Creative Caffeine: Nashville Recording Studio

The Wright of Center Music crew has been here quite a bit lately… Dave Pahanish’s music featured in this particular session.

We invited Cody Kilby  in to add some of his masterful guitar playing to Chicago artist Donna Adler’s latest project, still in the works.  His guitar playing was just what we needed!

CC Media Holdings has reported a $5 billion fourth quarter loss due to a major change in the value of its assets such as radio licenses and other permits. CC Media Holdings is the vehicle used by Thomas H. Lee Partners and Bain Capital to privatize Clear Channel Communications last year in what was reportedly a $17.9 billion transaction. The $5 billion loss on revenues of $1.6 billion compares with a fourth quarter profit of $321 million on revenue of $1.9 billion in same period a year earlier. CC Media reports its radio revenue fell 13% in the fourth quarter and revenue from its Outdoor Advertising business dropped 16%.

Full Article:
Clear Channel Reports $5 Billion Loss : MusicRow

When’s the last time you heard someone say they walked up to Justin Timberlake, Taylor Swift or Eminem at a concert and bought a new CD directly from the artist? And, oh yeah, can you believe this, it was autographed right on the spot?

Believe that one and let me unload some shares of GM stocks on you today — for $500 a pop.

So lies a big difference in the rock, pop and Top 40 Country world compared to the stars of bluegrass. Indeed, you can walk right up to Dr. Ralph Stanley’s CD table at a festival, buy his latest release and have him sign it. Or, if you just happen to already have a copy that you didn’t buy at Doctor Ralph’s table full of goodies, no matter — the iconic Ralph Stanley will still oblige you with an autograph.

In a February online survey undertaken by the International Bluegrass Music Association, many respondents — 31 percent –said they most often purchase their recordings that way, directly from the artist or record label. That was topped only by the 42 percent of respondents who said the bought their CDs online from Web sites. Just over 13 percent buy their CDs in the mass retail market while another 10.5 percent get their recorded music products via direct mail.

Full Article:
Bluegrass fans put spin on CD-buying habits | BluegrassJournal.com

A cascading series of booked acts for the March 20 concert, scheduled to both kick off a year-long tribute to The Bluegrass Hotel, and raise funds for the American Cancer Society, have announced that they will not appear on the show. Sam Bush was the first to drop, followed almost immediately by John Cowan and Tony Rice.

These artists claim that necessary assurances and contract requirements for them to take part in the concert were never received, while the event promoter insists that these performers have reneged on prior agreements. The tone has turned ugly, with the following headline posted on the official Bluegrass Hotel website: Bluegrass Stars Jilt Major Charity.

Full Article:
The Bluegrass Blog: Bluegrass Hotel Turning Sour

Tradition is good, tradition is important. But just as no one expects rock ’n’ roll albums today to sound like the Sun and Chess records of the genre’s 1950s pioneers, the sonic tastes of bluegrass fans have evolved considerably since the seminal ’40s and ’50s recordings of Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys, Flatt & Scruggs’ Foggy Mountain Boys, the Osborne Brothers, the Sunny Mountain Boys, Ralph and Carter Stanley, and all the other greats who helped define the style. True, there is a certain romance to the gritty mono recordings that were usually cut with just a couple of microphones direct to disc: You can sometimes hear the fiddler or guitarist or mandolin player actually leaning in towards the mic for a solo, and you can feel how the band as a whole balances itself from moment to moment, both in relation to each other and with the soaring vocal harmonies that rise above the instrumental conversation of the ensemble. Good as those recordings might sound—and with today’s restoration techniques, many of them have literally never sounded better—they tend to be light on bass and guitar, somewhat imprecise on both the upper and lower registers of the mandolin, occasionally too ring-y on certain banjo notes, and lacking the ambient “air” that modern ears appreciate.

Full Article:
Recording Bluegrass Instruments Online Extra | Read the Full Recording Bluegrass Instruments May 2008 Mix Article

Music labels can breathe a sigh of relief after a jury concluded that sales through digital download stores like iTunes should be treated like CDs for the purposes of paying royalties.

Eminem’s former production team, F.B.T. Productions, sued Universal over the issue in 2007. The brothers behind F.B.T. claimed that, when Universal provided music to stores like iTunes, it was actually “licensing” the tunes to another distributor rather than distributing them itself.

The distinction makes a huge difference in the royalty rate: Eminem received a 12 percent royalty on CDs, which Universal distributed, but a 50 percent royalty whenever the music was “licensed.”

read entire article:
Eminem producers lose bid for massive iTunes royalties – Ars Technica

The Sizzling Sound of Music – O’Reilly Radar

Are iPods changing our perception of music? Are the sounds of MP3s the music we like to hear most?

Jonathan Berger, professor of music at Stanford, was on a panel with me at a meeting of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in Mountain View, CA on Saturday. Berger’s presentation had a slide titled: “Live, Memorex or MP3.” He mentioned that Thomas Edison promoted his phonograph by demonstrating that a person could not tell whether behind a curtain was an opera singer or one of Edison’s cylinders playing a recording of the singer. More recently, the famous Memorex ad challenged us to determine whether it was a live performance of Ella Fitzgerald or a recorded one.

Berger then said that he tests his incoming students each year in a similar way. He has them listen to a variety of recordings which use different formats from MP3 to ones of much higher quality. He described the results with some disappointment and frustration, as a music lover might, that each year the preference for music in MP3 format rises. In other words, students prefer the quality of that kind of sound over the sound of music of much higher quality. He said that they seemed to prefer “sizzle sounds” that MP3s bring to music. It is a sound they are familiar with.

I remember wondering what audiophiles were up to, buying extremely expensive home audio systems to play old vinyl records. They put turntables in sand-filled enclosures with elaborate cabling schemes. I wondered what they heard in that music that I didn’t. Someone explained to me that audiophiles liked the sound artifacts of vinyl records — the crackles of that format. It was familiar and comfortable to them, and maybe those affects became a fetish. Is it now becoming the same with iPod lovers?

Our perception changes and we become attuned to what we like — some like the sizzle and others like the crackle. I wonder if this isn’t also something akin to thinking that hot dogs taste better at the ball park. The hot dog is identical to what you’d buy at a grocery store and there aren’t many restaurants that serve hot dogs. A hot dog is not that special, except in the right setting. The context changes our perception, particularly when it’s so obviously and immediately shared by others. Listening to music on your iPod is not about the sound quality of the music, and it’s more than the convenience of listening to music on the move. It’s that so many people are doing it, and you are in the middle of all this, and all of that colors your perception. All that sizzle is a cultural artifact and a tie that binds us. It’s mostly invisible to us but it is something future generations looking back might find curious because these preferences won’t be obvious to them.

On a related note, a friend commented recently that she doesn’t understand why people put up with such poor sound quality for phone calls on cell phones, and particularly iPhones. “I can hardly hear the person talking to me,” she said. “I don’t think smart phones are making any improvement to the quality of the phone call,” she added. “Is it not important anymore?” She wondered why people accepted such poor quality, and so did Jonathan Berger, but a lot of people just don’t hear it the same way.

The Judiciary Committee of the US House Of Representatives will take up the Performance Rights Act today (3/10) with a hearing at 10:00 a.m.

This legislation (H.R.848) seeks to require broadcast radio (terrestrial transmitter-based) to pay royalties to artists and performers each time a song is played. These royalties are currently paid to copyright holders (songwriters) by statute, and this proposed legislation would extend payments to include the named artist and studio musicians as well.

Proponents point out that these performance royalties are currently paid for satellite and internet radio, and that many other nations require them to be paid for broadcast radio as well. The Recording Industry Artist Association (RIAA) and record labels see it as a possible revenue stream to help offset declining income from CD sales, as do session players and artists.

Radio industry organizations argue that this doubling of payments would be an undue burden on their operating expenses, and that the airplay serves as important free publicity for the artists and labels.

Though bluegrass and traditional music formats are not likely to be discussed in the hearing, the legislation is being followed closely by industry folks in our community, with the same battle lines as described above.

The hearing begins at 10:00 a.m. (EDT) and can be seen via online streaming video.

Witnesses expected to testify include:

* Billy Corgan – Vocalist and Lead Guitarist, The Smashing Pumpkins
* Mitch Bainwol – Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Recording Industry Artist Association
* Paul Almeida – President, Department for Professional Employees, AFL-CIO
* W. Lawrence Patrick – President, Patrick Communications
* Stan Liebowitz, Ph.D. – Ashbel Smith Distinguished Professor of Managerial Economics, University of Texas at Dallas
* Steve Newberry – Chairman of the Radio Board, National Association of Broadcasters

via:
The Bluegrass Blog: bluegrass music news

Friends and family announced the death of Compact Disc — familiarly known as “CD” — this week. Its remains were said to be scattered over a few dozen remaining retail stores that continued to stock CDs. It is survived by millions of MP3s and thousands of vinyl LP records, which were themselves long thought to be missing and presumed dead.

Compact Disc was born in 1982 in Germany, after some years of gestation in the Netherlands. It first appeared in retail form in the form of Billy Joel’s 52nd Street on Oct. 1, 1982.

CD led a long, expensive and uproarious, if sometimes quarrelsome, life. It was never happier than when accidentally dropped on a hardwood or tile floor. It was then eager to make a disheartening noise upon striking the floor and springing open, scattering all its many pieces across the floor.

The cause of death of Compact Disc was said to be irrelevance. Symptoms of that lingering malady had become more noticeable of late. No memorial services are planned at this time.

Entire Article:
CMT : News : NASHVILLE SKYLINE: Death of CD Confirmed