When we moved to Louisville from Nashville I went from a larger space to a smaller setup. Basically I now have a control room shared with a small isolation booth for vocals, acoustic instruments, etc. and a second room next door for tracking drums, and other loud instruments. There are also several small rooms and closets nearby where amplifiers can be isolated when groups want to track live. The setup is small, but still large enough to do live work if needed. The floor is on a slab, and the windows are treated with “Indows” that improve room isolation a lot.
The studio is in a walkout basement in our home that overlooks Beargrass Creek. Access to the studio is via stone steps that run from the driveway alongside the house to a patio where musicians can gather or just hang out when not recording. The patio has a lovely view of the Creek
The door from the patio leads into a mi-size room where furniture can be easily moved around to set up drums, or other louder instruments for tracking. The door at the end of this room leads directly into the control room. The screen can be used as needed to see others in the control room and vice versa.
Here is a view of the control room / isolation booth taken from the large window on the creek side of the room. You can see that a large closet has been converted into a small iso-booth for vocals, etc.
When isolation is needed, or corners need to be taken out of the recording, I now use a lot of these moveable Auralex gobos. They are amazing and work for just about every application possible.
These can be set up around or in the isolation booth if more or less isolation is needed, depending on the voice or instrument and the frequencies you want to enhance or squash.
From the isolation booth toward the window, here is the view, and the scene out the window. A great place to work on music!
All in all, it’s a great place to hang out and record music! I’ve settled in now and the vibe and the sounds are absolutely first rate.
JonyMac Studio 