How To Record And Mix A World-Class Album For $40. to $50. an Hour:

Select a studio that owns the best, most versatile digital work station and is fully loaded with the finest plug-ins. Choose a place that owns a few carefully selected, expensive class-A tube and digital outboard units with amazing microphones. They will have integrated the best of digital and analog with a professionally designed room and will employ experienced engineers. Pick a studio that does not own or rent a large recording room that is seldom used.

YOU HAVE CHOSEN SILVERBIRCH PRODUCTIONS!

Footnote: You are really lowering your odds of getting world-class sound by considering a studio that has a project studio board with inexpensive pre-amps, low-end outboard gear/mics and less than 24 bit digital audio located in an untuned room. The engineers at these studios have usually learned on their own, without apprenticing at professional studios and have never been exposed to the working practices of award-winning engineers and producers. While some good recordings have been made at this class of studio, it is a rare occurrence!

A Silverbirch Overview

Our studio was designed around the following premise. The average pop album or demo only needs a large space and a lot of mics and inputs for a relatively short amount of time compared to the total recording/mixing time of most project; so, since the majority of time is used for recording only one or two people simultaneously, we have created a superb, cost-effective vocal/instrumental tracking and mixing studio.

We love the precision, speed, ease of use, good quality plug-ins, “digital tricks” and the clean, accurate sound of 24 bit digital but we also love the sound of great class-A outboard gear of both the tube and digital variety, and so our equipment selection reflects the best of both worlds. World class outboard gear is very expensive (two of our Manley units cost over $6.000. Cnd. each and our Weiss unit cost $10,000.) so, in order to keep our prices affordable, we only own a few of the best. However, we have more than enough to create world-class mixes. If there is any specific gear that you need that we don’t have, we have enough patch points to accommodate at least 6 more stereo outboard units should you wish to rent any more for your mix. In fact, we have access to a wide variety of modern and vintage gear at reasonable prices. Check out the sound of a mix through our new summing amplifier, the Dangerous 2-bus LT.

Our world-class recording chain, featuring Neumann U-87 mics, Manley or Milennia pre-amps, Manley and Requisite tube compressors, LavryGold 24 bit convertors interfacing with a Pro Tools | HD 2 Digital Audio Workstation (featuring an HD Core & 192 i/o) will provide a vocal recording equal to any world-class studio, even ones costing four to five times the price. For your bed tracks or any large ensemble work, we will set you up and supervise the recording at one of our affiliated studios. All other tracking can be done at Silverbirch.

If you have already tracked your album and would like to mix at Silverbirch, we have experience in transferring many multitrack mediums to Pro Tools. We have Alesis ADATs on premises and have access to Tascam DA-88s at very reasonable rates.

We also feature multi-effects and DSP from Massenburg, Sony Oxford , Waves, Bomb Factory, Digidesign, McDSP, Aphex and T.C. Electronic; Digital mixer by Pro Tools with an E-magic Control Surface; Monitors from Lipinsky, Genelec, Yamaha and Aurotone, MIDI from Logic, Notator (yes we have an Atari!) and Yamaha; and convertors by Lavry digital routing by Z-Systems; vintage Martin D18 acoustic guitar and much more, of course! For more information please see our equipment list.

When chosing a studio, never, ever underestimate the importance of an engineer. We offer the services of experienced engineers who are always focussed on how to get the best sound for your project. See the personnel link for more information. The engineer’s fee is always included in our studio rate.

Full Studio Brochure

Recording Rates