Bringing it to life
- Kieara Fisher
- Sep 29, 2017
- 2 min read
One of the most influential pieces of feedback in the workshop was to change the flute MIDI to a real instrument. I agree that the flute really wasn't doing the piece or it's style justice. Therefore, Mark and I decided our choice to change this main 'melodic' part to violin the focus this week. The results are proof that this was definitely favourable decision.
While in the studio we recorded the majority of the Violin for 'The Hollow' apart from the bridge as Hannah had to leave at 1pm due to other responsibilities. This is only a short section of the considerably long piece. We ran to time well considering the complexity of the melody and the short notice that we gave Hannah.
The practicalities of the process were also relatively straightforward, I have only recorded violin once before so I did some research using Bruce and Jenny Bartlett’s ‘Practical Recording Techniques’. I used my own combination of their suggestions. The setup consisted of two condenser microphones which in our case was the 'Rode NT2-A'. One microphone was situated above her head angled down with the front of the microphone facing vertically towards the violin and the other vertically towards the 'f-holes' of the violin. These microphones are very sensitive so they weren't situated too close to the violin as we wanted the 'raw' scratchiness of the strings but also the airy reverberant sound. (Video teaser at the bottom of the article.)
As we were already in the studio we decided to recording the final bass tracks for 'Drain'. Mark plays bass so it made the process reasonably simple. We used a DI unit and a fretless bass which did prove difficult as sometimes. However, I believe that the tonality of a fretless bass did add to that level of 'performance authenticity' that relates to the heritage of the genre. 'Drain' is now completely recorded and 'The Hollow ' only has the final violin 'bridge section' left. We have planned for one last session next week with Hannah to finish it off. Mixing is also well underway with the only a few adjustments needed for the bass in 'Drain' and of course the violin in the 'Hollow' is yet to be mixed.
Despite that the project is different from what we originally intended it is on track. The next steps now included continued updates to the ‘Facebook’ pages, and getting in contact with an aggregator for 'Itunes' and possibly community radio stations. There will be updates on the exact date and method release along with our marketing strategies.
Kieara.
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