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Joined: 03 Aug 2007
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It is my pleasure to have a special guest on the forum. Audio engineer and studio musician Steve Bigas. He's worked with some of the top acts from the USA, Canada and Europe including Daniel Lanois and Ziggy Marley to name a few. He's also an old friend. The interview is in bold fonts below. I hope his insights will help answer some of the common questions about the recording process.
CafeAman: Welcome Steve and thanks so much for taking the time out of your schedule to do this interview. I'm not much of a journalist so I'll just shoot off the questions I prepared one by one.
For those that aren't familiar with your work, why don't you start off by telling us a bit about yourself, who you've worked with etc.?
Steve Bigas: i've been very lucky to be in the right place at the right time. Although i am not really a bouzouki player I've spent my whole life trying to understand and trying to find a sound. I've spent a lot of time in recording studios all over the world working with really great people and have learned a lot about how records are and were made. I'm a very big proponent of vintage instruments and vintage recording gear as i have learned that technology never means better, it just means cheaper, faster, smaller (pick any two). I can't really stand the way bouzouki players sound these days as everything i hear sounds thin and very dull. I feel greek music, like most other popular musics of all culture is in a really bad state, and most of it is because of technology. Technology has turned all musicians into "i can't hear me" and everyone has forgotten to listen to the bigger picture. In all my years of recording, like alchemy, i've become more of a perfomance purist and less of a technician. I don't believe in overdubs, i don't believe in punching in and out, i don't believe in headphones, i don't believe in "recording isolation". i do believe that people should learn how to play together and really listen to each other, and that a song is much bigger than an individual or an ego. I don't really record a lot of people anymore because most musicians have lost this fundamental principal of performance.
CA:Steve, what is your experience with Greek music?
SB:With Greek music specifically? I've played weddings and dances as a kid. I mixed Alexiou and Gaitanos live
I made a killer record of Kazantzidis covers with my Dad with an all analog setup like they used back in the day.
CA: What instrument's do you play?
SB:Anything, as long as you don't need to blow into it...
CA:What's your favourite Greek track for the music?
SB:Musically, i love listening to Ponti Lyra, and the freakin Clarino. My favorite artist is Stelios, and my favorite Record is No.3. I have it on vinyl and i never get tired of listening to it.
CA:What's your favourite Greek track for the sound quality?
SB:The whole Kazantzidis No.3 record is the absolute most killer sounding record.
CA:What does a compressor do and when would you use one?
SB: It reduces dynamic range and squashes everything When to use one? If and only if you have a great compressor, it would be used all the time.
CA: Briefly, how would you use an EQ?
SB:I wouldn't use an EQ unless it was a really great EQ. If I have a really good EQ then I will only use subtractive EQ'ing I will never add his or lows I would only take them away. My favorite EQ is still just a hi pass filter and a low pass filter.
CA:Why do you use panning?
SB:After 20 yrs, I'm still trying to figure that one out. Back in the day everything was mono, and it was awesome. Then stereo happened and imaging was created. A lot of people try to make an image with stereo, but I like to look at stereo as two monos. I mostly leave everything in the middle, but sometimes you can create two versions of a song by panning things left and right. I only hard pan! Middle, Left, Right nothing in between.
CA:What do you prefer for the studio pickup+amp or microphone?
SB:I love both for different reasons.I can't stand the sound of a bouzouki direct through a board which is mostly what I hear these days. Direct bouzoukis sound like dog kaka.
CA:What about live?
SB:I think it depends on what you're going for. If you want to rock out, I love the old ideal pick-ups through tube amps, but if you are doing a more intimate setting, then a mic on the bouzouki is a beautifil thing.
CA:What do you think of micing a bouzouki on stage? There are legions of naysayers out there that don't think it can't be done. Do you agree with them?
SB:There are legions of naysayers that don't really understand what their goals are. I totally think you can mic a bouzouki live, you just need to have a killer band that understands that the bouzouki is miced. This goes back to what I was saying about "I can't hear me" If the objective of the performance is to get a song across to the audience and the truest representation of the song requires the true bouzouki sound (miced), then the drummer will know that he can't smack the drums. A real band will translate just as well on 1 microphone (just like the old taverna's with no mics). If a band can mix themselves on a stage with no monitors and technology then they will sound unbelievable with technology.
I can't stand a lot of the Greek drummers today, they sound like bad Dave Weckls (which is bad enough to begin with). Greek drummers sound like the kids I went to high school with. In 1972 the Greeks introduced the drum set, the electric bass, and the flute. This was the beginning of the end of Greek music. Lastly, to all those naysayers that say it can't be done, go visit Damianos in Tennessee and listen to some Bluegrass bands.
CA:In the studio, what sort of mics would you use to mic a bouzouki and where would you place it?
SB:Mics don't make that much of a difference, you can use a $100 sm57 or a $6000 M49, the sound always comes from the hands!
CA:How true is the old saying "it's not about the knobs on the console, it's about the knob in front of it" meaning is experience really more important than the gear?
SB:
*There is no gear that can write a great song.
*Nirvana got signed on a ghetto-blaster version of "teen spirit"
*Great gear always makes it easier to get great sounds.
CA: For all the bedroom bouzouki players and weekend warriors out there, aside from the computer and DAW software, what would you recommend for a good signal chain?
SB:1st you need a mic. There are some great mics that are pretty inexpensive these days. There is a guy in Vancouver that has a mic company www.aamicrophones.com He makes killer mics. also, the Apex studio mics are really great for people with a limited budget, you can get their 460 tube mic for under $350. You could also send your Apex mic to the guy in Vancouver for an upgrade for a couple hundred bucks.
The most important thing is the mic pre. I have over 160 mic pre's of the same kind as they were all made between 68 and 78 by the same company, I modify them and rack them to my needs. There are a lot of companies from back in the day that made killer mic pre's, the list is too long. So if anyone really wants to do the research and get the tone, I suggest they contact me directly and I can help them work out a mic pre situation. I like recording with compression, so I have a bunch of different ones that I like to use, the old UREI and dbx stuff was always great, and the new Universal Audio clones (1176, LA2A, LA3A)of the old stuff are pretty good too.
CA:What are the advantages of having good monitors to mix with?
SB:It's all about Tannoy dual concentric. A great set of monitors sound the same whether they are cranked up or at a whisper.
CA:What is the most important piece of advice you could give to somebody just starting out?
SB:
- Try to always play with people that are better than you.
- LISTEN, LISTEN, LISTEN
- Listen to a lot of music without prejudice! You'll find that no matter what kinda music and wherever its from, it's all the same shit. there are 2 kinds of music, good and bad. A great bouzouki player should have no problems playing with a great Cuban musician or a great rock'n'roll musician.
CA:Well that's it folks. Thanks again Steve for dropping by and doing this interview. I hope you drop by again some time soon.
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