Nathan Chapman has produced, written, and engineered records with artists such as Taylor Swift, Sara Evans, The Band Perry, Jewel, and K’Jon. Joe West has produced, written, and engineered with Warren Zevon, Emmylou Harris, Toby Keith, and Keith Urban.

Video Transcription:

NC: A couple of months ago, Joe West and I got to get together and do a shootout at Sony Studios here in Nashville.
 
JW: The way we had the desk arranged was that we had the two mics just coming in, just the two raw inputs, the mic pres, and then we had the Symphony I/O, a 192, and we had an AD-16X.
 
NC: We recorded piano and we recorded guitars… and we recorded everything simultaneously through all the different interfaces and then we were able to play back simultaneously and sit there and A/B all the different interfaces that we were going through.
 
JW: What I loved about it was it was a clear, concise difference.
 
NC: We were astounded at the Symphony I/O. The depth, the 3D characteristic to it which is kind of an intangible thing that you can’t explain. You feel it. There was a feeling of more of that openness and the air around everything and the detail and the 3D quality that is what we all really hope for when we are trying to record music.
 
JW: You know, coming in, being asked to come in and listen to that in an environment that you don’t know, on monitors that you don’t know, it’s always sort of like, well, am I really going to be able to tell the difference? But, man, it was just as clear as day.
 
NC:  The stereo piano really came through, even a mono acoustic guitar… you could tell that there was a place you could point at in the speakers where the guitar was.
 
JW: What I noticed primarily was that the 192 and 16-X both sounded good, but I’d always want to EQ them.. let me just get this frequency out of there, let me get that out of there. But with the Symphony I/O, I didn’t want to EQ it.
 
NC: It’s been astounding, the difference. I had an artist, that was sitting on the couch, the first day that I turned that on and we had been working for a few days, and one of the days in to the week we were working together, I plugged the Symphony I/O in and didn’t say anything and the artist immediately sat up on the couch. And they were like, what did you do to the song? Did you do something last night? I was like, No, it’s just this new interface.

That to me is a big deal because it’s not that, when an artist or an average listener or somebody who is not really listening critically, like engineers, I mean we are all pretty nerdy about it. But when someone who is more artistic about it notices a chance in the engineering, just with something as simple as plugging in a different interface, to me that is something that we -as nerdy engineers who love the gear- we should take note when someone who isn’t obsessed like we are, notices something better, that’s a good sign, and maybe even a better sign than someone like myself or Joe geeking out on it. 

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Dave Tozer has produced, performed, and written with artists such as Kanye West, John Legend, Free Sol, Musiq Soulchild, Jazmine Sullivan, Bridget Kelley, and Emile Sande.

Video Transcription:

I track probably I would say about 75% of the work I do here. And, If I have to track strings or live drums, I’ll do it in bigger rooms, but it all ends up coming back here. So when I come out with records that I produce, for the large part, they are recorded here. Absolutely.

My main chain going in is going through this Vintech Stereo Mic Pre into the Tube Tech compressor, a very good compressor, and into the interface, which is now the Symphony. It really struck me, you notice that all of a sudden, to me, that the bass is a little tighter. And there is more depth to the stereo spread. And it just sounds pleasant. It’s really great. And also I’ve noticed the sound going in, that’s just the monitoring side, but the recording side is sounding really good. The conversion itself is top shelf. So it’s a great thing just knowing that you’re getting the best conversion going in, because that’s really the sound you’re getting right there, that’s what you’re getting. You want it to sound really great going in.
 
***
 
One of the things that strikes me about the Symphony I/O is the thought that is put into the engineering of it so that it can be used across the board for people who work in a variety of styles and who also have a variety of needs. It’s set up to be very compatible. The fact that it’s modular in the first place really illustrates that. It’s designed being very intuitive and flexible and I think it’s great.

###

Use a Phillips screwdriver to remove the 11 screws holding the cover on.

If you have installed the rack ears, you will need to remove those as well.

Slide the cover off, The front lip may catch as you are sliding the cover off, pull gently on the sides, of the cover, and then pull back and up slightly.

Remove the 2 screws holding the center support in place, and  remove it .

Remove the blank panel that is in the second slot. Make sure to save these 2 screws as you will need them to secure the new I/O module later.

9 screws hold in the I/O module that has already been installed.

One by one, replace the 9 screws with the provided aluminum stand offs.

Place the I/O module and align it so that you can re-install the 9 screws you just removed.

Don’t tighten them all the way at this time.

Install the two screws on the back panel that you removed earlier.

Now tighten the 9 screws

Connect the provided ribbon cable to the Secondary I/O port on the Main board… and the other end of the ribbon cable to the new I/O Module.

Reconnect the center support bar.

Slide the cover back into place and secure with the 11 screws you removed earlier. The 6 screws on the bottom are flat and should mount flush. The 5 on the back have rounded heads and will not be flush .

Your new I/O module is now installed and ready to use.

Symphony I/O usually ships with the first module installed. However, there maybe circumstances where you may need to install it yourself.

Use a Phillips screwdriver to remove the 11 screws holding the cover on.

The front lip may catch as you are sliding the cover off, pull gently on the sides, of the cover, and then pull back and up slightly.

Remove the 2 screws holding the center support in place, and  remove it.

Remove both blank panels

Make sure to save these screws, you will need them to secure the new I/O module later.

Remove the 9 screws shown here

Remove the cable connected to the headphone board, by gripping the sides and pulling up.

Place the I/O module and align it so that you can re-install the 9 screws you just removed.

Don’t tighten them all the way at this time.

Install the two screws on the back panel that you removed earlier.

Now tighten the 9 screws

Replace the headphone board connection cable.

If you’re installing a second module right away, you will use the stand offs instead of the screws.

Also, if you are only installing a single module, you will want to replace the blank panel in the second slot.

Connect the provided ribbon cable to the Primary I/O port on the Main board… and the other end of the ribbon cable to the new I/O Module as shown here

Reconnect the center support bar.

Slide the cover back into place and secure with the 11 screws you removed earlier. The 6 screws on the bottom are flat and should mount flush. The 5 on the back have rounded heads and will not be flush .

Your new I/O module is now installed and ready to use.

Visit Puscifer at http://www.myspace.com/censorshipisacancer

Video Transcript

Hi I’m Mat Mitchell, currently performing and producing the project Puscifer. In the past I’ve worked with The Perfect Circle, teching for Billy Howerdel. That’s where I met Maynard Keenan. [I've] since worked with Tool, and most recently with Trent Reznor and Nine Inch Nails. Working a bit in the studio and extensively live doing programming and live tech work.

On tour and in the studio, I’ve been using Apogee products for quite some time. On the Nine Inch Nails tour, we used Symphony Mobile and Rosetta for all the guitar and keyboard sounds through MainStage. For the latest Puscifer recordings, we’ve been using Duet quite a bit. We use Soundelux U95 plugged straight into a Duet, and then using the dynamics in Logic.

Recently I was introduced to a new Apogee product, GiO. It allows me to scroll through my amps; it allows me to control stomp box effects; it allows me to control my transport functions hands free. Another thing we discovered is that you can assign buttons to create a new track and arm that track. Since we are already using MainStage Live, the GiO is a great addition. It allows me to switch through my amps and all my pedals through MainStage. Both live and in the studio, the GiO is really a good addition.

Related Apogee Gear
AD-16X & DA-16X
Symphony

Video Transcript

“ I am Jeremy Zuckerman and this is Ben Wynn, and we are the Track Team. We do music composition and sound design for TV, Films, and commercials. We met Cal Arts basically studying music technology and composition, and we were both basically freelancing for music houses mostly doing commercials and occasionally we’d get jobs where we would work together. Eventually we got this bigger project where we had to form our own company. We formed this company we called The Track Team and a bigger project called Avatar. We did that for four years and we have done a bunch of commercials and a movie or two thrown in between. “

“ I have been using Logic a long time actually, right after undergraduate, I graduated in 1997, it was sort of an affordable alternative to Pro Tools or something like that. And I found it had a lot of really useful compositional tools that Pro Tools didn’t have. So I’ve been using that ever since and I’ve found the integration with Apogee to be really smooth, and really easy and low maintenance which I liked.

Anyway, I have a really simple set up, we don’t have mixers, just a monitor control and SPL monitor control, and everything is hard wired. I have a Symphony Card, G5 and DA and AD 16x’s, and everything is sort of hard patched right into it. The microphone is patched in, keyboards, some really simple outboard gear, a nice pre-amp, compressor. We just try and keep it really clean and simple.”

“I’ve used Logic for years as well, probably about 8 years or something like that, and I only switched when I really started doing a lot of sound design, primarily because Nuendo offers things like offline processing and processing of plug-in’s and it just handles audio very well, so it’s very good for sound design.”

“And like Jeremy’s studio I have a very similar setup in mine, it’s very clean and we got the Apogee’s we sort of got it on that concept as well. Very few elements, but very clean and very precise and very direct, and so the clarity that that offered was great for the whole system.”

“Apogee was this unattainable sort of amazing holy grail product and I think it’s still considered that way and it occurred to me that we were at the point that we probably were able to swing it. So, we actually did a really cool A-B comparison which I will let Ben talk about a little bit because we did it at his studio.”

“We A-B’d it by basically playing a record live both through both our previous converters and the Apogee’s. We also ran it straight through the monitor control so we weren’t even hearing converters which was really interesting. We just listened to the analog output of the record player. We compared analog to the sound of the converter. And our previous one, as we suspected was indeed coloring it, wasn’t offering the correct bass response, or really high in clarity, the detail. And then we compared that to the Apogee which virtually we couldn’t distinguish any difference. “

“So that pretty much sold it, and once we did switch the difference in the spacial ness and the high-end detail and the low end seperation of the frequency was really apparent. It’s just more fun to listen now, it’s more enjoyable. And it feels like I can sort of just forget about it, forget about the converters and just focus on the work. Not even worry about trusting it, it’s just not even an issue, just pretty free. I mean that’s the best thing that it can be. A sound card should just be there in the background, you shouldn’t have to think about it.”

]]> http://video.apogeedigital.com/2009/02/the-track-team-symphony-system/feed/ 0 http://video.apogeedigital.com/2008/08/ulrich-wild-symphony/ http://video.apogeedigital.com/2008/08/ulrich-wild-symphony/#comments Thu, 21 Aug 2008 00:37:03 +0000 admin http://video.apogeedigital.com/?p=65 Mixer/Engineer Ulrich Wild describes why he moved from Pro Tools to Logic which then led him to Apogee’s Symphony System as the core of his native studio. Mixing in his home studio in Los Angeles, CA, Wild has employed his Symphony System on records for Static-X, Dethklok, Otep, The Kordz, Project86, and new tracks for Activision’s Guitar Hero.

Ulrich Wild’s Website>

Related Apogee Gear:
AD-16X & DA-16X
Symphony

Video Transcript:

“My name is Ulrich Wild and I am a mixer and producer, and I engineer my own records. I  worked for Terry Date for quite a couple of years,and made records with him like Pantera, White Zombie, Deftones, and then went out on my own, a little brave me, and took on Static-X, Powerman 5000, and now I’m doing a lot of mixing and the first project I actually did here on the Symphony System was Dethklok, but also Project 86.”

I’m now working with the Chords, a Lebanese band who is amazing, and they just keep coming, so you better check out my discography somewhere on Ulrichwild.com.”

“Originally, I just tried to put together a rig that would allow me to accomodate real low budget projects, and I was a heavy Pro-Tool user, but I never really liked mixing in Pro-Tools, and I needed something that would allow me to have more tracks than 48, than I was allowed to have with the Digi 002.I wasn’t really willing to spend more money on the hardware for Pro-Tools.”

“I went back to Logic because there are many awesome plug-ins that I remember because I did a record in 2001, the second Static-X record in Logic entirely, and I really liked it. Then I put this rig together and it sounded OK and I was really happy with what Logic was doing for me and how the work flow was in Logic and it was the closest thing I can find to work it on a big SSL, but sonically,having to crunch through the 02 was not very fun and that was about the same time that Apogee came out with the Symphony System. It all kind of crystalized into being able to do this kind of work at home, on my own schedule with quality results that meet and or surpass any analog console that I have been working on before.”

“The Symphony System is really awesome because it gives me zero latency in this native system that I’m running with Logic. I’m not relying on the Pro-Tools hardware anymore, and Apogee has always had a great reputation for making awesome converters. When they finally came out with their own system for supporting my native world,here I was jumping on it and here I am, haven’t looked back.”

Related Apogee Gear
Symphony
AD-16X & DA-16X
Rosetta Series

Video Transcript

“With the flexibility of the Symphony 64 card,you can configure Symphony as a basic two channel system, all the way to a full blown 64 channel powerhouse.In this tutorial we will be covering a basic setup using a single Rosetta, including how to install your Symphony 64 card,and how to configure the settings on the Rosetta to work with Symphony.”

“The first thing to do is to install the Symphony 64 software following the on-screen instructions.Now install the Symphony 64 card in the slot just above the video card.With the computer turned off, connect the PCI 32 to the left connector of the Symphony 64 card labeled 1-32. Connect the other end to the main port to the X-Symphony card you have installed in your Rosetta.You can connect either a Rosetta 800 or 200 and the following instructions will be the same for both.”

“Turn on the Rosetta.  On the front of the Rosetta,set the “source to digital out” to analog, and set the “source to analog out” to option. Make sure that you have only the sample rate selected, and nothing lit up above the sync button. This indicates that the Rosetta is on it’s own internal clock. Now start up the computer. Maestro should automatically launch. In the Maestro control panel, you will see some drop down menus. The first one is clock source select. The default will be internal.

If you want to use a Big Ben with your system, you will connect the output of the Big Ben, to the output of the Rosetta as described in the Big Ben manual. Now change the clock source menu to external, allowing Big Ben to be the master clock source. The next drop down menu you will see is V-bus selections.We will discuss this in the S-bus and V-bus technology video.”

“Next is performance tuning. For the lowest latency, set this to high performance. The last drop down is Symphony source. For now, leave it at the default setting, card 1-port 1.This is discussed in more detail in the Symphony 64 advanced set up video.Let’s open audio-midi setup, by opening applications, utility, and double clicking on audio-midi setup. Make sure that the default output is set to Symphony 64. Now open I-tunes and play something to test the output of the Rosetta. Remember that between the output of the Rosetta and the input to your power amp or powered monitors, you will need some kind of atenuation controller.”

“Your Symphony system is now ready to use. Open your favorite audio application and choose Symphony as your audio device. In Logic, is is located under prefrences, audio. Now choose Symphony 64 for device.

Under I/O buffer size, choose 32 samples for best latency performance.If you are running many plug-ins and system intensive soft synths, you may need to choose a higher setting such as 64, or 128. For more information or help, please go to our website. www.apogeedigital.com and check out our advanced tutorials on Symphony 64.”

Related Apogee Gear
Symphony
AD-16X & DA-16X
Rosetta Series

Video Transcript

“The symphony system combines a legendary sound quality of Apogee audio interfaces, the groundbreaking power of Apple’s mac pro computers, and the advanced audio production capabilities of apple’s logic pro studio. The result is the most professional, innovative and affordable audio work station available.”

“The processing power of the Mac Pro and the efficient design of the symphony audio driver work together to deliver incredibly low latency, an extremely high channel count, and an unprecedented plug-in performance.”

“And now, the symphony system is more powerful than ever. Introducing Symphony 64. The latest PCIE audio interface card from Apogee. Symphony 64 doubles the amount of  I/O of the previous symphony PCIE card allowing you to be more flexible in your I/O configurations. Symphony 64 also includes Apogee’s new s-bus technology . S bus makes low latency audio communication between mac pro computers a reality. From a basic 2 or 8 channel setup using Apogee’s rosetta series converters, to a larger multi channel system fronted by the award winning AD and DA16x converters, Symphony 64 empowers you to create your own Symphony and configure the exact work station to fit your needs.”

“V-bus creates a virtual patch-bay inside your computer from one core audio based application to another. This configuration will maximize RAM performance by allowing your sample playback software and your main DAW software to run as separate applications. And with VBus you can easily do a real time transfer of audio tracks from one DAW to another, or simply send your audio back and forth right inside the box.”

“Symphony 64’s second connection port not only doubles the amount of I/O that can be connected to a Symphony card, it also makes way for an exciting new feature. S-Bus. Apogee’s S-bus technology creates a musical bridge between Symphony equipped Mac pro, and Mac Book pro computers. This extended audio routing opens up the possibilities of your DAW exponentially by making it possible to leverage the processing power of multiple macs in one DAW environment.”

“Store your entire sample library. Processor  intensive soft synths and plug ins on a second Mac Pro freeing up your primary computers hard drive, CPU and memory.  Or send tracks from any core audio compliant app, like Final Cut Pro, Digital Performer, Nuendo or Ableton Live directly into a Logic session. Sbus makes audio connections between macs seem simple, sophisticated, and solid.”

“As you can see, the possibilities are endless, now you can truly build your ultimate native work station with Symphony. Up to 64 channels of I/O on a single card, Sbus and Vbus technology, lowest latency speck of any native system, built to utilize the power of Apple’s Mac pro computer, world class performance and sound quality that only Apogee can deliver.”

SBus & VBus>

Related Apogee Gear
Symphony

Video Transcript

In this tutorial, we will go over connecting and using two groundbreaking features of the new Symphony 64 card. VBus, and an exciting new feature called SBus. The new Symphony 64 card now has two PC-32 ports on it allowing you to configure your audio work station in exciting new ways. Each port can have up to 32 channels of I/O connected to it. Or, you can connect up to 32 channels to the first port, and use the second port for SBus.

“SBus allows you to send up to 32 channels of I/O back and forth between two Mac Pro computers or a Mac Pro and a MacBook Pro, all on a single cable. You can store your entire sample library on a secondary Mac Pro leaving the drives, ram, and cpu on your primary computer free for just recording audio tracks. Or, you can make transfers from other audio applications located on a separate machine. Throughout the tutorial, we will refer to the two computers as the primary and secondary.The primary computer in our case will have Logic on it. The secondary computer will have all of our stand alone synths, sample playback software, and libraries. It is best to first connect your interfaces to the port labeled 1-32 and make sure that everything is working properly before moving on to SBus.”

“Remember, that in order for SBus to work, you must have at least one interface connected on the first port. Now you can connect the port labeled 33-64 on the primary mac pro to port 1-32 on the Symphony 64 card on the secondary Mac Pro. Remember, you will need to install the Symphony 64 driver on the secondary computer as well. To trigger the samples on the secondary computer, you will need a midi connection. The easiest way is to use a single ethernet cable and the MIDI overLAN software. However, feel free to use any method you like for MIDI.”

“In the primary computer, open “audio midi set up” located under applications, utilities. Change the symphony source from card 1 port 1, to card 1 , port 1 and 2. This can also be set in Maestro, but it is important to know  where to change it in Audio MIDI setup as well. You can also connect to a Symphony Mobile Card on a MacBook Pro, making it your secondary computer. You may need to update the software and firmware if you have an older version Symphony mobile card. Please check the Apogee website for the latest updates and instructions.”

“In Logic, open Options- Audio-I/O labels. And option click on the first input listed under Provided by Driver. Now, 1-32 will be listed as Symphony in 1-32 and 33-64 will be listed as SBus in-1-32. You will notice in Logic there are 64 inputs. Channels 1-32 are for any I/O that you have connected to the first port and 33-64 will be used for SBus connections. Even if you only have a single Rosetta 800 connected using only the 1st 8 channels SBus will still be exclusively on channels 33-64. Now it’s as easy as sending the SBus out of one computer, to the S-bus in on the other computer.

VBus allows you to route demanding stand alone software instruments directly into logic or any core-audio based application instead of running them as plug-ins. The result is a much more efficient use of ram.VBus is also ideal for transferring audio from application to application. You can seamlessly send sessions back and forth, right inside the box.”

“Using VBus,is as easy as assigning an input, and an output.First, activate how many channels of VBus you would like to use in the Maestro control panel.You can select up to 64 channels of VBus. Now that you have selected the amount of channels, simply select the VBus output in the application you want to send audio from, and select VBus input, in the application you are sending audio to. It’s that simple.”

Related Apogee Gear
Rosetta Series
Big Ben
Symphony

Video Transcript

“I’m Michael Levine and I’m the composer for Cold Case and a number of other films and I occasionally help out other talented composers such as Hans Zimmer with their films and a little bit of additional music and arranging. My production manager is Peter Adams and I help Michael out with all sorts of things that are technical and musical.”

“Our symphony system is the Rosetta 800 and the Symphony card mostly. Which handles 8 In and 8 Out analog. We have all of our surround sound coming out,  The symphony handles our DA entirely and our AD as well. It was night and day compared to the MOTU’s we were using before. We also did a pretty extensive take test between the Rosetta and the Pro-Tools, the 192’s. We like them both but ended up going with the Rosetta. It has a sort of evenness to it, sort of a not hyped sound but it has clarity and evenness over the whole frequency spectrum. It’s very pleasing”

“  We’ve notice we have more sonic overhead and a better stereo field again and it’s a lot of depth, it’s been really a great sound. We sort of took our mixes from our old system and started playing it back here and we were like Oh no, and it really opened our eyes as far as the amount of sonic space we have to work with now as opposed to what we had worked with before.”

“ It’s subtle but the cumulative effect is fairly profound. And it’s difficult for me when I’m making A/B comparisons initially to even hear the difference between things that are good quality and things which are superlative quality, because they both sound pretty good. It’s really over a period of time when you listen to something that really does have superior sound as the Apogee products have… that you start hearing subtleties that you haven’t heard before and you learn to listen for them. It essentially teaches you to listen in a different way.”

“Our old work sounded like..  you could kind of hear where it started and stopped frequency wise and decibel wise, where there was a smaller space to work with overall. Frequency spectrum wise and  also just decibel wise, and now I feel like we have a little more room to work with. Even though we work at the same sample rates and bit depths we have.”

“One of the things that I mentioned before that I like about the Apogee system is that I just don’t think about it. It’s one more thing that is not in my way. We rarely have software issues, and never sonic issues and I just feel like there are so many things that overwhelm me in the course of working, so many musical problems and in addition there are all these technical barriers you have to overcome with most pieces of gear and software and it’s just a wonderful luxury to have something I don’t think about.”