Week 3 - AA1 - Session Planning and Management

Planning. Whether it’s a space shuttle launch, the latest slugging match between Rudd and Howard or Grandma’s pot roast, they all need some sort of planning to have a remote chance of a successful outcome. So too is it with a recording session. This week we learned that a good deal of time could potentially be wasted from fumbling about aimlessly plugging and unplugging microphones and outboard gear without having some thought put into the upcoming recording session. A session plan does not necessarily make the mic selection set in stone. It is not just a plan on mic selection. It is a plan including the musicians instruments, outboard gear, floor plans and on signal flow in general. It should also be written so that it can be quickly referenced later for troubleshooting by anyone in the session if something goes wrong with any part of the signal flow. Habits can form like using the same old mics on the same old sources which can lead to the same old predictable sounds being recorded and a session plan can help identify these recording patterns and inspire the experimentation of new ideas. Session plans can therefore also be used to reflect on past recordings.
Often, there are many items of outboard gear patched into the one signal and the same signal can be routed to other places. For example, a kick drum could be patched directly into an outboard preamp, straight into a compressor and into the line in on a channel. It could then have a gate inserted over it. It could also be split and routed out of a spare bus and into a spare channel. This could have another compressor inserted over it to parrallel compress the kick, and both channels bussed to a single track. Then there could be an auxilliary being used for an outboard reverb effect on the kick for the headphone mix. Good Lord! That was just to record one signal with one mic!? After 24 tracks there would be more leads than Inspector Morse would care to hear about. It is easy to see how quickly things can get confusing without some sort of template or plan to fall back on for reference. This would all be written down on the session plan before even getting to the studio, preferably after a couple of preproduction sessions with the musicians.
A good plan can save heaps of time at the start of a session thus allowing time for some quick experimentation in regards to final mic selection and placement. It saves time if something goes wrong and the signal flow needs troubleshooting. All the signal flow and equipment used for each instrument can be clearly seen at a quick glance. It saves headaches and stress of wading through mounds of leads to find out what is going where. Quite frankly, I think you’d have to either be really, really on the ball or completely nuts to go in the studio without some sort of session plan. Besides, when I’m sitting there calm and the recording session is roaring full steam ahead because we sorted out a problem in two minutes that potentially could have stopped the session for half an hour or more, I’ll smile and look at my session plan because I love it when a plan comes together.
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Here is a basic session plan for a typical rock band that I put together from the information from Tuesdays tutorial.

Hannibal also loves it when a plan comes together.

Picture taken from the DVD "The Ultimate A-Team." Universal Pictures (Australasia), 2004.