I had just one practice session 2 days earlier but on April 13, 2006 I decided to try recording. Here's my first try:
I played the organ about once a week for practice, and then made some more recordings on June 12, 2006. Here are my next efforts. I know it's not recommended to copy others' arrangements, but I have always had the desire to at least TRY to play a George Wright arrangement. So, this is what I came up with. Of course, because of my limitations, it probably doesn't sound like George anyway, but it was fun trying!
And so on to something completely different, here is an original song I wrote in 1976, as I try it out
on the King of Instruments (as with so many songs, it was written over a lost love!)
This next recording was done in August. I tried moving the mics closer to the chambers for this one. I would like to get even closer, but since they are so high up, my mic stands will not extend that far. But still I was pleased with the sound. I also experimented with the reverb settings a bit.
The question has come up, "How did you record the organ?" So here goes:
The organ is in a high school auditorium which seats, I believe, about 900. But the chambers do not open
toward the audience, they are over the stage on the left and right, about 1 story up, so the organ
basically speaks toward the stage. I used 2 Marshall MXL 990 condenser mics (these are cardiod pattern).
I put them on an adaptor plate (2 mics on 1
stand) about 20 feet in from the front of the stage and faced them at 45° angles toward the chambers.
(However, starting with the August, 2006 recordings I have been putting the mics as close to the chambers
as possible, which seems to eliminate the slight hollowness of the room.) I raised the mic stand to its
full height, about 6 or 7 feet. The mics then fed into an M-Audio Mobile Pre USB preamp. This was plugged
into my Dell laptop computer, and I used Goldwave as my recording software.
I record 15-minute segments (wav files), then, using Audacity editing software I extract individual
songs and add just a touch of reverb since the auditorium is fairly dead. I next process the audio with the Breakaway audio processor, and save the files in the .mp3 format.