As you begin looking at opportunities to pursue as a home recording artist, you may be overwhelmed by all the different options out there. There are live music events, recordings with bands, and home recordings for online distribution. The key is to make the best choice based on your unique musical talents, your interests, your financial resources, and your personal style.
To set up a home recording studio that will make great radio-friendly tracks, you only require 8 pieces of equipment. If you’d like to know what these items are, read on. The basic home recording studio setup includes the following components: drum set (the main equipment that will be used in the song preparation stage), a computer with a sequencer software, an acoustic keyboard, a microphone, headphones, and an interface with the computer for sequencing or recording.
In this stage, the goal is to set up the room for your home recording studio. You need to find a good spot with no visible clutter in the area, such as a garage, basement, attic, or attic floor. Place the speakers in an open area so that you can monitor sound levels and control the dynamic range of the speakers. Place the microphones too high or low that you will be at risk of feedback. Also, consider using the floor-standing monitors as floor speakers for your main vocal tracks and backup vocals, or for the low end during a live performance.
Next, you will need to hook up the audio interface to your computer. This audio interface will be responsible for connecting your computer to your sound card, your monitor, and the input and output devices that will go into your home recording studio. It also controls how the computer is used for sequencing or recording. Once you have everything hooked up, it’s time to start your first home recording studio.
You can start out by operating with only one input (your monitor). In this stage, you won’t want a large mixer or mic, and you will probably not want an effects processor. However, the main reason why you’re starting out with a simple audio interface and not something more is that it will take a little while to get used to working with all of the different software programs for creating a home recording studio. After a few weeks of using your new equipment, you’ll be ready to move on to more complicated tasks.
The third stage is headphones and speakers. Although your main concern will be the quality of sound produced when you record music production, it is also important to use these three items for your overall home studio set-up. In addition to the three main elements, you should also invest in a stereo tracking headset for your monitor and input monitoring, a subwoofer, and a reliable pair of headphones. Stereo recording headsets come in two types: closed-back and open-back headphones, and you should generally opt for the open-back style for the greatest audio reproduction available.
Finally, you need a computer, an audio interface for connecting your computer to your home recording studio, and some transfer software to load your recordings onto your computer. Transfer software is used to convert your music files into high-quality MP3-compatible files. The easiest way to transfer audio is through using the iTunes application. While it’s true that there are many other options, such as some kind of portable USB drive that can let you save files directly onto your computer, I highly suggest saving your files through iTunes. Not only does it have great searching features and a fast scanning process, but iTunes also allows you to make changes to your audio files without having to go through the complicated process of transferring them from your computer to your computer.
When you’re finished recording your first audio recordings, you will be amazed at how clean and perfect your final recordings are. However, you may want to experiment with the various levels of lossless compression. Many of the audio interfaces allow for a simple level of compression, which means that your recording will sound great, but won’t have any noticeable loss of sound when transferring it from your computer to your iPod. If you experiment, you’ll find out what the right settings are for your needs.
Dan is a musician who plays at local bars and perform small concerts with his band. He also writes and produces their own music. He also gives lessons on playing guitar and piano.