Want to be a recording engineer? Looking for a top recording school?
Confused about which recording schools would give you the best start?
Need to get a handle on your options for a recording engineer education?
Considering recording engineering as a profession or serious hobby?
Recording Engineer - Ghost Mixer Desk
This articles series will help save you time to find the best recording engineer options for you.
Don’t make the mistake I just made… I thought to myself:
“I’ll do a quick internet search on becoming a recording engineer, and easily find good advice on options for getting into the audio recording profession.”
Wrong!
I tried this just a couple of days ago. Yes it was easy to find course info. Too easy – I was swamped with details.
I tried searching on phrases like “recording engineer courses“, then changed torecording engineer training, recording engineer education, recording engineer schools. Then tried “sound engineer“, and finally “audio engineer“, again with all the variations. I used the main search engines – Google, Yahoo, and MSN.
What I found was long listings of individual recording engineering courses and various other training offers. A similar group of music recording schools showed up at the top of Google, Yahoo and MSN:
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RecordingConnection.com
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Cras.org
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audioinstitute.com
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soundmasterrecording.com
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audiomasterclass.com
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sae.edu
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oiart.org
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aes.org/education/
along with About.com (useful explanations of the recording process and what audio engineers) and Wikipedia, of course.
Drums
Talking about Wikipedia, they have a pretty clear explanation of the different aspects of sound-related engineering professions.
In summary, audio engineering includes recording sound, and reproducing sound (using some combination of mechanics and electronics)
It also draws on many disciplines such as
- acoustics
- psychoacoustics
- music
A recording engineer needs to be familiar with design, installation and operation of equipment for:
- sound recording
- sound reinforcement
- sound broadcasting
In a recording studio, the recording engineer is the person responsible for
- recording
- editing
- manipulating
- mixing
- mastering
…sound, by technical means in order to realize an artist’s or record producer’s creative vision.
Working mostly in music production, an audio engineer may deal with sound for a wide range of applications:
- post-production for video and film
- live sound reinforcement
- advertising
- multimedia
- broadcasting
Acoustical Engineering, on the other hand…relies heavily on
- physics and mathematics of sound waves
- sound wave propagation
- deals with
- noise control
- acoustical design
Amy - Recording Vocals
Back to my course findings:
These covered music producing schools and courses from product-specific operation, to advanced post-graduate research.
The problem was:
How could I tell if they are any good?
And more importantly, how do I know if they are any good – for me?
I spotted nothing that put things in perspective and helped me short list the options best suited to my needs. Or even helped me sort out what my “needs” were in the first place. (Turns out the info was there. It was just lost among all the noise.)
Eventually, I decided to find out what the main industry associations were for a Recording Engineer:
(obvious, with hind-sight!)
- Audio Engineering Society (AES)
- Recording Industry of America Association (RIAA)
- National Academy or Recording Arts and Sciences (NARAS)
- Society of Professional Audio Recording Services (SPARS)
- etc.
and that’s where I discovered good solid advice, and a suggested process on how to match my needs and aims to the kind of music technology or music engineering schools available.
I did find useful pointers elsewhere, but main acknowledgments go to the Audio Engineering Society’s Education section. Here you’ll find a pretty full directory of all sorts of training and education organizations, and some useful articles to help clarify your thoughts. You can search the directory by region (world-wide) or by type of course, so it’s useable whether you’re looking locally or considering type of course first.
From the research I did, there seemed 3 natural sections. Click the first link below:
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi Dave, im thinking about spending $500 or more not over $1000. Could you help me with buying things, whay would i able to buy?
I have my 13 tracks of powerful and spirited inspirational songs that I need to produce into a complete piece of music for all music lovers, suitable for the soul of men and worship of God. Can you link me to my desired international standard music recording studio to produce my work.
God bless you.
I had a budget of about $3000 when I started my home studio. There are certainly some great examples here of what to do.
All in all, very useful information here, I will be coming back.
realy i want to be a professional sound engineer since am already practicing it in my small studio.and i hope you will help me with ideas on how to improve the skill that i have.
hi firstly this site has been soo much help.
however i’m from England, do you know anthing about LIve sound enginering? and if you have heard of any schools in england that would offer somthing aimed more at live sound that would be great.
A recording school is not the best path for all, but Recording Workshop in Ohio has been doing it for a long time and should be checked out:
http://www.RecordingWorkshop.com
Short-term and not crazy expensive..
Hilarious parody of those audio engineering schools that guarantee you a job…..nowhere…..
Because as everyone finds out sooner or later .the good audio engineering job market is fierce.
If you don’t laugh you just might cry.
Check this must see video out and take a look at my other wacky vids….send the link to your pals!
Link is below
http://youtu.be/uvNLJHlC8gQ
(I don’t expect you to read this entire wall of text, but at least check out the video. If you want to see why I created this particular parody please read on)
I have a pretty good knowledge of how deep the science of audio engineering and mixing really is. I love music and comedy! All the music videos I’ve posted use music that I have written and recorded in my “home studio”
check out my favorites as they link to my other page……the MrJerryRio channel which has more of my videos and a lot of my “man on the street” interview segments.
(you can read my manifesto if you like)
I would just like to be serious here for a moment and state for the record that some of the top audio engineering schools do offer a lot of good information from excellent teachers. if you really apply yourself and are extremely dedicated to learning the craft you can learn a lot from the best of these audio schools.
The point is that due to the implosion of the record industry and fierce competition due to the fact that digital audio has enabled artists to have their own recording set up makes finding work difficult if not almost impossible. And your degree won’t help much.. Although not impossible, supporting yourself, much less a family as a recording engineer is sadly not a good career choice. Audio engineering and mixing is a very exciting, interesting and rewarding profession.
However, being a top notch engineer involves high levels of many skills: being creative, having a good ear for music, amazing technical, computer and software abilities and a good knowledge of mathematics, physics, and the science behind the audio you are working with. Great recording engineers are highly motivated, highly skilled individuals. It’s a lot more than pushing a few buttons and setting levels.
The reality is that someone who has those or similar abilities in another field will earn much more money and have a much more secure career. Creating great music is so rewarding that many are willing to dedicate themselves to the craft regardless of the harsh realities of the business. It’s not impossible to make a decent living as an audio recording engineer making successful records, but it’s quite a long shot. Similar deal with the video editing industry.
If they can’t be your carrear perhaps they can be your hobby, or you can earn extra income, or if you are really lucky you have a trust fund and you don’t need to support yourself doing this.
Recording Engineer is now upcoming career
I just wrote a guide regarding the tips on audio recording here: http://www.transcriptionwave.com/audio-recording-tips.html
I hope it answers your inquiry, thanks.