The day after the Millennium Park concert, Third Coast went into the recording studio to, as the kids say, "lay down some tracks." We did this at
Experimental Sound Studios on Chicago's north side, a not-for-profit recording studio dedicated specifically to innovative new music. They have a cool gallery in the entry way, featuring the crazy crutch-art pictured above.
This was our first experience recording in a studio environment, rather than a concert hall environment. It gave us the chance to control the sound on a more detailed level. We recorded Cage's
Third Construction, which involves a really wide variety of instruments that we could now mic in different ways to make sure they all come through the way we want.
This was our big chance to work in cubicles also, a privilege we rarely know as musicians...
(Interlude: Dave's iPhone gets no service in or near ESS. See the sadness in his eyes... poor Dave.)
Once we finished the Cage (in 35 takes-- we all felt pretty strongly about the options we'll have to choose from in editing), we re-set the room for Rob and David to record the Manoury marimba duo. Despite the multiple performances of this piece we now have under our belt, this is a pretty nerve-wracking one to record. It's hard to play 'perfectly' so it's just a question of getting a take that you feel like has all the most important elements in place.
Clay and Peter were in the control room with the recording engineer, bringing attention to all the mistakes we made, and counting up all of our takes (101 in all... yoiks).
"yeah, so someone missed one of those E-flats that time, and the 3rd note wasn't really together... take 79... measures 3 and 4.... we're rolling."
A long day, for sure, but we're pretty optimistic about the recordings we got. We'll be going back to ESS shortly to do editing and such, and are planning to release the recordings of these 2 pieces online as soon as we can. They'll also go on our next CD, hopefully to be completed over the next year. Keep your eyes peeled!