The Art of Record Production: An Introductory Reader for a New Academic Field

324 Pages·2012·2.1 MB·English

by  Simon Frith

The Art of Record Production
An Introductory Reader for a
New Academic Field
Edited by
Simon Frith and Simon Zagorski-Thomas
The ArT of record ProducTion
For Jan Fairley (1949–2012)
The Art of record Production
An introductory reader for a new Academic field
Edited by
Simon friTh
Edinburgh University, UK
Simon ZAgorSki-ThomAS
London College of Music, University of London, UK
© Simon frith, Simon Zagorski-Thomas and the contributors 2012
All rights reserved. no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher.
Simon frith and Simon Zagorski-Thomas have asserted their right under the copyright,
Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the editors of this work.
Published by
Ashgate Publishing Limited Ashgate Publishing company
Wey court east Suite 420
union road 101 cherry Street
farnham Burlington
Surrey, gu9 7PT VT 05401-4405
england uSA
www.ashgate.com
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
The art of record production : an introductory reader for a
new academic field. – (Ashgate popular and folk music series)
1. Sound – recording and reproducing. 2. Sound – recording
and reproducing – case studies.
i. Series ii. frith, Simon, 1946– iii. Zagorski-Thomas,
Simon.
781.4’9–dc23

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The art of record production : an introductory reader for a new academic
field / edited by Simon Frith and Simon Zagorski-Thomas.
p. cm. — (Ashgate popular and folk music series)
includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4094-0562-7 (hardcover) — ISBN 978-1-4094-0678-5
(pbk) 1. Popular music—Production and direction. 2. Sound
recordings—Production and direction. i. frith, Simon, 1946–
ii. Zagorski-Thomas, Simon.
mL3470.A77 2012
781.49—dc23
2012001679
ISBN 9781409405627 (hbk)
ISBN 9781409406785 (pbk)
ISBN 9781409449331 (ebk)
V
Printed and bound in great Britain by the
mPg Books group, uk.
Contents
General Editor’s Preface vii
List of Figures and Music Examples ix
List of Tables xi
List of Contributors xiii
Acknowledgements xxi
1 Introduction 1
Simon Frith and Simon Zagorski-Thomas
PART I HIsToRIcAl APPRoAcHes
2 The Lacquer Disc for Immediate Playback: Professional
Recording and Home Recording from the 1920s to the 1950s 13
George Brock-Nannestad
3 The Sounds of Space: Studio as Instrument in the Era of
High Fidelity 29
Susan Schmidt Horning
4 No-Fi: Crafting a Language of Recorded Music in 1950s Pop 43
Albin Zak III
5 The US vs the UK Sound: Meaning in Music Production
in the 1970s 57
Simon Zagorski-Thomas
6 The End of the World as We Know It: The Changing Role of
the Studio in the Age of the Internet 77
Paul Théberge
Interlude 1: Comments and Commentaries by Industry Professionals
and Producers 91
PART II THeoReTIcAl APPRoAcHes
7 Beyond a Musicology of Production 99
Allan Moore
vi THE ArT oF rECord ProduCTIoN
8 ‘I’m Not Hearing What You’re Hearing’: The Conflict and
Connection of Headphone Mixes and Multiple Audioscapes 113
Alan Williams
9 The Self-Effacing Producer: Absence Summons Presence 129
Michael Jarrett
10 Rethinking Creativity: Record Production and the Systems
Model 149
Phillip McIntyre
11 Considering Space in Recorded Music 163
William Moylan
Interlude 2: Comments and Commentaries by Industry
Professionals and Producers 189
PART III cAse sTudIes
12 Simulating the Ideal Performance: Suvi Raj Grubb and
Classical Music Production 195
Andrew Blake
13 The Place of the Producer in the Discourse of Rock 207
Simon Frith
14 The Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds and the Musicology of Record
Production 223
Jan Butler
15 Tubby’s Dub Style: The Live Art of Record Production 235
Sean Williams
16 Recording the Revolution: 50 Years of Music Studios in
Revolutionary Cuba 247
Jan Fairley and Alexandrine Boudreault-Fournier
Interlude 3: Comments and Commentaries by Industry
Professionals and Producers 269
Afterword 277
Bibliography 279
Index 295
General Editor’s Preface
The upheaval that occurred in musicology during the last two decades of the
twentieth century has created a new urgency for the study of popular music
alongside the development of new critical and theoretical models. A relativistic
outlook has replaced the universal perspective of modernism (the international
ambitions of the 12-note style); the grand narrative of the evolution and dissolution
of tonality has been challenged, and emphasis has shifted to cultural context,
reception and subject position. Together, these have conspired to eat away at the
status of canonical composers and categories of high and low in music. A need has
arisen, also, to recognize and address the emergence of crossovers, mixed and new
genres, to engage in debates concerning the vexed problem of what constitutes
authenticity in music and to offer a critique of musical practice as the product of
free, individual expression.
Popular musicology is now a vital and exciting area of scholarship, and the
Ashgate Popular and Folk Music Series presents some of the best research in
the field. Authors are concerned with locating musical practices, values and
meanings in cultural context, and draw upon methodologies and theories developed
in cultural studies, semiotics, poststructuralism, psychology and sociology.
The series focuses on popular musics of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.
It is designed to embrace the world’s popular musics from Acid Jazz to Zydeco,
whether high tech or low tech, commercial or non-commercial, contemporary
or traditional.
Professor Derek B. Scott
Professor of Critical Musicology
University of Leeds
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List of Figures and Music Examples
Figures
2.1 Home recording machine in the family environment 14
2.2 Two common types of recording machine 19
2.3 Comparison of cellulose and wax logistics (1938 EMI. From an
original in the EMI Archives) 26
5.1 Spectrograms of UK and US recordings of ‘Behind Blue Eyes’
by The Who (1971) 64
5.2 Spectrograms of UK and US recordings of tracks from
Sticky Fingers by The Rolling Stones (1970–1971) 65
10.1 Csikszentmihalyi’s system model of creativity 152
11.1 Spatial dimensions of the overall sound 165
11.2 Individual sound sources placed on a sound stage 166
11.3 Stereo sound stage with distance designations 169
11.4 Surround sound stage with distance circles 170
11.5 ‘A Day in the Life’ from Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,
stereo sound location graph, measures 1–34 171
11.6 Sound source locations, beginning through verse 1 of
‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps,’ LOVE version 174
11.7 Sound source locations, first chorus of ‘While My Guitar
Gently Weeps,’ LOVE version 174
11.8 Sound source locations, beginning through verse 1 of ‘While
My Guitar Gently Weeps,’ White Album version 175
11.9 Surround image placements from ‘Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’
(Yellow Submarine, 1999) 185
11.10 Surround sound mix of ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’
from LOVE, measures 1–24 186
11.11 Surround sound mix of ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’
from LOVE, measures 57–72 187
16.1 Kiki in his bedroom studio, Santiago de Cuba, photo by Alexandrine
Boudreault-Fournier 263