Multitrack recording and playback for training

[Dave m]

just to be clear

 

are you after the ability to record (albeit for banking practice) the existing/current production?

or

a source to give repeatable multi-channel outputs ( possibly the same year in year out) of some kind of music so that they can practice on a random bit of "live multichannel" as if it was live?

[gotty]

Reaper isn't too demanding on the laptop specs; if you want to do much editing you need a big screen, but you don't need that if all you are doing is playing tracks back. Audacity is also popular, and simpler.

For my normal audio work I normally have Audition or ProTools on a dual screen desktop, but also occasionally on the laptop. Reaper and Audacity are certainly less demanding of resources, however, it's more the speed of capturing/recording 16 tracks via the USB port that I'm concerned about.

 

you don't have a BBC background do you?

Funny you should say that ... yes :-)

 

the extra excitement a DAW might generate would be worth the extra time and effort

Good thought, , and would love to give them that experience. It would certainly brighten up the more routine training with cables, mics etc.

 

Couldn't you work with the drama teacher and schedule a few extra rehearsals for purely technical purposes? Free...and (even if the technical people call the shots, any rehearsal is useful for student actors.

A very useful thought. We did try for an extra technical rehearsal last year, but it didn't quite work out. Because of our remoteness, we have to limit the number of after-school rehearsals, and there are lots of obstacles in the way of extra in-school rehearsals. There's also an interesting problem with stop-start technical rehearsals with these kids, and that's vocal consistency! Run a song three times and you get three different performances - it certainly reflects the variability of the live show, but doesn't allow the kids to get the feel of what adding some eq or reverb does to the sound.

 

I'm not clear about the kit? ... schools always have IT departments who may be able to re-purpose an old laptop. Audacity is free, so it's just multi ins you need and not ins and outs which is expensive. Old 8 in, 2 out units like the M-audio and Tascam 1600/1800 series might do the trick.

Basically, it's my idea to record the rehearsals on a multi-track, then go back later, play back the multi-track and let the kids get some experience with the Allen and Heath - playing with the balance, adding effects and learning what a good balance sounds like. It's a once-a-year event, and the kit (which I will have to buy) is unlikely to be used for anything else. As for all schools having an "IT department", this one doesn't as it's so small, and there's very little spare kit around. Last year they managed to find an old Vista laptop, but in the end I let them use my own hi-spec Toshiba laptop for the productions (using MultiPlay), with an older laptop of mine as a backup.

 

are you after the ability to record (albeit for banking practice) the existing/current production?

or

a source to give repeatable multi-channel outputs ( possibly the same year in year out) of some kind of music so that they can practice on a random bit of "live multichannel" as if it was live?

Really just to record the existing production during rehearsals and allow the kids an opportunity to try different things without needing the cast to be present. However, I might well use the kit to record a performance for practice in later years.

 

How about an Alesis HD24?

Thanks Peter - it's definitely a thought. The Tascam MX2424 was also suggested. I'm going to have a closer look at both as second-hand options.

 

Can I just say thanks for all the thoughts - they've given me some extra ideas. Teaching (perhaps mentoring would be a better word) 10-11-12 year olds how to balance a live show, and to understand what they're actually doing, is definitely a very enjoyable challenge. This idea of giving them some extra time to play around with the balance (of solos mainly) is something I've wanted to do for a while. There are additional technical issues in that there are no direct outputs available on the mixer - but that's relatively easy to work around.

 

Thanks again

 

 

 

 

 

[richardash1981]

I should point out that (unfortunately), Audacity can't play back multiple tracks to a multi-channel output device (and as an Audacity contributor, that's sort of my fault), so you need to use something else if you go down the software route.

 

What I have used for this sort of application was the command-line Sox utility in a script - I got it to do 5 channels in and out of a Roland UA-101 USB interface on a netbook PC (running Linux), so I wouldn't expect to need huge performance, although a reasonable disk (and turning off the power saving) will help.You don't need software monitoring (I would assume) so you can afford to run with a high latency (big buffers) to get stability.

[OddSocks]

If you want multi track on a pc at limited cost you could try Ardour.

 

It is mainly aimed at the Linux user but has been ported to Windoze.

 

I have used it for a while on both OS, and have it running happily on a windoze 10 laptop with a Focusrite 18i20 which has plenty of inputs and outputs.

[david.elsbury]

I don't think software is the issue....

 

Years ago I multitracked 8ch in and out using Cool Edit Pro and a desktop pc with 4 pci soundcards. Depending on software choice could you do something similar ? Aggregate many cheaper devices?

[Dave m]

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/aug12/articles/presonus-audiobox-1212vsl.htm

 

why not an old PC with one of these?

[themadhippy]

is it not possible to repatch the 5.1 output most pc's are fitted with?