Casting Now : Reality Show For Aspiring Male Country Artists Age 14 to 20
Posted: October 31, 2013 Filed under: Music Industry News, Songwriting and Career Promotion | Tags: casting, country artists, Jan Smith, Justin Bieber, Kimberly Perry, reality, show, The Band Perry, TV, Usher Leave a comment
Hit The Country Music Jackpot!
Jan Smith, vocal coach for The Band Perry’s Kimberly Perry, Usher, and Justin Bieber is part of a new reality TV show focused on discovering the next generation of country music talent.
If interested, upload your video to YouTube then e-mail the link to castingcall.bei@gmail.com
Please include your city of residence, age and all contact information.
https://twitter.com/gromsparadise/status/378240362109616128
https://twitter.com/FlyingTortilla/status/377973193249546240
Our New Plug Ins Will Take Your Recording To The Next Level!
Posted: October 31, 2013 Filed under: Pro Tools Software, Studio Equipment | Tags: SSL console, Waves Vocal Rider plugin 1 Comment
Nashville Trax Mixing Board Shot
This Solid State Logic plug is $300 retail but well worth every penny; it sounds just like a channel pulled from an SSL 4000 E Series console. There is no way anyone, including a seasoned Nashville studio engineer, could tell the difference in a blind A-B comparison. The richness is there, the clarity, the punch…love it! It’s an awesome addition to our studio that will bring quality up several notches:
SSL 4000 E Series Channel Strip plug-in
And here’s a cropped pic of our new Waves Vocal Rider plugin:
Waves Vocal Rider
Man, does this take a load off. Until now I didn’t make it a practice to ride the vocal fader manually on demos, it was too tedious and the budget isn’t there for that degree of manual labor on a demo mix. Only master mixes with inherently higher budgets received that level of attention to detail.
This SSL vocal fader plug will change that. Less than 60 seconds of setting levels and it rides a vocal automatically, pre-reading the vocal signal, comparing it to the mix level, then adjusting the vocal setting in real time to compensate for the music/vocal variations and keep the vocal in your face at all times. Awesome! Awesome, AWESOME! Why NOT start using it on demos too?
But guess what? We purchased the version for bass guitar too!
Here’s a studio screen shot of our Bass Rider in action on a mix:
Pro Tools HD2 Bass Rider Software
And Max Bass? Got it! In the Max Bass window, the green area on the left is the original bass signal, the green line slanting left shows where the frequency of the original signal cuts off and the brown area to the right shows the frequencies generated by Max Bass, psycho-acoustically creating a huge bass sound that seems to eminate from everywhere, rather than from the fixed point of the stereo speakers.
Studio Shot of Max Bass for Pro Tools HD
Combine the Max bass, Waves Bass Rider and Vocal Rider and you have the foundation of one fantastic mix!- b.e.
The Freemans : Voice In The Desert CD
Posted: October 31, 2013 Filed under: Christian, Music Industry News, Song Pitch Opportunity | Tags: Hendersonville, The Freemans, The Isaacs, The Oak Ridge Boys, TN, Voice In The Desert CD Leave a comment
Freemans Voice In The Desert CD
The Freemans are just one of the big name Southern Gospel groups that call Hendersonville, TN home base, H-ville is about a 15 minute drive north of Nashville. The Oak Ridge Boys, The Isaacs and others do the same, as well as several top nationally known bluegrass groups. I’m not sure why there’s such a concentration in such a small area, obviously the proximity to Nashville plays a part but there are probably historical and family connections as well.
I met Darryl Freeman and his son, Caylon, the drummer in the band, for the first time about 8 weeks ago. They gave me a free copy of their newly released Voice In The Desert CD which I’ve since listened to several times and found to be super.
Reading the liner notes I noticed they didn’t write their own music on the CD so that might be a pitch opportunity for you if you have something that’s dead on target for their next project. I highly recommend you purchase their VITD album and listen thoroughly beforehand, just because you wrote a song that mentions Jesus it doesn’t mean it will fit their style- b.e.
Study Claims Increased Ability To Hear Pitch In Adults On Valproate
Posted: October 28, 2013 Filed under: Music Industry News | Tags: absolute pitch, hear pitch better with Valproate, relative pitch Leave a comment
Fiddle Tracks Online: Click through and listen to musicians play with perfect pitch!
Adults can learn to play an instrument, but many previous studies have demonstrated that certain synapses in the brain close by age twelve and eliminate the possibility of developing into a world class musician.
It is also been an accepted fact that while the ability to hear relative pitch may be improved with practice in some adults, if the ability to hear absolute pitch hasn’t been acquired by age three or four up to, at the latest, age nine, it’s no longer possible. Here’s just one of many examples of why this matters: a fiddle doesn’t have frets so a player with the ability to hear absolute pitch has a huge advantage.
Now comes research, The Valproate Study On Pitch claiming taking Valproate can permit an adult to greatly improve their ability to recognize absolute pitch:
So is this a great breakthrough or will we soon hear the usual: “Want perfect pitch? Take Valproate, but by the way “side effects include hair loss, incontinance, increased risk of cancer, five weeks after starting treatment you may grow an extra head…..”
Verse Chorus Form
Posted: October 21, 2013 Filed under: Songwriting Tips | Tags: Holy Spirit by Jesus Culture, songwriting, The chorus is the high point, Verse Chorus Form Leave a comment
Acoustic Guitar Sound Hole and Strings
A good example of this form at work in today’s music is Holy Spirit by Jesus Culture: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBifjXFA-W4
As you see the verses usually have the same number of lines, the lines are of the same length, while the words are dissimilar to each other. Each verse moves the song forward with new information.
But the chorus that appears after each verse or two typically is an exact repeat of the original chorus. In this case at 1:21 the first chorus begins with “Holy Spirit You Are Welcome Here…” and continues on for a total of four lines. After a brief musical Interlude the verse comes in at 2:00 with “I’ve tasted and seen…”
So the form of a simple verse chorus song is:
Verse, Chorus, Verse, Chorus, Verse, Chorus
To make it more interesting you can double up some sections: Verse, Verse, Chorus, Verse, Chorus, Verse, Chorus, Chorus
The chorus is the high point both musically and lyrically. It sums up the point and calls attention to itself. It should be distinct from the verse and that can be achieved by altering the note length.
A Bridge section that’s dissimilar to both chorus and verse can also be used.
Verse, Chorus, Verse, Chorus, Bridge, Verse, Chorus
Upgrading Pro Tools HD 7, HD 8, HD, 9, 10 or HD 11 : Gear Glut Alert!
Posted: October 19, 2013 Filed under: Music Industry News, Pro Tools Software | Tags: 64 bit AAX, HD 10, HD 11, HD 8, HD 9, Leopard, Lion, Mac OS X, Mountain Lion, Pro Tools HD 7, Snow Leopard, Tiger Leave a comment
Aural Exciter Software for Pro Tools HD running on Snow Leopard
So a rather large monkey wrench has been tossed into the Nashville music machine recording engine! Avid has released Pro Tools HD 11 and it doesn’t play well at all with much of the the gear required to support earlier HD versions. Used Accel PCI and PCIe cards, digital converters and more are being dumped on the market as studio owners realize their gear is dated, and if they intend to move to 11, nearly worthless. Control 24 mixer control surfaces that cost about $8,000 new a couple years ago are not supported in PT 11 and are being offered as low as $2,250 on eBay, with few takers. I suspect it will be tough to get $600 for one in a year or two.
Almost all professional grade studios and most project studios in the Nashville area use Pro Tools HD (Or HD2 or HD3) software. Home studios and others may run Cubase, Logic or regular Pro Tools but Pro Tools HD is king in dedicated pro studios. On my last project I worked in three different studios around the area. Because my home base, Nashville Trax runs Pro Tools HD2 and the others run HD too, it was easy to interface with the other two studios by transporting the music files on portable hard drives. No individual file consolidation necessary, just click on the PT session file icon and the song session opens, ready to go, sweet!
HD is far more expensive than regular PT because it’s more robust and has more features. The initial software cost alone is $6,000 to $11,000 more than the $300 to $600 regular Pro Tools costs. Plus you need expensive hardware too, each piece costing in the multiple thousands. Now most studios that move to 11 will upgrade from an earlier PT HD version so the pain of acquisition will be greatly mitigated, but it still isn’t cheap. For example, going from 7 to 11 is a $2,500 jump.
The big problem, and I heard this from several fellow studio owners, then confirmed it on Avid’s website, is that PT HD 11 supports no plug-ins (for quality reverb, EQ, compression, etc.) from earlier versions. If you’ve invested in $50K of extra plugs and you’re running HD10 you either stay with 10 or try to sell the plugs while you can, usually for pennies on the dollar. But a lot of engineers swear by their favorite plugs and won’t give them up without a fight. Many plugs don’t even have comparable 64 bit AAX versions that will work in 11 yet.
“I can’t afford to move up; I have way too much invested in plug-ins.” one owner confided.
“Avid has ticked off a lot of people in this town with 11 and lost some customers,” said a session musician.
I suspect there will be much kicking, screaming and gnashing of teeth, but most studios will eventually cross the bridge to 11. Nashville is a world class recording environment and PT HD is still the best thing on the planet.
So a lot of studios that ran early PT versions for years are taking advantage of the used gear glut and upgrading to a higher level of HD or moving from PT to PT HD. But that can be a nightmare because the operating system on the studio’s Mac (Pro Tools HD runs better on a Mac so few serious studios use PCs/Windows) must match up with the version you’re upgrading to.
To help fellow up graders out I thought I’d post some useful info:
To upgrade to HD7 you’ll need to run the Mac Tiger operating system 10.4.2 through 10.4.8. The old G5s often had it as well as Mac Pros. Beware of purchasing one of the short-run Intel Mac Pros from around 2006 unless you get the original disc or unless the Tiger version your upgrade requires is already on it. The Tiger OS X disks for the Intel machines were machine-specific. Otherwise, there are lots of retail Tiger versions for Power Macs and G5’s.
There’s little difference between PT HD 8 or HD 9 and 8HD licenses are dirt cheap. But if you can afford to jump to 10, do so, a lot of pro studios will be hanging at 10 for at least another year or two, some for good.
Also, check out the limit your computer will upgrade to! If you’re trying to jump from Tiger 10.4 to Mt. Lion 10.8 it’s not likely to happen.
HD 8 requires Mac OS X Leopard 10.8.0 to 10.5.8
HD 9 is Snow Leopard 10.6.2 to 10.6.8
HD 10 is 10.6.7 Snow Leopard to 10.7.4 Lion
HD 11 requires Mountain Lion.
Be careful, I’m talking about software. If you purchase any of those cats you should NOT hear a GRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!! If so, forget exchanging it, run for your life : ) b.e. watson
Do you produce music at home or in a commercial studio? Did you realize how inexpensive and EASY it is to get a Nashville session quality player on your projects? Yes, make your project better or even make a profit! Tell your country music clients you have Nashville quality pedal steel guitar and fiddle tracks available and they’ll sell themselves! Add a markup and voila, easy money in your pocket! Or how about saxophone? Harmonica? piano? Bass guitar? Acoustic? Electric? Mandolin? Vocals? You name it, we can probably do it?
Posted: October 17, 2013 Filed under: Music Industry News, Songwriting and Career Promotion | Tags: Nashville songwriting, The Music City Songwriting Competition Leave a comment
The Music City Songwriting Competition is accepting entries in just about any genre or category imaginable. No instrumentals though.
Entry fee is $30. A pro demo isn’t necessary to enter but considering many entrants will be from cogs in the the Nashville songwriting machine who always do great demos; it’s questionable if you’ll win without one, we believe it’s a very good idea.
Click through the link for more information.
Music publishers Looking for Songs for Carly Pearce and Kenny Chesney
Posted: October 3, 2013 Filed under: Song Pitch Opportunity | Tags: Carly Pearce, Kenny Chesney, Music Publishers Looking for Demos, Music publishers Looking for Songs, Paul Worley, Sony Nashville Leave a comment
Sony Music Publishing, Nashville
Speaking of Sony Nashville, word has it that producer Paul Worley is looking for songs for a new artist, Carly Pearce. Meanwhile, also for Sony, producer Buddy Cannon needs tunes for Kenny Chesney by late October.
But do not try to submit directly to the producers or the label, they don’t accept unsolicited materials, won’t accept phone calls from songwriters, etc. The best route onto one of these projects is by getting your song professionally demoed and signed to a song publisher who has a relationship with the label.
So what are you waiting for? Send your rough on an mp3 to nashtrax@bellsouth.net and ask for a quote.
There are also independent music publishers looking for songs that fit these two projects. File this under Music Publishers Looking for Demos.
If you’re sure you already have a demo that absolutely, positively meets industry standards (pro session quality musicians, pro singer, professionally mixed, nothing semi-pro or home quality about it) you can submit .wav files via Hightail.com or e-mail MP3, MP4, AAC, or AIFF files (1 type of file per song! 2 song max) to music publisher Michael Bright of Bright Songs Publishing at brightmusic3501@gmail.com.
Sony Music Hires New A & R Director
Posted: October 2, 2013 Filed under: Music Industry News | Tags: Arista, Columbia, RCA, sony, Sony Music Nashville, Taylor Lindsey Leave a commentSony Music Publishing, Nashville
A new A&R Director has been hired for Sony Music Nashville. Taylor Lindsey. Her duties will also include A&R for the Nashville branches of Columbia, Arista and RCA.
Basket Case: A Nashville Session Player Band
Posted: October 2, 2013 Filed under: Nashville Session Musicians, Samples of Our Work, Session Player Stories | Tags: Basket Case, Bill Watson, David Northrup, Jon Smith, Kristen McNamara, Rodney Ingle, Steve King, The White Coat Band, Tigar Bell, tom wild Leave a comment
Basket Case
Basket Case at 3rd & Lindsley, Left to Rt: Steve King (keyboard); Holly Steele (background vocals); Rodney Ingle (background vocals); Tom Wild (guitar); Kristen McNamara (lead vocals); Bill Watson (bass guitar/bandleader); Tigar Bell (fiddle) ; John Heinrick, (sax). Background: David Northrup, (drums).
I received the first e-mail from songwriter Jon Smith back in my short hair days, 2005 I believe, saying he was disappointed with the work he’d received on his songs at several other Nashville studios and asking that 5 songs be produced for him at a budget far higher than any I’d experienced up to that point. The previous attempts to record his songs were interesting and the musicians competent, Jon said, but the music was flat, bland. There was no magic that he was sure was there.
We found it.
That initial e-mail led to multiple sessions totaling over 80 songs, a friendship, lots of rehearsals at S.I.R, and Soundcheck Nashville, a CD release, two videos and this live band that played Jon Smith tunes at venues in the greater Nashville area. What great fun it was!
Over the years of producing those sessions I used a lot of different top Nashville session players, excellent musicians all, but when Jon asked that a band be assembled so he could hear his songs performed live, I chose the ones I considered not just great musicians and singers, but also friends.
And my friends came through big time, the band sounded fantastic!
We initially resisted Jon’s suggestion that the male members wear white coats, but it turned out to be simply one more stroke of Jon genius. We only did a few gigs but quickly became known as “the white coat band” and it was memorable enough people still mention it occasionally, always referencing the white coats.
Here’s a swingin’ little tune that always made the setlist:
My Tears Are Puttin’ Out Your Fire is © 2007 Jon Smith. Co-writers: Jon Smith/Bill Watson, produced by Bill Watson. Used by permission.
That’s the studio version of MTAPOYF I produced in ’07 using mostly the same band pictured above.
Jon’s work was where I learned how to use horns effectively as opposed to creating a train wreck. Arranging, doubling, combining different horns together, stabs, swells, stacked horn tracks… if you have a tune you need sax, trumpet, clarinet or trombone on, or any combination of them, you’re at the right place! Send out an e-mail to nashtrax@bellsouth.net and ask for a quote!
I have the vids around of the band yet too and when I get around to it, will post some footage- b.e.
Left: David Northrup drums, Bill Watson Bass Guitar. No wonder the band was called Basket Case. Two prime examples for sure!
BMG Chrysalis signs Wynn Varble
Posted: October 1, 2013 Filed under: Client News, Music Industry News | Tags: BMG Chrysalis, Wynn Varble Leave a comment
On September 26th, 2013, Wynn Varble signed with BMG Chrysalis Nashville as an addition to their songwriter roster.
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