Engineers make the music sound right

Be honest. When you listen to an album by your favorite artist, you really only pay attention to the music.

The more avid fan might check the liner notes to see who wrote the songs, maybe even where the CD was recorded.

But who really pays attention to the names of the engineers who tracked, mixed and mastered the album?

Sound engineers, whether involved in the recording, mixing or the mastering process, have a great deal to do with the quality of the final product.

"The engineer is responsible for making everything sound good," said Jimmy Nutt, recording engineer and producer.

Nutt has been a professional sound engineer for the past eight years but has been involved in recording and playing music for about 20 years. He and his wife, Angi, and several friends and contractors are putting the finishing touches on the new NuttHouse Recording Studio in downtown Sheffield.

"Mixing is like painting, except you're painting with sound," said Mike McGuire, a sound engineer at Wishbone Studios in Muscle Shoals.

With a well-engineered album, the listener can visualize the location of the different instruments and sounds.

An engineer's work normally begins with the recording process, where a band or solo artist performs a song live in the studio. A session could also involve the recording of individual guitar, vocals, drums, keyboard or other instrument tracks.

In that situation, Nutt explains, a sound engineer is responsible for setting up microphones by each instrument to capture its sound, known as "micing the instrument (or microphoning)."

The engineer then makes sure the instrument and vocal levels are correct for each song, which is done with a mixing board or console. From that console or mixing board, the engineer can control the input of an individual instrument or singer. It can also be accomplished with a personal computer and a mixing program such as Pro Tools.

In many cases, the engineer is directed by a producer who knows what sound he or she wants for the band or a particular track.

"If there isn't a producer, a lot of times the engineer ends up being the producer," said Nutt, who has on occasion worked as both engineer and producer on a project.

A sound engineer also is involved in mixing the recorded tracks. Once again, the individual instruments and vocals are brought to their correct levels according to the wishes of the producer, or in cases of smaller budget projects, the engineer and the band. Again, this task is accomplished with a sound board or computer.

Nutt said he could be working with numerous sources from a single vocalist or instrument to 16 to 20 inputs from a variety of sources. There could be 10 to 12 microphones attached to a single drum kit to capture the sound of the various drums, cymbals and percussion instruments.

"If I record and mix, I try to mix as I go," Nutt said. "There's something about being in the moment, being in the moment with the musicians."

McGuire said certain instruments, such as different drums and cymbals, can be mixed to sound like they're in a certain position when the track is played back. Certain instrument sounds coming from your speakers, for instance, are stronger on the left speaker and certain instruments sound stronger from the right speaker. Low frequencies will sound like they're near the floor while higher frequency sounds, like cymbals, are higher.

"That's what an engineer is doing," McGuire said.

Near the end of the project, the engineer will get into the mastering process, where the track order is determined, which track will open and close the album and how much silence is placed between each track. The engineer also will make sure the sound levels are consistent among all the album's tracks.

"We're making it radio-friendly," said Donnie Gullett, owner of Muscle Shoals Music Marketing. "We're making it as loud as it will go so it sounds good on the radio."

Gullett and Nutt agree that an engineer cannot make a band sound good musically.

"The engineer is only as good as the musicians, as good as the source," Nutt said.

The quality of the sound the engineer has to work with depends greatly on how well the musician knows and plays his or her instrument.

"If you have a great song, great musicians and a great performance, and all those things come together, it comes easy," Nutt said.

"One super important job of the engineer is to make the musicians feel comfortable," Nutt said. "A musician will play well if he's comfortable, if they have everything they need in their space."

Second-generation musician Don Srygley played guitar in bands around the Shoals for years and got into engineering as a way to get in the studio and have some control over the music, whether it's his or someone else's.

"I grew up wanting to be a rock star," Srygley said. "I got scared out of the rock star thing."

Srygley has worked as a producer, recording engineer and mixing engineer, utilizing the Internet to upload and download music files to work on in his home studios, which is equipped with Pro Tools and a variety of electronic equipment.

"It was a way to get in everybody's band," said Srygley, who does mostly mixing now.

As a producer or engineer, Srygley becomes part of the band for the time they spend in the studio, helping them develop their sound.

Srygley built a name by working with a variety of artists from a wide spectrum of genres that include The Backstreet Boys, 98 Degrees, Nick Lachey, country artist Vern Gosdin, Texas rockers ZZ-Top and local artists including Zack Hacker, Angela Hacker and Gary Nichols.

He spent several years working in Los Angeles and Nashville, Tenn., then realized he could live in his hometown and utilize the Internet to complete his projects.

"Plus, Muscle Shoals is not a bad place to be if you're in the music business," Srygley said.

The Internet is just one thing that has changed the way music is recorded, engineered, mixed and mastered.

"When I got started, there wasn't any Pro Tools," said veteran songwriter/producer/engineer Alan Schulman.

Schulman has enjoyed a 30-year career as a producer and engineer and has worked with some of the biggest names in the music business. He has two Grammy Awards for engineering work on Ricky Skaggs' "Soldier of the Cross" and "Bluegrass Rules."

Schulman spent years working in the Shoals along with such producers as FAME Recording Studios owner Rick Hall. He's worked on projects with Jimmy Nutt and has a close relationship with Mac McAnally.

Schulman said recording engineers can have as much passion as a songwriter or performer.

"It's a passion making a song sound like itself instead of sounding like something someone else did a week ago," Schulman said.

He said the best engineers are the ones who do their jobs to the point that the artist doesn't know they're there, that the mix the artist hears in their headphones doesn't need to be adjusted.

"A very integral part of when you're working with a musician, you give it the best you can for their benefit and kind of stay out of the way," Schulman said.

He has worked with some of the greatest artists in the world and most of them have developed their sound to the point they know what they want.

"I make sure I don't mess with it," he said.

Nutt, Schulman and Srygley agree that a sound engineer's reputation is based on what they've done and is spread by word of mouth.

"If you get enough contacts over the years, they know what you can do," Srygley said. "Frankly, that's been a blessing to me. People anywhere in the world can send me files and I can work on them and I can get stuff back to them quick. I don't have to live in L.A. to do work for people in L.A."

For Srygley, the key to being a good engineer is having "good ears." Real-life experiences on the job don't hurt, either, he said.

McGuire said he achieves a particular sound by running instruments into a 60-channel Neve sound board, then into Pro Tools.

The final tracks are recorded onto a hard-disk drive, rather than 2-inch magnetic tape that was popular before digital recording came along. Analog recording is still popular, but the large reels of tape are expensive. Tape recordings can be uploaded, however, into a computer so they can be mixed using Pro Tools.

McGuire agrees that engineers are every bit as important as the artist.

"It's like if you have a good looking pair of shoes and they're all muddy, you can't tell they're good looking," McGuire said. "You have to put a spit shine on them."

Russ Corey can be reached at 740-5738 or russ.corey@TimesDaily.com.