Home Recording Studio Benefits

Home Recording Studios have been on the increase and will most likely continue to increase in popularity. I recorded my first CD Sound of the White Phoenix in Japan where I built up my own home recording studio. Of course there are plusses and minuses to doing it at home, but overall I was happy with the outcome.

Japanese traditional music in general has proven to be quite difficult to record. The instruments are much better suited as a type of chamber music, which won't necessarily fill a large hall. Particular detail to intonation and tone color are often difficult for a microphone to pick up. The space in which the music performed also greatly affects the way we hear and feel the music.

For my first solo CD I used Sony's digital recorder. It has built in mics and everything you really could need at a competitve price with professional equiptment.

It is a little more expensize than some other makers like Edirol, but in my experience SONY beats most other brands in this price range.

I recorded most of my one-on-one lessons with my teacher in Japan on an Olympus mp3 digital recorder. I used this one:

I found this product to have a great sound quality, especially when I added on a small microphone. Even when I forgot the mic the built in mics did their job.

When I began recording my first solo CD I thought it would be quite easy, given that I lived in a fairly rural area of Nara, away from the city traffic. Little did I realize that those nature sounds of crickets and frogs, and the occasional plane swooping over, really do get picked up on a recording. I like the idea of a soundscape with ambient nature sounds, but I think they should also be professionally recorded and mixed. I came across this inexpensive sound proofing guide (Click Here! ) which I was able to easily follow and I built up one room of my house. After I added in the sound proofing I restarted the recording process and the overall project was quite successful. It's a do-it-yourself guide, but there are so many inexpensive and uncomplicated ways to sound proof your home studio that I saved a lot of money in the long run.

For my second solo CD MahorobaI had a team of recording engineers in a professional studio at Osaka Arts University. They were all also familiar with the intricacies of recording the shakuhachi and the best possible mic angles, distances etc. But I still continue to use the home recording studio as a base for larger studio work. Click Here! for an easy great guide to home recording.

With the price of equipment going down and the quality of digital technology going up, more and more musicians are recording very respectable music from home. I also like the idea of not having to pay for hourly studio time as well being able to record any time of the day whenever I feel like it. I use a Mac, but if you are not computer savvy you can still record it yourself and have someone else master and edit it.

Sound Proofing Guide
A Blueprint to Easy, Professional Home Recording
Mahoroba CD
Sound of the White Phoenix CD
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