Jeff Zahos

This semester, I have been assisting Jon Schoenoff recording the New Philharmonic Orchestra, under the direction of Music Director and Conductor, Kirk Muspratt.

On April 23rd and 24th, I had the opportunity to record the orchestra myself, which was a great learning experience.  This example is from one of the concerts from that weekend:

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This is the documentation for the concerts I was involved in recording:

New_Philharmonic_Recording_Documentation

New Philharmonic Recording System Diagram

The following photos are from the January concertized opera performance of Puccini’s Turnadot.  The orchestra mic’ing was supplemented by microphones on the front edge of the stage to highlight the solo singers, and mics were placed in front of the choir and on the organ loudspeakers.

Soloist Mic Placement

Choir Mic Placement

Organ Mic Placement

Recently I had the opportunity to produce and record a project with percussionist Matt Jacklin.  We completed two sessions, one week apart in Foellinger Great Hall at the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts.

Matt_Jacklin_Recording_Project

We recorded three pieces:

Session 1 (4.11.2010):  Bernard-Francois Machet – Phenix (for vibraphone and 9 tom-toms)

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Session II (4.18.2010): Andrew Thomas – Merlin (for marimba),  Jacob Druckman – Reflections on the Nature of Water (for marimba)

Session I Photos:

Session II Photos:

Recently, Faster Forward played a short recording session at the Krannert Center for students in the audio production class (I am not in the class – I was just drumming and singing background vocals. In fact, I was forbidden from touching microphones or other audio gear – I could just “Ask questions”. I asked many annoying “questions”!). Sound files from this session

…will never be heard in public! (You could say it was an “off night” for FF, which is to say “a night”. That said, we did 3 songs in as many hours, which is an insane pace).

The good 2/3 of Faster Forward

Jay on bass

Hamptone keeping it real on kick and snare

Robert at the DDA console

Chris, Beth and Robert, our engineers for the session

I have the opportunity to record each performance of the Champaign Urbana Symphony, one of two professional orchestras in residence at the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts. They perform regularly in the Foellinger Great Hall.

The view from the balcony - Foellinger Great Hall. Photo: Andy Krumeich

Ready to record the Champaign Urbana Symphony Orchestra in the Foellinger Great Hall Studio. Photo: Andy Krumeich

John Phillips Harpsichord in Follinger Great Hall, Krannert Center for the Performing Arts

On 01.04.10 and 01.04.10, I had the wonderful opportunity to assist engineer Jon Schoenoff in recording harpsichordist Charlotte Mattax performing several suites of baroque comoser Pierre Fevrier for an upcoming release on Centaur Records.  The session took place in the Foellinger Great Hall of the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, my favorite space (for sentimental reasons in addition to sonic ones).  Keyboardist/Choral Conductor Kerry Heimann was present as producer.  Added to all that, Mattax performed on a beautiful new instrument by John Phillips of Berkeley, CA, which belongs to the University of Illinois School of Music.  Phillips was present to assist with production and with keeping the instrument in tune – a challenge given the extremely cold and dry weather (the instrument had to be moved in on the first day of recording).

Mics used:

• 3 Schoeps CMC6
• 1 Neumann U87

Techniques:

Two CMC6s were placed L and R, on high (~12′) Atlas iron-based stands.  A single CMC6 (wide cardioid) and the U87 were placed next to each other (giving two options for “main” mics) about 4′ high and about 5′ or 6′ in front of the instrument.