Why Record At The White House?

In-house engineer Martin

In-house engineer Martin

► Experienced in-house engineer – consistent quality service

► Great acoustics and isolation booths – bands can record together

► Accurate monitoring – what you hear really is what you get

► Pro Tools ‘Ultimate’ digital and iZ Corp Nyquist converters – state of the art digital

► Vast collection of ‘plug-ins’ for creative processing, from crystal clean to downright dirty

► High-end mics and big-name outboard and effects – quality capture and polishing

► Competitive and affordable rates from just £20.00 per hour, zero VAT

► Stress-free out-of-town location

At The White House we are proud to offer the highest possible recording quality in comfortable surroundings at a price any musician who is serious about their music can afford.  Every session is in the capable hands of in-house engineer Martin, with over 40 years experience in all styles of music – a safe pair of ears!

Great acoustics in the playing areas and excellent isolation between the booths ensure the clearest possible recordings and allow creative mic techniques to be employed to enhance the character of any instrument or voice.  Accurate monitoring in the control room means you can trust what you’re hearing on the main speakers, and Auratones allow ‘low-fi’ checking of the mix for best compatibility with any playback system.  Genelec S30s, active 3-way units with ultra-low-distortion ribbon tweeters, sit at the end of the mastering chain as a final check on the finished product.

The best of analogue and the best of digital: exceptional selection of vintage and modern hardware combined with no-compromise Pro Tools ‘Ultimate’ digital and the legendary iZ Corp Nyquist ADA  for pristine analogue-sounding signal conversion – no digital ‘harshness’, guaranteed!  Classic analogue outboard for adding that special ‘something extra’ sonically.

Superb mic collection including many vintage classics, Hill 32-channel main-frame classic British desk and the largest collection of compressors, reverbs, EQs and effects you’re ever likely to see outside Abbey Road ensure plenty of options for creativity and craft.

The studio has a homely, lived-in feel and there’s a chill-out garden with relaxing views over the Severn Estuary for those quieter between-take moments.

Bands

The studio layout is perfect for bands who want to record while playing together, whether for most efficient use of time or better ‘feel’.  The main room has a great acoustic for a big drum sound, and isolation booths allow noisy guitars and bass to be recorded as they should be: through amps with mics on the cabs.  Direct inject inputs allow pristine keyboard recording, and the singer can provide a guide vocal if needed.

Once the backing tracks are perfected, the main room has acoustic areas that work perfectly for vocals, brass, strings – whatever you need to complete your productions.

There is natural daylight is all areas and good sight-lines for all important cues.  Quality Beyer headphones provide spill-free monitoring, and independent fold-back mixes (two stereo or four mono) are available to suit different players requirements.

Solo Artists

Jules Reason at work

Jules Reason – guitarist for hire…

For singers a great selection of classic vocal mics coupled with the flexible acoustics of the main recording room mean a perfect vocal sound every time.  For pluckers, blowers and bowers the room also suits acoustic instruments – guitar, mandolin, concert harp, flute, brass, violin, cello, crumhorn, irish pipes, sitar, even a banjo – you name it, it’s probably been recorded here many times.

Overdubbing

Overdubbing Drums with Dave Jones

If you like to program and prepare tracks at home but need properly recorded drums, vocals, brass or strings to add class and polish to your songs, we can help!  File exchange between most digital recording platforms is very straightforward, and completed overdubs can be exported as industry standard WAV or AIFF files for further work at home, or you can take advantage of our mixing service with access to a vast range of world-class plugins and effects.

Violin Overdubbing

Alison Francis-Black on the fiddle…

Voice Overs

We also do speech!  Whether a simple voice-over for broadcast or video, or a full talking-book, audio training program or web presentation soundtrack, we can assist with direction and script editing if required, and supply raw files to take away or complete fully-edited program.  We are a BBC approved supplier.