On the radion, playing live and learning to record

Added on Friday 8 May 2009

I had a busy but enjoyable weekend playing music; on Saturday I chatted and played on Alex Jenkins Celtic Music Radio show, which was part of an outside broadcast from the Whiskey Bar Oran Mor in Glasgow's West End. It was a really fun show. And because the Celtic Music Radio people were so friendly I felt very relaxed myself, which meant I did more chatting than singing. The show has been added to the 'Listen again' function of the Celtic Music Radio website; go have a listen it's quite entertaining: Jim Byrne on Celtic Music Radio.

You will have to excuse my croaking voice; we had been getting work done in the house and the dust had got to my delicate chest and lungs. The croak gave my voice a bit of character - though I found it very hard to sing; unfortunately I did sing a bit out of tune on The handles broken.

Pat and my mum came along to provide support - though it was difficult to hear much from within the pub itself - unless you had a radio. :-)

Playing at the Butterfly and Pig

Here's me in Oran Mor on Celtic Music Radio

On Saturday I was invited along to chat and play as part of Celtic Music Radio May day celebrations. The show has now been posted on the 'Listen again' feature.

You will have to excuse my croaking voice; we had been getting work done in the house and the dust had got to my delicate chest and lungs. The croak gave my voice a bit of character - though I found it very hard to sing; unfortunately I did sing a bit out of tune on The handles broken. The show is quite entertaining though - as there is a lot of chat.

On Celtic Music Radio live at Oran Mor

On Sunday I played a set at the Butterfly and Pig; mostly new songs that I'm recording for my next album - it was good to give them a public airing. The pub was very noisy, but I felt the songs went down well and I enjoyed playing a fresh set. There were friendly faces in the audience including the crowd from Celtic Music Radio (Ciaran Doris, Stepanie Greer, Paul Baird and Mary Kathleen Burke). Mary and Paul got up and played some songs; great singing and playing as usual; what a fantastic voice that girl has! Also nice to see Paul's expert guitar plucking for the first time; I hadn't realised he was such an accomplished player.

After the music myself, Pat and Mary had a good chin-wag about the music scene in Glasgow - and about the issue of musicians not getting payed to play - which had been highlighted by Vivien Scotson and discussed on Mary's show earlier in the evening. The discussion went on so long that we were the last out of the pub (after 1pm I think); an unusually late night for us; so today I'm completley knackered. Good to clear out the cobwebs though.

All the best,
Jim

Learning to record music at home

I've been spending some time trying to figure out how to record my songs at home; the idea being that I'll do the recording in my own time - them book a studio to get them mixed, by someone who knows what they are doing.

With this in mind I've bought myself some fancy new recording software called 'Logic studio' - which apparently is the software to have for Mac users (that's me).

Complicated stuff - this Logic. My first setback was discovering that I can't install it on my laptop because I don't have enough space on the hard disk; a full install is about the same size as the entire capacity of the disk! Hmmm ... wonder if that's an excuse for a new computer? Probably not.

Luckily I was able to install it on my iMac, so I've been playing with it over the last few days - and recorded a new song to help me figure out how it works. The first thing I've learned is that recording is the most 'jargon infested' subject I've ever come across - and it is also deeply complex (or is that just me?).

It's a far cry from recording into a cassette tape machine with a plastic microphone from an electrical store; which was the cutting edge for me when I used to visit my friend Derek to record our imaginary radio shows. I'm not sure what age I was then - probably about 12. Not sure if it armed me with enough experience for my latest attempts.

I'll post my first results on Myspace shortly.

All the best,
Jim p.s. Thanks to David Kusher for the mention on Spiral Earth: http://spiralearth.co.uk/news/story.asp?nid=2753

And later..

A little update to my previous post about recording music at home. So far I haven't really got anywhere, other than having learned some new words. The most important new word I've learned is 'latency'; here is a definition, "a synonym for delay, is an expression of how much time it takes for a packet of data to get from one designated point to another." (http://searchcio-midmarket.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid183_gci212456,00.html).

In practice this means I sing into the microphone and then there is a delay before I hear myself coming through the headphones; which gives me a headache and makes it impossible to sing along to the music. I'm a long-terms user of Apple computers - and a fan - but I think this is the first time I've actually been made depressed by a computer problem.

I couldn't find a solution in the manual or online - so I booked a slot with an Apple 'genius' at the Apple store in Glasgow. I'm just back. They couldn't sort it - though suggested a work-around. when I got up the road and tried it the work-around didn't work.

I'll keep you posted. So far it's bleedin' crap this home recording thing.

All the best,
Jim

Comments are now closed on this page