Music Technology students at Farlingaye High School in Woodbridge, Suffolk, had the opportunity to hear their own performances on professional studio monitors, thanks to an innovative educational programme supported by PMC.
The school's A level students record on an Apple/Logic set up mostly using headphones. However on March 5th, the students took part in an afternoon seminar covering mixing and mastering techniques, and for this special event PMC supplied a pair of twotwo.8 active monitors so that they could hear every nuance of the music they were making.
The seminar was organised by sound recordist and a producer Nigel Palmer, who owns Lowland Masters mastering facility in Essex. Teaching was undertaken by producer and sound engineer Simon Allen, who runs regular courses at Point Blank and the Backstage Centre in London.
"The aim of this session was to teach students real world mixing and mastering skills," Palmer says, "Using their own recordings as a starting point, they learned what mixing and mastering is all about and its importance in the recording chain. Thanks to PMC's generous support, the whole class was able to listen to each other's music through professional speakers that didn't distort or mask any of the sounds they had created."
Simon Allen adds: "The seminar was a great success and I'd like to thank everyone involved for their support. I sincerely hope events like this can re-occur at Farlingaye and at other schools, colleges and Universities."
Feedback from the students who attended was very positive. One student said: "The plug-in parts were brilliant. They gave a real insight into how they work, which really helped for our coursework."
Another added: "'It was great to hear from people with specialist skills and experience in this field. I would not have minded the seminar being longer with a break for practical work, too. I learnt loads."
Nigel Palmer is already aiming to roll out sessions to other educational facilities over coming months so that students benefit from the knowledge of professionals already working in the recording industry.