Old-School Swing (S210710JN)

[irthlingz]

Love to get ears on this!

Swingin it old-school: https://sharmuse.com/oldschool1.html

===

Michael and Sharon

[BradGray]

Hey IM&S,

I think you're on the right track there. It has a nice feel and sound to it. The only things that I would suggest would be:

1) A strong melody or motif - this sounds like a jazz improv session. Sounds nice, but at a glance not what the listing would expect.

2) If the production needs to sound like the references, you're a bit too modern/clean. The production back then was called "balance engineering". They would have a couple of mics in the room, and place the instruments, according to volume, around the mics. Drums were in the back of the room, vocals would be forward closer to the mics. Instruments would step forward for a solo, and step back when their turn was over. This is some of the reason that there's less lows and highs on the instruments - they were further back in the studio. Other things to note is that cool things like the horns on one of the tracks being a bit to "hot" and have some mild clipping adds to the sound too...

3) The 2/3 of those recordings were much more lo-fi, as magnetic tape was not widely in use and/or new, so there were no great lows and the highs were rolled off. The Benny Goodman track is a great example of this.

4) I would suggest even speeding it up a little, or giving it some more swing. A couple of stops in there, will make things punch too. =)

Good luck and keep swingin' - in the musical sense.

Cheers,
BRad

[irthlingz]

Thank you, Brad! Will look at all this!

[irthlingz]

Hi Graham - Thank you! Yeah, it's BIAB, mixed in Reaper. We're brand new to BIAB so just wrapping out heads around its capabilities and limitations.

===
Michael & Sharon

[Paulie]

Fun track, but not a fit for the listing, in my opinion. All three references are big band tracks, 15-17 piece groups with a big sound and thorough arrangements that include intros, melodies, solo and soli sections, etc. Your track reminds me more of a New Orleans small group ensemble, which is not in the general stylistic ballpark of the references.

[AlanHall]

[snip] Yeah, it's BIAB, mixed in Reaper. We're brand new to BIAB so just wrapping out heads around its capabilities and limitations[/snip]

I'm a BIAB fan, and have made a few submissions that included some BIAB generated tracks; drums mostly, but also a rhythm instrument or two. My personal take is that the soloists are very good, but what we're hearing is a bunch of random licks strung together by the algorithm - not what a professional soloist would do at all. It'll take careful editing and composition chops to pull those licks together into a cohesive whole. And then it's still not a melody per se. BIAB is useful, but can get you only so far

And I agree, some of the changes were reminiscent more of early 60s - al a Coltrane's 'giant steps' - than of the big band era. But Graham already mentioned that point too.

Keep moving toward the prize!

[irthlingz]

Thank you Paulie and Alan!

Onward ...

===
Michael and Sharon