On Mastering

Mastering engineer Chris Sonia owns and operates Dauntless Mastering in Keene, NH. Among his recent projects was the mastering of the album Farrago by Justen Cimino, a prize offered in a recent contest sponsored by Recording…

In this issue of Recording, you will read about different aspects of the fine art of mastering, mostly from pros. Working with professional mastering engineers can be a rewarding and positive experience, but there are some instances where you may decide to do your own mastering work….

There’s a lot of interest in “high-resolution” audio lately, spurred in part by audiophile record labels that offer uncompressed 24-bit files at 96 kHz, as well as Apple’s recent Mastered For iTunes initiative that aims to increase the fidelity of music processed using lossy data compression…

Mastering continues to be one of those tantalizing pursuits where we’d all like to do it, but aren’t sure quite what is needed. Meanwhile, we hear sage advice telling us to leave it alone. “Don’t do any fancy compression,” we’re told. “Leave that for the mastering engineer. He or she has very special compressors that will…

With more than 20 years’ experience recording, mixing, and mastering, I have an in-depth understanding of the mindsets involved in each step of a project. The focus of the mixer is the balances of the individual elements and how they relate to create a song. By contrast, the mastering engineer focuses on the song as a whole…

So you’ve just spent the last few months or more putting the final touches on your new album. Recording went by without a hitch, and the mixes finally feel like you can live with them. Are you done? Not yet—not if you want to have a professional sounding and commercially viable record to sell. Welcome to the mastering process…

Grammy Award winner Brad Blackwood works at Euphonic Masters in Memphis, TN and has mastered records for Maroon 5, Alison Krauss & Union Station, Black Eyed Peas, and Three Days Grace. We put the following questions to him…

I asked one of my favorite mastering engineers, two-time Grammy® winner David Glasser of Airshow Mastering, for his advice on your expectations for a mastering session and on how to prepare your tracks…

Howie Weinberg is a mastering engineer with a career span of 35 years. Clients include: Nirvana, Beastie Boys, Pantera, Public Enemy, Slayer, Muse, The White Stripes, Sonic Youth, Run DMC, Tom Waits, Garbage, Smashing Pumpkins, Prince, Cypress Hill, Björk—and the list goes on…

Stephen Marsh has a discography that goes on for pages and reads like a Who’s Who of the entertainment world. In addition to mastering everyone from Jars Of Clay to Keb’ Mo’, Ben Harper to The Donnas, and Jeff Beck to Los Lobos, his mastering expertise…