The Siebelses began as musicians: Jon Siebels as a guitarist and co-founder of the group Eve 6, and David Siebels as a guitarist accompanying Gordon Goodwin’s Big Phat Band. The two later branched off into recording engineering, allowing them to create better recordings for themselves. In teaching their class, the Siebelses teach the basics, from how to plug in a microphone to how to hit record, Jon Siebels said.
This week, the class goes over proper microphone placement when recording drums. While Jon Siebels is in the booth, Dave Siebels plays each drum on the kit. Back in the booth, Jon Siebels shows the class various ways to optimize the microphones picking up each drum, from decreasing the gain, to adjusting for low-level frequency noise.
After recording several seconds of David Siebels playing the drums, Jon Siebels shows the class how he can manipulate the recording through the ProTools recording software on his computer. He brings up each channel, showing the class the imperfections that exist in the recording and why they are there. He then expertly manipulates the recording, as he shows the class how he can correct for those imperfections in the finished product.
Cheryl Holland of Studio City is a music therapist at Childrens Hospital Los Angeles, where she works with kids from all over the city and the world. Her decision to attend this class stems from her need to learn the technologies that will help her kids.
“We don’t have this equipment,” Holland said. “But when we do, and when my kids have the opportunity to use this kind of stuff as part of their development, I can employ it.”
