.uk> wrote:
> If I ever get that pompous, just shoot me, OK?
>
> On Wed, 3 Mar 2010 21:10:44 -0800 (PST), ganttmann
>
>
>
> <ganttm...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >You're joking, right? *As a recording engineer my "best efforts"
> >involve accurately representing the music that gets played in the
> >studio. *Using digital trickery to create an event that never happened
> >falls into a different job description. *Which is OK, and I can do
> >that job too, but to insinuate that I'm shortchanging them by not
> >offering to make them sound like Brittany Spears is silly.
>
> >Gantt
>
> >On Mar 3, 12:01*pm, Laurence Payne <l...@laurencepayne.co.uk> wrote:
> >> Well, that's (sorta) fine as long as the girls were in on the
> >> decision, agreed that the session should be merely a training
> >> exercise, and weren't funding it themselves. *Otherwise they could
> >> well consider you'd cheated them by not giving the job your best
> >> efforts.
> >> On Wed, 3 Mar 2010 06:45:07 -0800 (PST), ganttmann
>
> >> <ganttm...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> >I think that the thing that most disturbs me about all this amazing
> >> >pitch correction capability that we engineers and producers have is
> >> >that budding artists don't get the same sense of where they are in
> >> >their development that recording once provided. *I just recorded a
> >> >band of teenage girls. The producer is a music teacher and we made the
> >> >decision NOT to fix pitch so the girls would be able to listen and
> >> >learn.