Few questions on recording equipment?

First let me say, after seeing the small videos on Youtube of recording Score To A New Beginning, how incredible it is sounding from what I can see!
Too many people put too much importance on singing in a perfectly isolated booth etc, you have shown that you can get an incredible sound anywhere if you know how.

Onto my questions.

1. What is your guitar setup for the recordings? Amp, stomp boxes, guitars, pickups, effects, mics, everything! Do you mic amps or use software amps?

2. How about the orchestral stuff? How much of it is real? What's your method with writing these amazing parts? I always seem to write really boring parts and I wonder what helps you when you have all the different instruments at your hand. Do you use ensemble string patches or individual sounds mixed together?

3. Any more pictures/videos of the studio you're doing all this in? I'm always looking to find more information about the recording (I'm a home engineer/songwriter)


Thanks a lot!
Lewis.

Hi Lewis.

The videos on Youtube are actually videos of the recording of the pre-production demo. So we didn't take too much effort isolating Marco. Though it is true that this way of recording could be fit for an album, there's always the risk of interfering noises that would have us re-record the parts and loose time.

For the final recording Marco was two rooms away, and was surveyed via a mini-camera. Oh, and we wouldn't touch him, except with tweezers

On to your questions:

1. We used a regular guitar amp (I think it was a Peavey) with an effect rack. For more details, you should try to contact Chris Menta. I am but a mere keyboardist, and when it comes to guitars, I usualy let the guitarist and sound engineer work on the basis. I'm only here to bitch about the sound until satisfied

2. So far, none of the orchestral stuff is "real". it is a mix of different sounds, both from keyboards and softwares. It is, in itself, quite a lot of work just finding a suitable sound. As for a method for composition and arrangements, I'm afraid I can't really help you. It just pops into my head and builds up as I'm working on the parts. I have no classical formation, so i really couldn't phrase my way of working in a way that would be understandable.

3. I've got a few bad quality footage of vocal takes from Marco, Georg and Klaaire on my cell phone. As soon as I can get my hands on the bloody cable, I'll upload them to my CPU and try to make a short montage.

I hope this helped

Thankyou very much Phil!

Of course, noone wants to nail the perfect take then hear someone farting in the background!

Hehe, same as me for recording orchestral stuff, I don't know a lot about orchestras themselves so I often have a hard time deciding where to put each sound and how to use it. I guess I should just get writing more stuff!

And don't be put down, we keyboardists are not "mere", We ROCK!

Thankyou again for your quick answer, I appreciate it.

Your welcome