Alastair Couper wrote: This is kinda what I was hinting at earlier... this kind of stuff tends to sound over-produced and manufactured, IMHO. I think the life and breath of music gets taken away by trying to make it too perfect sounding. But as for using a drum machine, some of us have no choice. I don't have the money to buy a full kit, let alone have the equipment to record one, let alone have the time to take lessons to play at a skill level high enough for the music I want to play. :-) But I would never use a drum machine live. I'd hire a real drummer for that. :-) -- Rule of Feline Frustration: When your cat has fallen asleep on your lap and looks utterly content and adorable, you will suddenly have to go to the bathroom.

A great E-Mail. I did some ProTool overdubs recently on tenor saxophone. When I asked the producer/engineer if we could do another pass on a section as I felt the high Eb was a little down, he stated that: "it was OK, we can fix it with AutoTune." What bothered me was that there were notes that I DID want a little detuning on, and that it was ALL out of my hands at that point. /mel Professional Musician - Saxophone/Flute/Clarinet Alastair Couper wrote:

The trouble is, though, that these guys WILL do it to the entire track. There are people that do use these things wisely, but, unfortunately, they seem to be too scarce. /mel Eduardo Guerrero wrote:

Hi Alastair, --- Alastair Couper <kalepa(a)shaka.com> wrote: The current state of artistry compared to the 1940's and 1950's jazz scene is probably fritening for any player that was part of the bebop jazz era. I, like you, definitely subscribe to the school of music that demands mastering an instrument. It can't be any other way for me but that's my values. In my professional reality, people pay me to make them sound great and I do my best. Numerous drummers have said, "Make me sound like Jon Bonham." Of course I could respond by saying, "sit down at my kit and let me hear you sound like him and when you do, I'll make you sound like him." Because the truth is, you either do or don't. Many of us need to play an instrument for 10 years before we begin to sound similar to anyone for whom we aspire. Until I achieve that degree of compentency, audio engineers can fix my slop. Why shouldn't they? I don't want to pay good money for a studio product that makes for a painful listening experience. And I don't want to wait 10 years before I can record or perform my songs. Most of us would never perform if we had to pass a test to recieve and carry a musician license that proves we're on a level with David Crosby, James Brown or whomever Tipper Gore and her church lady planning, tea toddler friends decide we should sound like. None of us needs any type of license to love making the music of their choice. Frank Zappa stood up for the right of free speech which includes our god given rights to autotune, pitch shift and quantize. hehe Or was Frank a hypocrite? Should I forever refrain from expressing my stupidity? Alastair, honestly, I share your exact sympathies. Which is why I practice L, R, L,L, R, L, R,R and a handful of the other 25 drum rudiments every day--I want to be a better singer and song writer. Don't ask! ron I recently read an __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail

RickTaylor wrote: OK, you're right: That which I prefer, of course. ;-) IMHO. De Gustibus, as always. It's just that there is an experience that all musicians crave, but for myself it comes all too rarely. I refer to the magical moment when all effort vanishes and the flow begins. I sit in amazement watching as my hands move by some other force than usual. Good stuff happens as a result, and you hope the record button is pushed. I guess my comments are based on the fact that I haven't had that experience tweaking a slider or quantizing a botched passage.

Last Tuesday 06 July 2004 18:42, Alastair Couper was like: Yes, David Crosby has the legendary ability to sing on pitch even when his entire throat and lungs were coated with cocaine residue and he was unable to attend to his most basic life requirements. Much the same could be said for James Brown. These guys are exceptional musicians. However, Crosby was not above using the studio, either, some of his takes were pieced together line by line. By and large, it's generally quicker and easier just to do the take again and get it right, but you get moments in an otherwise excellent and possibly unrepeatable take where you need to adjust the odd note or whatever. You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear to be sure, but sometimes you can get a rather fetching little leather wallet if you persevere. I would also much rather use a live drummer in all circumstances, but finding someone who can play it right at 3 o'clock Friday morning isn't always that easy either :] Yes/no. I find I tend to play stuff live when I'm writing then adjust with a MIDI editor, my technical skills really aren't up to the music I'm writing, so some compromise is necessary. I can't afford session fees. Yes, it _is_ like photoshop for audio. I think that provides some wonderful opportunities for creativity. Using anything to make up for skill deficits is going to be a bad job, generally speaking. Consider instead the skills we can develop using new tools to do things that were previously impossible. Most of what seems to make the difference between a shoddy and an excellent piece of work is the quality of attention applied to it, the technical skill of the creator isn't strictly important here, if they gave it 100+% when they made it, that often comes across in the final piece. (IMO) cheers tim hall

In case anyone's interested, I just found an interesting closely related thread on rec.audio.pro: http://groups.google.com/groups?th=e1a8a02e65f3da0c&seekm=jmtpe0t9ru3q4… -- Paul Winkler http://www.slinkp.com