I have heard talk about Yamaha styles being too much like a CD. What makes them good or bad? Your opinions are wanted, I am thinking about a new keyboard.

John C.

Hi John.

Since I'm one of the few arranger keyboard users who dont fancy the too
"machine" souding Yammie styles, I might as well be the first to reply.

I find the sound too clean, cold and polished, and styles is a kind of
too perfect. It don't sound "human" in my ears. Start the style and it
sounds the same level whatever style I hear,a kind of limited in peak.
If I did not feel it that way, I would probably been a Tyros owner long
time ago......

If you i.e. listen to Ketron SD1 or SD5, the bass and drums give a very
live feeling, and when swap styles, it don't sound like it's a totally
different orchestra playing, it give me a feeling of that's the same
"gang" playing.
The nearest I've heard who manage this, is so far Korg.

But again, as said before, this is very personal, just the way I hear it.

Happy Playing whatever keyboard we play on
GJ

From the perspective of some who prefers the the more polished sound of the Yamaha:

As someone who uses the Tyros for songwriting and recording purposes only, I like that it sounds more CD like. I would not use it for raw rock or dance stuff though. Think Michael Omartain and David Foster productions and mixes.

I can concentrate on the vocals more and less about the mix in the mastering process. All tracks are equal in frequency and volume already. The instrumentation in my opinion sounds more like it was recorded in a $100,000 studio. Having had the Korg PA2x for a few months and a Trtion as the center piece for years I welcome the slick sounding samples and styles of the Yamaha.

I bought an Arranger because I wanted to spend less time polishing mixes, keep them more consistent with each other (as one finds on a 12 track CD) and more time on vocals. Also because I like acoustic sounds and use them a lot and in my opinion ion no one does acoustic sounds better.

For live use I can't offer an opinion. My wife is the OMB live player in the family. She uses the Tyros for tracking certain parts then takes an 88 key piano and her guitar on gigs with a CD of certain tracks from the T3. Her live playing of a Roland RD700 piano and guitar erases any "too CD like" issues with Tyros. She might only use a Drum part in a song and kick left handed bass, Or she may use the style without the guitar and play that part live. She never uses just the Yamaha for a backing track like many OMBs. She will not take any less than 88 weighted keys with her. She doesn't care for synth keyboards. Weighted keys are important to her.

Its all about what one prefers. IF you want a more raw in your face sound the Yamaha is not a good choice (as there their acoustic pianos are not a good choice if you don;t like a bright piano out of the box)

Yamaha Arrangers and Motifs have a signature sound as does Roland and Korg. That's Yamaha is the only major Arranger maker that actually makes real pianos and samples their own instruments.

If you are a live player and want to carry only ONE keyboard the PA2x is the way to go. I cannot speak to the G70, never owned one.

If you like slick sounding polished CD mixes like you would find behind Adult Contemporary Artists the Yamaha delivers.

I wish I knew what people meant when they say that Yamaha arrangers sound "CD" like. Being a professional recording engineer and producer for over 25 years I have never once recorded anything on CD that sounds like what I've heard on Yamaha's arrangers. Thank God! Even their TOTL arrangers with the exception of a few SA instruments aren't even close in sound to live instrumentation that I've recorded. Yamaha's weak drum sounds have already been talked about here ad nauseam so certainly Yamaha hasn't seemed to hit the mark in that department either which is a shame given their excellent Custom Series Drum sets they manufacture.

To me a great "CD sound" is one that has been well engineered, has incredible dynamic range, and sounds organic, open, and airy. Good examples of such CD's are most anything released by GRP Records or recorded by George Massenburg. To me when someone says something has a polished sound I think of works by Trevor Horn, not the anemic over compressed sound of a Yamaha arranger. Trevor Horn's sounds is certainly a polished sound one would never achieve using factory sounds from any Yamaha arranger.

Call it whatever you want, but it is the sound that I love to hear come out of the speakers when I play.

Use whatever pleases YOUR ears.

Ian

Of course you wouldn't nor would any from the perspective of someone who spends their life dealing with minutia in the recording process on a recording using the best gear available. Average Joes like me can view it as polished and CD as well as many players in this and other forums. The sound is considered too "CD like" too "slick"m "machine like". That's not a compliment for many and a stated detriment to using the Tyros. For others it's exactly what they want!

Ordinary people just don't listen with the same "ears" as those who deal with this stuff in a very high detailed level everyday.

Besides that, most of what is coming out of major studios today is very highly compressed with little dynamic range to make them loud and in one's face for 3.5 minutes. Something akin to what the Waves L2 would do to a track.

I would add most people do not actually "listen" to music. They "hear" it as a back ground soundtrack to whatever else they are doing at the moment.

In that regard we are really splitting hairs when comparing Arranger keyboard tracks. One thing I have learned about record producers/engineers at every level. They don't agree or use the same processes and/or gear. They are all critics. That's why I focus solely on the average Joe Plumber when painting my musical canvases. It's amazing what people don't hear and what passes off as real. We get to use that to our advantage.

The gear is out there to make great sounding CD's at home. The demise of commercial Recording Studios are proof of that. Between that and regular folks lack of listening skills, we are fortunate our work is considered worthy at all. Who cares if Trevor Horn or David Foster likes it? Really? They are not our market. Joe and Joan Sixpack are and they are easy to please.

[This message has been edited by Kingfrog (edited 10-26-2008).]

I think the difference is mostly, if you are a self taught, 'home' arranger player, you have never probably played in a real band. Most of what you have heard comes off of CD's and the like. So, you'll tend to prefer a keyboard that has this kind of dynamic.

If you ever played in a live band, though, you'll be used to something a bit more punchy and in your face. More raw, more difficult to ignore...

If you are doing primarily home recording and songwriting, the Yamaha's help make it easier to get 'close' to a CD sound with little technical recording skill, but once again, the more 'live' sounding arrangers, once compressed and limited correctly, tend to have, IMO, a better CD sound, due to them, just like a REAL CD, starting with a more live sound.

But I believe both 'sounds' have their place. If I was doing a restaurant 'background music' type of gig, I'd shoot for the Yamaha's. Very 'Muzak'-like, nothing jumps out, nothing disappears. VERY 'polished' (like Ensnareyou, it's not MY preference in 'polished', but it is ONE type ), very smooth.

If I were doing more in your face type gigs, I'd shoot for something else, a Roland, a Ketron, a Korg...

To be honest, I think it is fairly easy to hear these sonic differences from the factory demos themselves. If you can't tell the difference, bruno, then it doesn't really matter... and if you can, only your OWN opinion really matters, in this case, anyway!

I'll agree that much of the music that comes out today from major record labels is what I would call seriously over compressed with practically no dynamic range. To me that's just an audio engineer either not doing his/her job properly or being told what to do from some label executive who knows nothing about great sound. No engineer who truly loves audio would ever over compress the hell out of their track only to have it lose all the dynamic range they strived to achieve in the recording process in the first place. Compression and Limiters should be used as tools to help make a track sound better not worse.

I'm going to have to disagree with you that the demise of many commercial studios is because you can now make a great sounding CD from home. The demise has to do more with people being cheap (yes cheap) and presuming they can record a World Class sound out of their home studio with little to no knowledge of audio engineering. It doesn't matter if you have the best gear money can buy at home, if you don't know how to use it then it's pointless. I've seen it happen time and time again where I am hired to record a drum or vocal track for a home studio recordist because they weren't able to achieve the sound they wanted. It wasn't for lack of gear although many times that can be the problem, it was from lack of knowledge on how to track and mix an instrument.

In my opinion the recording industry went into a downward spiral and audio quality has suffered from the proliferation of home based studios with people at the helm who lack engineering skills. Just because you own Pro Tools, an instrument or two, and a microphone does not make one an audio engineer. Far from it!

On the positive side cheaper gear has brought recording to the masses and those that could never afford to record a CD before can now do so. While many of these CD's are recorded for vanity reasons, there will always be those few that take the time to learn their craft seriously, record a CD that can compete sonically with other major label releases, and may even achieve airplay and sell well.

I see this going bad fast!!

But I like Ians reply

The Korg PA series is very capable of doing soft restaurant ballads, big band, standards - everything. Just to clarify others' opinions.

John,

You can tune any arranger keyboard to sound the way you wish. As stated above, it's what you hear that counts and nothing else.

As for the home player aspect, I would venture a guess that more than 2/3 of the forum members have at one time or another performed with a live band. They know the problems associated with live bands, egos, drunks, drugs, etc.., most of us have been there, done that and got the Tee-shirt. That's one of the primary reasons why many are now OMB entertainers.

If you are in the market for a new keyboard, my best advice is to spend some time and money playing them first hand. It's time and money well spent.

Good luck on whatever brand you decide upon,

Gary

I've owned several Yamaha arrangers over the years, along with a Korg PA80 and a Casio MZ2000 ( I still have both of the latter). Since I do play harder edged blues, jazz and Rock, I find that I have to work more to get the Yamaha styles to sound better, as opposed to my other arrangers.

Tweaking the effects and eq settings on my T2 helps some, but I get the best results when I do it in combination with making eq and effect adjustments in my outboard mixer. I rarely feel the need to put either the PA80 or MZ through the mixer in this way, as they usually tend to sound optimum to me "outta the box". OTOH, no matter how I tweak the internal eq and effect settings in the T2, I can't get it to sound somewhat close to what I want to hear without playing it through my mixer.

Then, in order to make the style themselves a little more dynamic, I like to tweak my styles by adding or modifying drum parts. It doesn't always take that much, sometimes adding a few ghost notes and slightly altering the timing, particularly on bass drum notes, along with making some adjustments to the dynamics, ie velocity, panning, etc. Other times I might add and subtract regular drum notes. Sometimes I might even add a slight touch of distortion or overdrive to the drum and bass parts, not much of course, but enough so that they don't sound so sterile. I also sometimes like to alter the bass lines and to a lesser extent some of the other instrument sounds as well.

I find with the Korg styles, and even the MZ's to some extent, that there is much less needed to get them to sound more "lifelike" for my preferred genres. Unfortunately, style editing, especially in conjunction with an external sequencer, proves easiest in the MZ, with the PA80 being almost as good to work with and the T2 not so good.

With all this in mind, and since my primary foucus is not playing as a OMB, I can easily see me parting ways completely with Yamaha arrangers and possibly adding a Roland arranger to the mix, or perhaps the PA800 or 2x.

AJ

"Great sounding" means different things to different people. That's the rub for commercial studios. "Great Sounding" to you is different than to me and still different to others and way different form those who consume the music. The "quality" is as subjective as the very content and is tied to it. I don't care for drop D Shred Metal or Trance,Rap,Hip Hop so whether recorded using fruity loops in a home studio or Electric Ladyland, it all sounds terrible to me.

The "noise" gap between home and studio recordings has narrowed a lot over the years. I would bet David Foster could make great tracks on all Behringer gear in someone's bedroom.

I blame the record companies,producers, and engineers for the dumbing down of the population with highly compressed limited dynamic range recordings.With that and good home gear getting better and better and less expensive. That is a good thing for the home recordist. Not so good for many Commercial Recording Studios and independent producers.

Many "vanity" recordings are sold everyday on gigs and provide additional income for the act. I know a guy who plays in a Piano Bar on a cruise ship who sells an average of 50 self produced CD's a week. He records them in his cabin using a notebook computer, a keyboard and a MXL mike. That's $2000 a month unreported "extra" cash! They may be just "souvenirs" purchased by people caught up in the moment but they are money in the bank he would not have otherwise been able to do. Many local single acts sell home produced CD's at their gigs. These are what you would call "vanity CDs but they are a steady income stream for the acts and exceed tips in many cases. Even if one sold only 5, that's an extra $50.It adds up. People like them and I don't expect nor are seeking "airplay". A lot more people are getting to shares their music because of Arrangers and Home Recording gear and that's not a bad thing. I enjoy going to Soundclick and hearing other people's homegrown work. Some I like other's I don't.

A good song transcends a bad recording. The otherwise isn't always true.

I am afraid that the decline in high dollar studio production has come about because of a precipitous decline in record industry profits. They are running at close to 20% of their gross pre-Napster.

People are buying ONE track on the iTunes store at 99¢ rather than the whole CD at $15.

You can't run and staff a world class facility, develop artists over time, foster and care for songwriters, and promote product as well as you used to on 1/5th of the money you USED to make.

People are making more records in home or small commercial facilities, because the big dollars from big labels for TOTL production has virtually dried up except for the highest profile artists.

And yes, the CD has gone from a musical delivery medium capable of 98db of dynamic range to a sonic abortion with a dynamic range of maybe 10db because of the 'louder is better' wars that labels have played with each other in an effort to catch radio programmer's attention. They don't care if it sounds good. Just as long as it SELLS.

Add that to the decline in popularity of high quality home audio gear... Most people listen to music on crappy computer speakers or badly set up surround sound systems for TV's. Those computer speakers are another primary reason for the drop in dynamic range... they sound like crap when given anything with a big range of dynamics, so 'let's just reduce it!'

Kids today are spending the money they WOULD have spent on hi-fi back in the seventies on computers, iPods, cell phones, blackberries, plasmas, all the detritus of the 'digital age'. So, even if you DID make a great sounding CD, their gear would not play it back well...

Sad, really...

Bluezplayer, just as a matter of interest ,have you tried playing ANY of the Korg rock styles? Especially the "heavier" genres. They are bloody awful imo, and sound NOTHING like any rock band I have heard or played in.

The same goes for a lot of their 50's/60's and pop styles as well.

I have to admit that to me, the Rolands seem to be much more "Lifelike" in pretty much all of their rock/pop genres, than any of the other.
And no, I do not own a Roland!!

Dennis

Ummm for about 8+ years now ... That's how long I've had the PA80. Mind you, I almost never use every part of every style, no matter which board I'm using. I'm mainly concerned with the drums and bass sounds, and sometimes I leave another part or two on. For the most part I'm not that concerned about guitar or organ emulations in a style. Few keyboard guitar parts ever sound very realistic to me, whether they use utilize megavoices or the Motif arps for that matter, though the latter can sometime sound a tad closer than most ( yes I have one of those as well )

Still, I think I can mimic a pretty good rock tune with the PA80 styles I have.. at least a lot better than with any of the comparable T2 styles.

Again, you have to understand, I've had the board for ages and have customized almost all of the internal styles in the PA80, making better fill matches, adding dynamics to the drum and bass parts. I can do that on the PA80 and make it sound pretty good. On the T2.. not so much...


I haven't heard enough of the Roland styles to give a fair judgement, though I was not overly impressed in the when I demoed the G70 or E80. Perhaps a more fair test though would be on the same sound system I use with my boards, and then after I've had some tume to fiddle with the style data.

AJ

Yep... I honestly think that expecting ROM styles, a la factory set, to be anywhere NEAR where we each personally like them is optimistic at best.

I have rarely heard a factory ROM style, on ANY arranger, to be exactly where I want it, no matter what genre it is in! I feel that it is one of the things each owner should have to do, because expecting some guy in Japan or Italy, or wherever these styles are made, to have EXACTLY the same idea as me of where the mix should be is lunacy!

Hence, one of the reasons I am still unapologetically a fan of the Roland's. If you DO like o tweak your styles, or SMF's and don't have some kind of fantasy that one day, someone will make an arranger that magically mixes everything JUST right (the 'baby bear' arranger!), the tools that you do that remixing and revoicing on are critical. Most that have actually bothered to dig into this area of the OS (not something many try out casually in a store) have nothing but the highest praise for the way that Roland have engineered this section.

Now, of course, I'm not expecting many to drop their favorite arranger, and rush out and buy a Roland (you can't find them, anyway ), but at least try to get YOUR favorite manufacturer to look at how Roland do it. If it was as easy as Roland make it, few would even worry about how the factory styles sound, because it is SO easy to change them to how YOU (and you alone!) want them to be.

Cool, thanks AJ.

Just wanted another opinion on them.

Cheers
Dennis

I have to disagree. There is a standard for audio quality that is well known in the music industry. While many labels and engineers don't necessarily adhere to that standard, others do and record labels and distributors will reject any submission if its not up to par. Any engineer who has done work for major labels is well aware of these standards and will meet them. Some labels are very strict about audio quality and I admire those labels because they not only believe in delivering an album that has great musical content but quality audio as well. GRP and ZTT are some of those labels.

As an engineer I have worked on all styles of music and no matter what genre or audio format I work within (analog, digital), I strive to give the client the absolute best audio quality possible. Just because I am recording a RAP record doesn't mean the standard for that recording should be any less than that of a Jazz or Pop record. Any engineer who cares about their work will strive to make any recording they do as good as it can possibly be.

I realize many people today record vanity CD's at home each year and sell them at gigs but that doesn't mean the CD quality is any good. I'm personally disappointed when I purchase a CD where the music may be great but the delivery of the musical recording is sub par at best. A great song may be a great song no matter how it is recorded but I still don't want to pay good money for a recording where the artist didn't care enough to make it of decent audio quality.

One of the reasons CD's today sound so horrid is that many people are commanding the helm of a mixing console and recorder that they aren't qualified to mix on. One wouldn't pick up a scalpel and expect to be a Surgeon so why is it one can buy Pro Tools and call themselves and audio engineer?

Just curious, but when you have a rap client, and he wants his CD as loud as, say a 50 Cent CD, or the latest Kanye West, what do you tell them?

"No, sorry. It'll sound terrible" or "OK, whatever you want!"

Because, if it's the former, they always turn round and say "but the Kanye sounds bangin'! That's what we want..."

How can you fight that?

And sorry, but GRP isn't exactly a mainstream label... jazz music for aficionados...

Trouble is, major labels ARE putting out pop, rock and urban music that sounds terrible. It's mixed by guys like Lord-Alge and the best of the best. But then it is handed off to mastering engineers who are TOLD to make it as loud as it possibly can go. You either do it, or they hire someone else.

It has got to the point that they (the mastering engineer) often request stems of the mix, so that they can mitigate the effects of slamming the compressors and limiters so hard it actually changes the mix! So much for a great mix!

And, you know the REALLY stupid thing about the whole thing? Most record buyers nowadays listen to much of their music from iTunes, either on an iPod, or streamed from the computer to their music systems. And you know wht iTunes does to all the tracks? Yep, you guessed it! It has a feature called 'Sound Check' which actually turns all the LOUD tracks down, so they are roughly the same volume as older CD's that are ripped into your collection!

So, you gain no practical benefit from having ruined the sound of the CD trying to get it as loud as possible...

It has gotten INSANE, and I'm sorry, but this is NOT primarily at the hands of bedroom studio owners (no matter how good or bad they may be). They have NO impact on what major Top 40 labels do to their CD's

Just TRY to listen to the new Metallica CD if you want to hear ear bleedingly bad sound at it's worse. Nobody did THAT one in their bedroom, I can tell you!

Jazz labels, classical, yes, there's a little sanity left in the world. But mainstream pop and rock has gone off the deep end...

Diki,

It is possible to make a track loud and not make it sound completely squashed. Of course it requires a high end compressor that doesn't impart excessive coloration to the mix and someone to use the compressor who won't get heavy handed with it. The trick is to try and school your client on what is available to do a great mix and hopefully they'll listen. Many times that's nearly impossible though. Most often once a mix is done it's completely out of the engineers, producers, and artists control. It doesn't take long for some label executive with a Deity complex to tell the Mastering engineer what to do and destroy a mix. After that its all downhill from there.

Well, here at the studio, we run our mastering chain Apogee PSX100>Manley Massive Passive ME>Manley Slam!ME>Waves L2 hardware.

If mastering in software, I am am a big fan of most of the UAD-1 Mastering Plug-ins, and a variety of other stuff, Waves, Sony, etc..

I think I know a LITTLE about mastering.

But the labels want hot, the artists want hot, and no-one is even listening on decent speakers at the labels, anymore. It's pathetic.

Rip the original Nightfly CD (widely recognized as one of the best recorded and engineered CD's ever) and some of the tracks don't even PEAK at -3db! Most pop tunes, even the quiet passages hit the limiter. Half the time, the intro is the perceived loudest part of the song, because the compressors and limiters haven't bit down yet!

I've been doing mastering for quite a while, and it's enough to make you weep!

Right or wrong, I just love reading this stuff from knowledgeable and talented members. It's the only way us layman can learn about studio sound, plug ins, post processing, mastering, etc. Thanks guys for the informative conversation; this is when SZ is at it's best!!

------------------
Al Giordano
Visit us at ARRANGER WORLD! http://www.arrangerworld.com

Korg Pa2xpro, Roland VK8-M, DW Collectors Series Drums, Roland TD-12 Vdrums, Roland SPD-S.

Get the Yamaha if you want a keyboard to record nice CDs with great sounds (except for the drums of course which suck by any standard).

Get the Korg if you want amazing punch on the dance floor, though the right hand sounds are not that great.

I would say a Korg Pa2x and Motif Rack are the best combination.

Nice Mastering setup Diki. EveAnna Manley is a friend, she's a great person, and she makes some phenomenal tube gear. I really love the Massive Passive and Slam. I'm more a fan of great hardware rather than software mastering but the UAD and Waves are nice.

I always try to final mix as close as possible to what I envisioned so as to not need much tweaking when I master. When people bring me projects to master that's an entirely different story and I've heard some horribly mixed songs that I suggest the client remix before mastering. When a song is too far gone I'd rather send the client elsewhere as I don't want to put my name on a project I know can't sound good no matter how much you tweak it. You'd be amazed how many poorly tracked projects I've heard from supposed top notch engineers. I think most people also believe that if they do a poor mix they can fix it in mastering and that just isn't the case.

You are missing the point. The END USER doesn't care. The END USER is not that sophistacted. What sounds great to them may sound like crap to you. You may not pay for it with your educated ears. But Avg Joes are buying it anyway! There is no "industry standard" for the end user. They are listening to songs on MP3 @ 128bits.

Of course the "industry" will pan home grown work. But the bottom line is they sell their CDS whether crap[ or good and the end user is happy. I have never had someone return a CD because it does not sound like an industry standard CD.

Even as you say "pro" engineers and record companies are not adhering to "industry standards" which makes me wonder what they are. I certainly don't make a CD as good as can be done in a $100,000 studio. But I'm not making them for those people either. We make them for Joe and Joan who show up at a gig and pay ten bucks for a CD. Even with today's home gear its a hell of a lot better than it was 15 years ago. With mastering plug ins and all the SW help it's nearly fool proof. The avg person could not tell the difference. The average person is the market. Home Recordists like me don't worry about "industry standards". Im not going to spend $3000 for a Pre-Amp or $2000 for a mike when the Joe Meek and Rode NT2 does the Job. People really cannot hear the difference and more than that they don't EXPECT a personal CD to sound like a Steely Dan production.

I learned along time ago. I did not have to send a CD off to a mastering house. I would have sold the same number either way. But then again I was not sending them of to "industry professionals." Recording pros beat up everybody's work no matter who. You have DIKI telling you GRP is not all that great an example. You see its all relative.
IT's all about the end user. Theres the market. They will buy anything and listen to it on anything and if they like the tune nothing else matters.

It's all about the song. A great song can be recorded using "piano voice" on a Zoom H-4 and still be great. A bad song will never survive the best engineers. I don't call myself a "recording engineer" and I turn down any outside requests for recording other's songs. I did that once and would never do it again. So in my case anyway I support and ENCOURAGE Home Recordists. Always have. The lack of "industry standard" sound more than makes up for watching the clock while paying someone else. stsaying up until 4AM working on a tune that would have cost $25 an hour and up. People can make some pretty nice sounding stuff in their bedrooms. Especially to average Joes. I understand how professional engineers can find that a threat between that and the dumbing of the listener.

And the line between "industry standard" and Home Recording is pretty narrow nowadays.




[This message has been edited by Kingfrog (edited 10-27-2008).]

Great post that is so true!

Anybody's bedroom produced, crappily engineered, poorly mastered CD signed to a major label and getting steady commercial radio airplay?

Didn't think so...

Just because your friends and fans at the local nursing home/watering hole don't return your CD doesn't mean it doesn't sound like poo... Or that, if it sounded better, they wouldn't like it MORE (and thousands more would like it, too)

Look, while we decry the state that things have gotten to, on the whole, most commercially recorded CD's still sound FAR better than most home productions. And sell in MUCH higher numbers. Maybe you DO just want a 'vanity' CD, to sell to the locals. Nothing wrong with that. Have done it myself.

But if you DO want to take it to the next level, sooner or later (sooner if you want to succeed!) you are going to HAVE to take the audio quality seriously. As bad as it can get, I have yet to hear anything posted here that even approached the quality of the BAD modern label productions..!

And the customers DO care... they are buying these CD's at Best Buy and WalMarts. Not your home produced stuff...

And, Ensnareyou, next time you run into EveAnna, thank her for making a couple of SUPERB pieces of kit.

One more time. Most of those I know producing their own work are not looking for a major record deal. IF they were they would go to a WELL KNOW enginner. Not some dude down the street with no track record of real recognized commercial work!! And pay for it. I wouldn't. Home Recordists don;t HAVE to equal commercial work and in some cases sound better if they are not all squashed with no dynamic range,

Succeeding to me is selling 50 CDs a week. Thats plenty. I'm too old to want nor have I ever sought a record deal and those deals suck nowadays anyway. Independants abound with limited recources.

Yes Joe buys CDs at Wal Mart but they also buy CDs on gigs. They don't have the same expectation but knowing the artist up close helps.

I don't do nursing homes so I cannot speak for that market. Perhaps you can share your excperiences in those venues. But I sold a ton of home grown CDs when we were on the road. My wife sells them locally.

I have not heard anything that has either on this site or any other site that I could compare to a Steely Dan recording either. But that is so subjective it means nothing.

But the point is even if you and I may be able to tell the difference on some level. But the average customer can not. I CHOOSE not to buy expensive gear becasue we won't sell any more CDs. Simple economics. People are buying the songs, They don't expect to hear a $100,000 recording and nor do I expect it from anyone with a home studio,

ANd I have met many "producer engineers" in my travels with their own "floating studios with Pro Tools and all the goodies. Very few of those "unrecognized" self procalimed experts and engineers have good things to say about another's work. There is a certain a snob appeal to the gear used as well. Gear means othing if one does not know how to use it. On the other hand a good producer can squeeze a great recording from cheap gear. Many who make want to earn a living as a Producer have to have a list of certain the gear for advertsing purposes becasue they won't be taken seriously unless they have the likes of Pro Tools d Avalon VT-737SP, Maney, Portico, Neve 80 Series Consoles, U87s.......on and on. Thousands more for 5% better syndrome

I will say it again. Its all about the song. A great recording will not save a terrible song. But a great song can jump out of a 4 track cassette tape.

All this talk about super recording productions is all fine & good......but does the musician have the talent to First sound good & have super chops & vocals.......otherwise now you have a great recording of bad music

Point well taken, Donny.

But if you DO have the chops, why ruin it with a BAD recording?

If all anyone shoots for is mediocrity, that's all they'll ever achieve

Thats my line. Bad song, great recording, Still bad. Great song crappy recording still great song. Great Producers CAN hear great songs through the "noise".

These Arrangers have great mixes out of the box. Far better than many can accomplish on their own. Home recording is getting easier and easier by the year. Prices are way down on great gear, I remember when the AT4033 was the cheapest large diaphragm one could get at $600. I thought I had dies and gone to heaven to be able to use a Large diaphram mike!! Now you can get that "quality" for less than 1/2 the price. Pre Amps, DA/AD converters, Software plug ins rivaling the best hardware of years gone by. Never be discouraged by those in the business of selling "dreams" by the hour. Take those thousands and buy the gear and learn the process and record what you want when you want. IF you have a good song and a regular crowd, the gear will pay for itself.

There are enough players who are not technically inclined and will want to pay to record in someone else studio. That's a good thing for them and a great reason to have professional commercial studios out there.
But its not a requirement anymore. IF the studio thinks the material is good enough and wants a Master. They will see that one is recorded. If they don't like the material no matter how good the recording, the money spent making the CD was wasted when it could have gone to purchasing their own gear. Hollywood ,Nashville and NY waste bins are filled with $5000 recordings.

But if one doesn't care about recording contracts they can do it themselves. Even if they do and have a decent demo they can get a deal....ITS ALL ABOUT THE SONG. Thats what they all will tell you in Nashville. A good producer will hear a great song with just piano part perhaps and actually look forward to painting the rest of the pallet.

All well and good, Kingfrog, but you are kind of arguing circularly, here...

Either Nashville wants a ratty piano only Portastudio demo, in which case a T3 is utterly wasted, if not actually detrimental to helping it get cut, or they DO want quality and good sounds.

You want it both ways. Either the very expensive T3 helps, in which case, a very expensive mike, pre, and plug-in suite with a good engineer in the seat helps also, or the very expensive T3 gets as much in the way of success as spending time (and maybe some money) to grab their attention with quality production.

Which is it?

The point is anyone songwriter who has the good fortune of owning a T3 and some decent Home Recording gear can make a CD that will be a good representation of their music. Good enough to sell on their own or send to Hollywood.

If the song is great it will still be so if someone does not have the gear and just an H4 and a guitar.

You can have it both ways!
$3500 for a T3 and another $1500 for a large diaphragm mike, a pre Amp and decent interface (or a ZOOM HD8) is far less of an expenditure than paying a studio to produce the same CD with no guarantee of success and no more of a guarantee because it was recorded for $5000 in a Commercial Studio.

As we know $5000 doesn't buy much even in a Commercial Studio, especially if using live musicians. That money is gone forever. Whereas if someone buys the gear they can try again and again to record their music without spending any more money and LEARNING to get better quality recordings as well! WIn WIn.

I would always advocate a musician to learn how to record their own tunes ,especially on the gear thats available today. Stay off the clock.

Its the old "I can give you fish or teach you how to fish".

I don't honestly think that using an arranger is much of an improvement over using great players..!

I've been playing and recording a bit recently with a guy who played for years with James Taylor, Jackson Brown, Bonnie Raitt and many others. The day an arranger can play 1/100th as well as he does, I will pay any amount of money for it! Same with drummers (my last one was with Asleep At The Wheel for years - got a Grammy!), same with horn players, etc., etc..

Look, I'm not putting home studios down... plenty of good stuff can come out of them. I do orchestration work out of mine that sells six figures a year (for a client, sadly! ). But getting people to realize that maybe they are messing up a good thing with a terrible recording can be difficult. And no, they don't have to rectify it by paying $1500/hr and hiring the Saturday Night Live band to play on it! But something in the middle can go a long way towards achieving what they want to do. Few here are pitching songs to Nashville (are you?). Most just want to make a decent quality CD to sell on the gig (like your wife).

But telling everyone that, with a T3 and a decent mike, it is all going to happen ain't always true. You can teach a guy to fish, and he can STILL get skunked every time! Or he can go to Captain D's, or even an upscale fish restaurant, and get fish any time he wants it. Learning the studio techniques to even get a passable demo can take many, many frustrating months or even years. Few here have even the patience to learn to PLAY, yet alone work a studio (you catch my drift?) to an acceptable level (to even themselves).

I heard the one thing you posted recently, which you said was done quite a while ago... Have you anything more recent, arranger-based, that utilizes your improved recording skills? I would love to hear it. Honestly. You've got a great voice, and I'd like to hear how you've come along in the home studio. We can talk all night, but a song say a thousand words.

But, bottom line... Professional production has it's place. Not everyone needs it, not everyone DOESN'T.