#scott gusty christensen

[tobiasreber]

TM513 Photo Blog 3 - The Recording Session

I'm continuing this series (see here for Part 1 and Part 2) of photo posts with another treat, something which is also not covered in the documentary movie about the project: a couple of pictures and notes from the Todmorden 513 "studio" recording session, along with an account by one of our supporters who visited us as part of his PledgeCampaign reward. The recording took place on April 20, 2013 at Bunker Auditorium Golden, Colorado. First, click play and treat yourself to some music while you read!

Todmorden 513 (Concerto for Orchestra by Markus Reuter) by Colorado Chamber Orchestra / Thomas A. Blomster

Thomas checking out the acoustics of the room.

The view from the back of the venue.

Scott "Gusty" Christensen, the recording engineer, at work. Scott also provided one of the two mixes features on the CD/DVD package.

The view from my place after we finished setting up the microphones: as during the rehearsals, my job was to follow the score, writing down beginnings and endings of takes and taking notes for discussion with Markus and Thomas. Read a bit more about that over at Todmorden513.com in my TM513 diary entry for that day.

Our team of friends, facilitators and PledgeMusic campaign supporters who got to visit us as part of their pledge rewards and had flown in from such diverse places as Minneapolis MN, Austin TX and Boston MA - not to mention Markus and me travelling there from Germany and Switzerland, respectively.

Cedric Theys, frenchman living in Austin and founder of Mad Ducks Records, and me.

Cedric, who has since gone on to support Markus and the project in numerous ways, was kind enough to share a few memories from the recording session with us. Here's what he wrote me:

"Golden City CO. An unassuming small American city with a big arch with its name at the entrance. I got there a bit late the day of the recording as I was staying at a friend's place about an hour away and every day thus far had been extremely exhilarating. Seeing consummate professionals doing what they love to the highest caliber possible with very little financial means to do it: Markus, Thomas, Tobias, Jack and of course the whole chamber orchestra.

The day of the recording was yet another lesson on what can be done by sheer will. And lots of work! The orchestra went straight through recording for a good 3 to 4 hours. Stamina, perfection and feel. Nobody complained and everybody played at their highest. Markus and Tobias were very focused; I could see it in their eyes. Thomas was on stage so I didn't see him close but I'm sure he was the same. And relaxed! Got to be when conducting such a big group on such a difficult and new piece.

And I got to see the score for the first time: huge but very clear and I actually understood what was going on for each instrument and in general, even though I've got no formal training and my music reading skills are very limited.

Helped with clean up afterwards, getting the chairs, mics and cables back in place. We then went to lunch and I left for the airport to get back home after three days in Denver. Took a few days to land back into "reality" after getting a glimpse of what we as humans are capable of accomplishing. If we only tried, the world would be such a different place."

And, finally, here's the arch that Cedric mentioned: Golden, CO - Where the Western Contemporary Classical Music lives.*

*You can't see it at that image size but below the arch it says "Where the West lives" - not an opportunity for goofing around that I can pass up!

Thanks as always for stopping by. I may or may not write a fourth post in the series if I can gather enough useful material. If you want to keep up with new blog entries I suggest you subscribe to the RSS feed by clicking here - that way you'll get each new post delivered straight to your feed reader.