Holly Taylor

Music Recording Session

A typical music recording session lasts all day, starting early in the morning and ending late at night. They do not have a set outline for how they work, each different artist and genre vary how each session works. Some artist may start of with a beat/rhythm or maybe with lyrics.

Although many people are involved in the process, they all serve their own individual purposes including;• Artist/Vocals• Sound Engineer• Producers• Band/Instrument Players• Songwriters – for the lyrics. Etc.

Equipment is also essential in creating a successful piece of music, including;• Microphones• Instruments• effects boxes• sound mixing boards• amplifiers etc.

A&R Department at a Record Label

A&R - Artists and Repertoire

Two Main Roles – Scouting and overseeing development of artists.

Scouting:

This is the division of a record label in which scouts for new talent, therefore they are expected to be aware of the current market and able to find artists that will be commercially successful. Most A&R workers are typically young and musicians or producers, as they are more fitting for the role. To find new and promising artists, the scouts will attend gigs, search social media and more, in order to find the best new talent.

Overseeing the development:

Once an artist has been found and signed, A&R will choose which producer, engineer and studio an artist will use, and will decide which of your songs are most likely to produce the most money. For example; If you’re a great performer but don’t write your own songs, they could be in charge of finding the right material for you to perform. Once a record is complete, the responsibility of the A&R department is to get retail sales outlets and radio excited about an artist. It’s a fiercely competitive industry and artists have an increasingly short shelf-life, so it’s become more and more common for A&R people to want artists to have an existing, sizeable following before they sign them up (such as Ed Sheeran).

Deals between a record label and an artist – The Past

In the past the relationship between a record label and an musician was very different to how it is today. Independent and self established successful artists were not common and very rare, instead most heard of artists were signed to a record label.

The most common type of deal that would be signed with artists, would be too pay the artist a sum of money as an ‘advance’, to record material, and specify how much the artist would have to sell before that advance would be paid off – then the artist would start to get a cut of the profits (averaging 15%).

The large corporations provided; recording facilities, a large fund, plan tours, networks to distribute etc..

Popular services such as iTunes and Spotify didn’t exist, so the labels would have the records and cd’s physically manufactured, and use its distribution and marketing network to get the product into record shops. Promotion and publicity was generated via radio, TV, magazines etc. These mediums are still used today, but now internet is highly used compared to when it wasn't even available.

The Gorillaz; The Fall.A well known, British, virtual band, The Gorillaz recorded their entire 4th

album on an Ipad.

Co Founder Albarn said of the recording: "I literally made it on the road. I didn't write it before, I didn't prepare it. I just did it day by day as a kind of diary of my experience in America. If I left it until the New Year to release it then the cynics out there would say, 'Oh well, it's been tampered with', but if I put it out now they'd know that I haven't done anything because I've been on tour ever since.”

Number of Apps used include;

Speak It! Text to Speech / SoundyThingie / Mugician / Sylo Synthesiser, SyloSynthesiser Pro / Synth / FunkBox Drum Machine / gliss / AmpliTube for iPad / XENON Groove Synthesizer / KORG iELECTRIBE / bs-16i / Mellotronics M3000 for iPad / Cleartune – Chromatic Tuner / iORGEL HD / olsynth / StudioMini XL Recording Studio / Bassline / Harmonizer / Dub Siren Pro / Moog Filtatron

360 Degree Contract – Where did it originate from?

Due to piracy/illegal downloading, record sales began to drop so labels decided to venture other contracts and ways of generating income.

Record Labels noticed how artists and celebrities were making money from outside the sales of their albums, through tours, merchandise, TV etc. At the time most record companies did not take money from these other methods and supplements, normally be sorted by managers of the artists. But due to their success they decided to construct a new contract which covered more then just recording. They wanted a piece of all the artists incomes.

Revenue including –

• Music Sales

• Publishing

• Touring

• Merchandise

• Endorsements

• TV/Movie Deals (appearances)

• Books

• Other

Artists who are signed with 360 deals, include;• Madonna – Live Nation• Robbie Williams - EMI