Can you mix Jazz on an SSL?

[Depressionman]

Nonsense question.

[waxx]

Originally Posted by kittonian

You can mix any type of music on any type of equipment

i agree in a large way, only very colouring consoles (wich are rare these days and ssl is certainly not among them) can be a bit wrong sounding for modern classical and jazz recordings. But even when used for it, it will still sound good, but retro in a certain way. This is mainly because the last 20-30 years, most of those recordings were done with transparant gear and we're not used to coloured recordings of those genre anymore, but again:

Originally Posted by kittonian

You can mix any type of music on any type of equipment

[Telefunk]

If you have to ask that question, i think all consoles are wrong ones for you.

With a SSL you can mix anything.

[lecleric]

the question was can you mix jazz on an ssl.

well why dont you entertain us and throw us some of your mixes. we'll be the judge.

[Telefunk]

Originally Posted by lecleric

the question was can you mix jazz on an ssl.

well why dont you entertain us and throw us some of your mixes. we'll be the judge.

[pieter]

Originally Posted by Telefunk

If you have to ask that question, i think all consoles are wrong ones for you.

With a SSL you can mix anything.

Thanks guys

[outofphase]

Originally Posted by thethrillfactor

Where is the facepalm after your post?

I am sorry to say that the post above is totally ridiculous. You can mix anything on anything if you really know what you are doing. I've mixed jazz, classical, musical theatre on a 4K,6k and 8k and i've never heard one client tell me it couldn't be done. And i don't know what consoles you've been working on, but the SSL's i know are transparent with very little distortion. They have a sound, but distorted would not be the word i would describe it.

I think you guys over think things sometimes. The gear has no preference on what style of music you put through it. It doesn't really care. The only one with the preferences are the user and that is a different question/discussion all together.

Its like asking can you mix jazz on a Mackie?

If someone says no than i would love for them to explain why. Because the question at hand is not would you mix jazz on a Mackie but can you mix jazz on a Mackie? And i feel its with this 1 word that people are confusing themselves.

you want the cleanest sound with the best dynamic range on a traditional jazz record (upright bass, small drum kit, piano, maybe sax and vocals) , are you gonna put those noisy VCA's that distort with low levels and color the sound?
I'm not saying you can't, but it's not the best option.

YES:

[Telefunk]

Originally Posted by pieter

Thanks guys

Sorry. I couldn't resist.

[ronzie]

Originally Posted by outofphase

you want the cleanest sound with the best dynamic range on a traditional jazz record (upright bass, small drum kit, piano, maybe sax and vocals) , are you gonna put those noisy VCA's that distort with low levels and color the sound?
I'm not saying you can't, but it's not the best option.

YES:

Record mode... mix off of small faders, patch around the stereo buss (big ole' vca)... How much cleaner does one need without being itb???

Ron Allaire

[thethrillfactor]

Originally Posted by ronzie

Record mode... mix off of small faders, patch around the stereo buss (big ole' vca)... How much cleaner does one need without being itb???

Ron Allaire

You know i was going to post the same thing.

And the days of SSL's with the old DBX VCA's has been long and gone. Almost every professional studio that i know of upgraded the line amps and VCA's to THAT VCA's long ago. Also in the 90's SSL switched to the latest THAT VCA's of the time exclusively in all of their consoles pre 9000J. The THAT VCA's are the most transparent yet. They maybe not that fun sounding if you are planning to make a processor based on a VCA(a compressor or envelope follower for example) but for mixing they are really good & clean.

Very hard to hear them working. But what Ron posted before has always been an option if you want to bypass the VCA's completely and don't need the automation.

[sound_music]

of course you can.

you can also drive to the grocery store in a go-cart or a monster-truck, if that helps....?

[Cheebs Goat]

Originally Posted by elambo

It's a fair question. Obviously he knows you "can" mix on an SSL, so he meant "should." Some brands/designs sound better with particular genres than others, so the question isn't odd to me at all.

Dude, it's a console, not a stomp box. Next we're going to be asking what type of hard drive works for bluegrass.

[kats]

I can tell you fellas one thing. When we replaced our Neotek with an SSL I found out pretty quickly that most of the negative internet chatter is greatly exaggerated. From A-Z actually on all accounts. It was a huge sonic improvement over the Neotek as well. And if this thread was titled "Can you mix jazz on a Neotek?" everyone would have said of course... go figure.

[Enlightened Hand]

Most of the internet chatter is BS, especially about gear.

[Telefunk]

Originally Posted by thethrillfactor

The THAT VCA's are the most transparent yet. .

I have to disagree a bit on this, Valley People/Allison Research VCA's are even bit more transparent, IMHO.

[brewery]

Originally Posted by thethrillfactor

You know i was going to post the same thing.

And the days of SSL's with the old DBX VCA's has been long and gone. Almost every professional studio that i know of upgraded the line amps and VCA's to THAT VCA's long ago. Also in the 90's SSL switched to the latest THAT VCA's of the time exclusively in all of their consoles pre 9000J. The THAT VCA's are the most transparent yet. They maybe not that fun sounding if you are planning to make a processor based on a VCA(a compressor or envelope follower for example) but for mixing they are really good & clean.

Very hard to hear them working. But what Ron posted before has always been an option if you want to bypass the VCA's completely and don't need the automation.

amen.
i can't hear the VCAs no matter how hard i try, and usually am really picky about stuff like this. (can't stand cd playback through the masterlink converters, hugely prefer listening through apogees, even when they come up on 2 channels with VCAs in the path)

[ddageek]

If you can't mix a genre on a SSL its not the console

[Fidelis]

Guys, the real question was: if you mix jazz, would you go for an SSL AWS900? Is that so hard for you to read? And that's a really GOOD question.

But from this topic I learned one thing: just a few of you really know what jazz is all about... I bet most of you didn't even listen to any jazz music...

[jcc449]

Can you mix jazz with protoolHD?

[feedback]

i wonder what rudy van gelder was using in his living room. and was it a live mix to 2-track? when charlie parker played the legendary rockland palace ballroom in detroit (full gig available on amazon downloads), on some of the tracks laying down the best playing by him i've ever heard, his wife was recording using his own tape recorder. i don't know what it was, and the recording is really nasty, but the playing is so good you just don't care.

[Nowak]

The latest Jeff Lorber record was mixed on his E. Sounds great.

[kats]

Originally Posted by Fidelis

Guys, the real question was: if you mix jazz, would you go for an SSL AWS900? Is that so hard for you to read? And that's a really GOOD question.

But from this topic I learned one thing: just a few of you really know what jazz is all about... I bet most of you didn't even listen to any jazz music...

I certainly know jazz and I can tell you with 100% certainty that it has absolutely nothing to do with what console it is recorded with.

[waxx]

i've done a jazz band (sax, acoustic guitar, grand piano and drums) in a rather small studio somewhere near Hastings (UK) about 8 years ago, the studio had an SSL 4000E 28ch console, and almost no outboard (only some old sfx from lexicon and TC Electronics, and a Focusrite parametric eq (one of the orignial ISA's). the mic collection was fit for that band altough (old rca and coles ribbons, nuemann and schoeps condensors and shure and sen dynamics) and the room sounded super nice.

so everything is tracked and mixed fully on the console. I didn't use automation because of the VCA's, because still originals and the computer was a bit shabby. And also because it's not really needed for freejazz Altough i was a bit affraid of that minimal setup (no decent outboard collection),it sounded good. It was released by the artists themselves (rather good but unkown jazz band who's name i've lost now, to long ago) but could stand next to a lot of other jazz cd's i heared that time...

The 4000 is supposed to be the most colouring and worst sounding ssl (for many audio freaks at least, i don't agree) but of course it worked... But a neve 80xx series or an Trident A range would probally sound better

[ronzie]

Originally Posted by Fidelis

Guys, the real question was: if you mix jazz, would you go for an SSL AWS900? Is that so hard for you to read? And that's a really GOOD question.

But from this topic I learned one thing: just a few of you really know what jazz is all about... I bet most of you didn't even listen to any jazz music...

I take offense to this. I can record and play 2 mistakes in a row with the best of them.

Ron Allaire