We are happy to announce that we are offering more instrumentalists specializing in country music.  The new country instruments available include: dobro, pedal steel,  upright bass, fiddle, mandolin and lap steel.

Check out our country music productions:

Click here to order your country music production!

Click here to listen to our country musician’s demos.

The Studio Pros elves have been busy at work this holiday season.

We wanted to share a Christmas song produced by our team this holiday season, fresh out of the studio.  Every once in a while a songwriter will come along with a NEW Christmas song to switch up the holiday classics while still getting us in a festive mood.  Mister Link’s “Swingin Christmas” is one of those songs that makes me want to plug in my Christmas tree, put on my dancing shoes and sing along.  We finished this song just in time for Christmas!

Listen to “Swingin’ Christmas”, produced by Studio Pros, vocals and songwriting by Mister Link:

Happy Holidays from the Studio Pros Team!

check out more on Mister Link at: http://misterlinkmusic.com/

After years of discussing how we’d love to add a live string section, I’m happy to announce we’ve finally done it!  Introducing Studio Pros’ Live String Section.  Say no more to those mediocre midi string samples and unrealistic orchestral pads.

We have added onto our team a talented string arranger and world class string players to add live violin, viola or cello to your song.  Choose the string section that fits your needs with the number of layers you’re looking for and let the string players work their magic!

Read more about strings or order online:

http://studiopros.com/strings.php

If you need help setting this up, give me a call at: 1-310-928-7776.

Richard Davia is a singer-songwriter and recording artist based in Providence, Rhode Island. His melodic, well-crafted soft-rock tunes reflect a career spanning more than 20 years as a professional musician. Richard recently had his latest song, “Breaking Up Around Me”, produced at Studio Pros.

Like many singer-songwriters, Davia began at an early age with piano lessons. “I’ve been into music as long as I can remember. I took trumpet and piano lessons as a kid. When I was 10 years old, I took guitar lessons and started a band with two friends shortly after that.”

Growing up, Davia’s household was filled with the music of Simon & Garfunkel, the Mama’s and the Papas and the Supremes. These early influences and constant radio listening inspired the young musician to start a large top 40 record collection. “In high school, I got into artists like the B52′s, Gary Numan, and the Cars. Then I became obsessed with the Rolling Stones. I learned every Keith Richards riff I could get my hands on. That’s when I stared to really understand what rock songwriting was all about. Shortly after that, I got into artists with a harder rock edge, alternative and grunge.”

Davia was writing songs before he was old enough to get into clubs, and started in playing local rock cover bands around the same time. But early on he realized he was much more interested in playing and writing original music. “Working with other musicians to make original music and building a following seemed much more genuine to me as an artist. Music was integrated into my life from the start – from my personal practice time to band rehearsals, shows, recording and then teaching. I grew up a full-out music geek and loved every minute of it.”

Richard’s Studio Pros Experience

Check Out Richard Davia’s New Song “Breaking Up Around Me” produced by Studio Pros

Davia found Studio Pros online while looking for a studio to remix and master some of his music and was impressed with their capabilities. “I spoke with Kati, a producer over the phone and learned more about all the great things they had to offer – great musicians, live drums, and strong mixing/mastering expertise. They seemed to be a great fit for a singer-songwriter like me, so I decided to start fresh and record a new song with Studio Pros.”

The result was “Breaking Up Around Me”. At the time people close to Davia were experiencing lots of simultaneous emotional turmoil – life partners, marriages, and serious relationships all seemed to be collapsing all around him. “This all happened around the same time, so it was very much in my face and very raw.”

“Through it all I witnessed the inner struggles that people go through with matters of the heart, and I could relate to those feelings. I became inspired by the strength people have to move forward through adversity and ultimately grow stronger…to break through. The idea of finding courage comes through in the lyric …do you dare to do it over again? That sums it up for me – you’ve got to keep moving on in life.”

Davia recorded a rough cut of “Breaking Up Around Me” in his living room on an acoustic guitar. Once he had something he was happy with, he set up his profile on the Studio Pros web site and uploaded the song along with its lyrics and some reference tracks for overall musical direction.

Davia then worked closely with Kati and the Studio Pros production team to lay out an overall vision of the song before initiating the project. After a few back and forth phone conversations they were off and running.

“Within a couple of days, I received my first sketch track back from Studio Pros to review for structure, tempo, etc. It was a great foundation to build upon and pretty much spot on. From there, layers of instrument tracks were recorded – bass, live drums, guitars, and keyboards. I have to say, it was a blast – every time I received an email notification that a track was ready for my review, it was like getting a present in the mail!”

During the process Davia had multiple opportunities to give feedback to the production team. Once he was happy with all the instrumentation, he received a rough mix to take into a local studio where he recorded  lead and harmony vocals. “The sound engineers at my local studio were impressed with the quality of the Studio Pros tracks. Once I was happy with the vocal tracks, I simply uploaded them back to Studio Pros, and they started working on the final mix and master. It was pretty smooth every step of the way.  I was really happy with the quality of the recording. It exceeded my expectations. I especially liked the mastering quality. That extra “umph” in the final mix was just what the song called for.”

Davia plans to use Studio Pros again for recording his new music and remixing and mastering some past recordings he’s done. He’s even considering a possible EP or album package. “Studio Pros is really a unique studio. I’m not aware of any other that gives you access to musicians in such a wide variety of musical styles, work with you to create your sound, and deliver it all as quickly as they do. This allows me to focus on what I love to do – songwriting and performing.”

To submit your material for a Free Project Consultation with Producer Kati O’Toole, follow this link:
http://studiopros.com/free-consultation-form.php

If you have any questions or would like to speak with a StudioPros producer, contact Kati at: 1-310-928-7776 US or +44 (0)20 8196 2429 UK.

Studio Pros Teams Up With ProActionMedia!

ProActionMedia based in Phoenix, Arizona are now offering Studio Pros’ customers a 5% discount for all of their duplication and replication service. Like Studio Pros, these guys have a FAST turn around time and a 100% Customer Satisfaction policy.

Price Match Guarantee

ProActionMedia will match any competitor’s price on duplication and replication services. So you can relax and focus on making your project the best it can be. (click here for more info)

For more information and ordering, contact Tara Kanavy at 1-877-593-4261, or contact them by email.

Be sure to mention Studio Pros’ to get your exclusive 5% discount!

We’ve had a lot of requests for a female country vocalist and now we’re happy to announce, we’ve got one!  Meet Tara.

She is a youthful and versatile vocalist that can record beautiful vocals for country recordings, pop, ballads or adult contemporary.  I’ve only gotten positive feedback on the tracks that Tara has sung on.

Click below to listen to Tara’s vocal sample:

You can order Tara’s vocals online here :
http://studiopros.com/vocalist.php

Call StudioPros’ Head of Production, Kati O’Toole to set up an order today at: 1-310-928-7776 (US) or +44 (0)20 8196 2429 (UK)

Almost every modern recording studio uses digital audio recording techniques for tracking their projects as opposed to analog audio tracking (digital recording became the norm in the early 80′s). In digital audio,  the sound is being sampled X amount of times in a second. That’s where we get the term: sample rate. The sample rate can be anywhere from 8KHz (Kilohertz – 8,000 times per second) up to 192KHz. The bit depth determines the number of decimals in the sample which determines the accuracy of the sampling. The Bit Rate can be 8, 16, 24 bit. (for example, 8 bits will result a sample with only 8 decimal numbers)

Audio CD Quality

All  Audio CD‘s are formated at 44.1KHz, 16bit.

Q: “If my final song is going to be in 44.1KHz, 16bit, why should it be recorded at a higher sample rate and bit resolution?”

A: Changing the sample rate from a high sample rate to a lower sample rate (for example: 96KHz to 44.1KHz) can slightly modify your final recording. That process is called:  “dithering”, and is part of the mastering process. Research has shown that recording your audio at a higher sample rate (such as 48KHz or 96KHz) and then dithering it back to 44.1KHz doesn’t improve the sound of the recording and even cause slight distortion. We highly recommend recording your songs at 44.1KHz.

Q: When should I record at 48KHz 96KHz or 192KHz?

A: 48KHz sample rate is the default sample rate for TV and film tracks. The 96KHz and 192KHz is mostly used for Blue Ray DVDs.  Since your audio is being processed digitally in the computer, even the slight volume change will result in a mathematical formula with a lot of decimal numbers. We always recommend recording your song in the highest bit rate possible – 24bit.

The default sample rate and bit resolution for Studio Pros custom studio tracks and productions is 44.1KHz, 24bit. Recording at this rate will ensure your song will be recorded at the highest quality possible.

In this part in the series of How to record vocals, I’ll talk about vocal editing, and preparing your vocals for mixing.

If you reach this part, you already have one or more vocal takes that you like and now you’re in the process of piecing together your final vocal track. Start with the take you like the most.  When you get to a sentence or a phrase you don’t like, look for an alternative in your other takes. Remember to always go back to the original take after you’ve fixed that part. This is important to keep your vocal take at the same overall level and avoid odd volume changes.

Pro Tools’ playlist is probably the best tool for building up your perfect final vocal track from a few vocal takes. Almost all other vocal recording DAW’s such as Cubase and Logic have a similar feature that make it easy to perfect one vocal track from a few takes. It’s very important to be in ‘Snap to Grid’ mode and setup the grid to 1 bar. (It’s unlikely that you’ll need to move your vocal parts 1/4 or 1/2 bar from it’s original position)

After you chose the best parts from all of your vocal takes it’s time for editing. You’ll find out that some words start before the beat and were cut by the editing.  Switch to slip mode (or turn off the snap to grid) and drag the starting point of regions to fit the wording. Pay attention to your breathing and always crossfade between two regions.

Bouncing Vocals and Preparing Your Tracks for Mixing

After you’ve finished editing, it’s time for bouncing your vocal tracks. Bouncing will turn all regions in the channel to one track, from start to finish.

If you’re recording your vocals for Studio Pros’ music production, the rough mix you’ll get from us to record your vocals will include two bars of clicks before the song begins. When you bounce your tracks, you need to include those clicks in each one of your vocal tracks. It will help us make sure that your vocal tracks are 100% in sync with your music.

If you’re planning on exporting your tracks and not bouncing them as I suggested, make sure to keep your vocal tracks WITHOUT any processing such as compression, gates or EQ as well as any effects such as reverb or delay. Those will be added by the mix engineer.  A common mistake is exporting your mono vocal tracks to stereo tracks.  Your vocal tracks should always be in mono. If you are using export, always send your vocal channel to a mono bus and export a mono track. Again, bouncing is a better choice than exporting.

When you hire Studio Pros to record your songs, you can send a rough vocal mix back to our music producer Kati O’Toole for a free consultation. It’s a free service that can help you perfect your vocals before sending them for mixing.

Auto Tune Software, Pitch Correction and Vocal Tuning

Vocal tuning won’t turn really bad vocal tracks into a masterpiece. However, they WILL help you fix flat or sharp notes and clean up the tuning of your vocals. Auto tune software such as Antares Auto Tune or Celemony Melodyne are great, but they require a lot of sound engineering experience and often make your vocal tracks worse than they have been before you used them if you aren’t experienced in the software. That’s why we offer a detailed vocal tuning service at Studio Pros done by an experienced audio engineer. Tuning each and every word individually note by note rather setting up an auto-tune setting that will affect the entire song is the best way to achieve professional vocal tuned tracks. I highly recommend sending your vocal for a vocal tuning service prior to mixing your vocals to give your songs a professional edge.  Don’t be ashamed of vocal tuning, most tracks you hear on the radio have been tuned by an engineer prior to mixing.

That 3rd and last article concludes our three part series of how to record vocals. Like it? Got comments? Speak up in the comment section below.

Have you ever tried writing a song on a deadline? There may be any number of reasons why you’d put a due date on songwriting. You could be trying to write a song for a TV or film licensing opportunity that has a deadline. Or maybe you have a show coming up and you wanted to make sure you had a brand new song to perform for your fans. It could be that you’ve set up a meeting with the A&R department of a record label and you want to show them some new stuff that shows off your new musical direction.

For me, it was because my band had a recording studio booked for a certain date and we wanted to make sure we had enough songs to put on an album (and then some). For our first two albums, we hit the studio after we had written ten songs and recorded two ten-song albums. This time around, we wanted to be able to pick and choose out of 15 or 20 songs so we could piece together and record the best album we had in us.

When a producer wanted to work with us, we chose a time to record that fit in both of our schedules. It was the fall, and we would be recording in the spring. We only had a couple songs ready then, but there would be plenty of time to write enough to reach our goal, right? Our singer and principal songwriter agreed, adding that he works best on a deadline. He does, after all, compose music for commercials and is regularly required to provide timely songwriting.

It didn’t take long for us to learn another lesson from the “songwriting tips” page of the musician’s handbook:

You can’t force inspiration.

You see, when he would write music for commercials, it wasn’t the same as writing songs for the band. It was easy to get something finished when he didn’t have a personal stake in the songwriting; when you make background music, you can resort to cliches and various techniques that create a good commercial product but not necessarily a heartfelt song that you personally believe in.

And then the inevitable happened: he hit a dry spell. Not a major one, but he ran into the same issues that every songwriter runs into once in a while. He just wasn’t feeling it. And when he wasn’t feeling it, he couldn’t be expected to write a great song. He probably could have forced out a bunch of songs, but they wouldn’t have had the same impact as the tracks that he really believed in.

The solution: give yourself a little time to breathe.

After telling us about the situation he was in, we decided to ease up a little on our constant attempts to write and rehearse new material. We scaled back our rehearsals from three times a week to two times a week, and our singer took a break from trying to write songs for the band. In essence, he took a little time to breathe. We all did. As collaborative songwriters, we relied on our singer to get us started but we were burning ourselves out as well. We took a break.

A week later, you know what happened? A song. A new song. And it was a good one, too! The cycle of creativity was back on the upswing, and all we did was give it a little break instead of forcing it when it wasn’t working for us.

The next time you get frustrated by writer’s block, especially if you’re working on a deadline, just step away from the project and don’t think about it for a while. It may seem counterintuitive, but you’re likely to find that the moment you start focusing on something else is the moment when inspiration strikes and you write some of your best work.

If you would like feedback on your creative process, upload a song using our free project consultation form!

We love giving musicians a lot of options for their songs, but not every option can be right for every song. You should always carefully consider the instrumentation you choose. Not only will the right instruments make your track sound appropriate for its genre, they will also allow you to showcase the parts that are most important to your song. Here are a few choices you may come across when picking the right instrumentation.

Real drum track vs. programmed drums

The first decision to make is whether you would like a live drummer playing a real drum set or would rather have a programmed drum part. Usually if your song is rock, country, and certain kinds of pop, you’ll want the sound of one of our Los Angeles session drummers to give your song that full band, live sound. But if you do R&B, hip hop, electronic or top 40 pop music, you’re most likely going to want the sound of programmed drums.

Real vs. synth bass

A great bass line is a key part of a great song. That bass line can be played by a studio bassist, or we can program a synth bass line. Once again, it all depends on what vibe you’re going for with your music.

Guitars

There are many types of guitars that make all kinds of sounds: solid body guitars, hollow bodies, acoustics, electrics, etc. There are tons of different guitar sounds even out of the same guitar, too: different pickups, distortion, clean, reverbs, delays, and various effects.  Different guitar sounds fit with different styles: acoustic goes great with folk and singer/songwriter music, hollow body electric is perfect for jazz, etc.

Guitars also sound good when they’re layered, and rhythm guitar parts are often doubled in songs you hear on the radio. But don’t go overboard laying guitars; more than 3-5 and your song starts sounding muddy and undefined.

Keyboards and synths

Keyboards are similar to guitars: lots of options, but add too many and the listener won’t know what they’re supposed to be listening to. With keyboard tracks, you can have piano, organ, electric keyboards (like a Rhodes or Wurlitzer), and synth instruments (including string sections). If the rest of your song sounds very acoustic or live, you probably want to stick with one of the basics like piano or organ. If you’re producing a dance track, you’ll probably want to have a lot of cool synths and sounds that aren’t quite as “natural” as your standard keyboards.

Vocalists

Vocals are instruments, too. Even if you don’t use one of our vocalists for your lead part, they can add a new dimension to your music with harmonies or other background vocals. You’d be amazed what a few tracks of “oohs” can do for your song!

Horns

Studio Pros also offers horn sections.  Horn sections are essential for certain styles like swing and Latin music, but you might be surprised how many songs in other styles use horns, too.  A horn section can add a very unique element to your song, and they often bring the energy level up considerably when added to a recording.

Don’t forget that you can always mix it up—there’s no rule saying rock music has to have a live bass track or that rap can’t have a real drum set. We love to hear artists experiment and push the boundaries of their style. Just remember to always pick and choose your instruments wisely…  You want to make sure your listener gets the experience that you’re hoping for.