Analog Tape Listening Seminar at Electrical Audio

Hey Recordists,
I am not sure where this should be posted, but I will be running a workshop illustrating the way analog tape recording sounds at different levels, biases, speeds, and eq standards at Electrical Audio in Chicago (March 5th).  This might be old hat to you seasoned engineers out there, but most people haven't had the opportunity to compare these formats back to back. 
The recordings will be done on a perfectly working Studer 24 track (A820MCH), in a fully functional studio (A). 
If you are interested, there is a full description of the workshop, and registration here.  The ticket pays for the day of studio time and a fresh 2" reel of ATR tape.
Let me know if you have any questions.

Hi Greg,
If I was in Chicago, I'd probably do this.  This sounds very interesting.  If you do make a reference CD, I'd be very curious to hear the differences.  Thanks for doing this!
Take care,
Joel

Marvin, Jackie, and Greg, wish I could make it, I bet there will be some sweet sounds going down. However I'm on the Night Shift and start at 3pm. If it goes through I would love to get a copy of the CD...do AES folks know about this?

Mbira said:

Hi Greg,
If I was in Chicago, I'd probably do this.  This sounds very interesting.  If you do make a reference CD, I'd be very curious to hear the differences.  Thanks for doing this!
Take care,
Joel

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I might make a higher resolution digital copy of the mixes, then host it somewhere.  I think the failure of a lot of AB tests I have seen in the past is when people dump the recordings into a DAW for a quick comparison, or worse, CD.  Some of the differences in the formats are subtle, and I would hate for them to be confused with the quality of the digital copy.  The value of this is hearing things as they come directly off the tape in a studio control room environment.  It is also good to hear the band as they are tracking to know what it sounded like going into the machine. 

Hey folks, I'd highly recommend this to any Chicagoans or have-wheels-to-get-to-chicago-ans.
I attended Greg's seminar in Montreal and I thought it was top notch.
The guy really knows his stuff. One of the really practical things I got out of it was knowing exactly what to listen for if you want to scrutinize the record bias. he really goes beyond what you'll find in the manual or hear from random internet pontificators.

shabtek said:

Marvin, Jackie, and Greg, wish I could make it, I bet there will be some sweet sounds going down. However I'm on the Night Shift and start at 3pm. If it goes through I would love to get a copy of the CD...do AES folks know about this?

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I'm not part of AES.  I should be right?  I like reading and technology.  For some reason, it has passed me by. 
I would be happy to do it again if there are enough people interested.  I tried to keep the group small enough so that people would be as involved as possible. 
Greg

I'm an AES member and I recommend it to anyone who's seriously into audio technology. That reminds me, I need to renew today!

Seminar is full now.  I will look into starting a "campaign" for a Saturday event for people who need to travel.

I was thinking of another workshop based on destroying a ribbon mic.  We would start with two freshly re-ribboned Coles 4038s, then stress one out over the course of mic'ing things people normally do to show the degradation of the ribbon and its sound (compared to the untouched one).  We could then finally show how easy it is to "blow" it.  The more important lesson would be that there are stages of degradation that make the mic shitty without completely failing.  It isn't as binary as mic works/ribbon blown. 
The tickets can pay for the cost of a new ribbon. 
Sound interesting to anyone?

Greg Norman said:

I was thinking of another workshop based on destroying a ribbon mic.  We would start with two freshly re-ribboned Coles 4038s, then stress one out over the course of mic'ing things people normally do to show the degradation of the ribbon and its sound (compared to the untouched one).  We could then finally show how easy it is to "blow" it.  The more important lesson would be that there are stages of degradation that make the mic shitty without completely failing.  It isn't as binary as mic works/ribbon blown. 
The tickets can pay for the cost of a new ribbon. 
Sound interesting to anyone?

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Sadly the car pool from Africa would be a bitch! But I think it is GREAT workshop concept and would love to see/hear it, maybe you could film some of these and make them available at a cost to us?

I got to attend Greg's workshop at Potluck Con... was great, esp. his comment about dissecting cats with screwdrivers... bizarre...  apparently they taped that workshop and it was going to be hosted on-line somewhere but never did take down the URL... bummer...

Cheers

Matt