Unit - BAP250 Mastering
Assignment - BAP250.1 Mastering Essay
Student name - Tejas Nair
Student Number - 106552
Unit Coordinator - Alex
Tejas Nair - 106552 - 205.1
BAP250.1 Mastering Essay
The History of “Mastering”
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Music, in most of its styles and forms that is targeting commercial distribution now undergoes a final process of transformation and quality verification known as Mastering.
For those working within the audio industry, this process is an unavoidable step to pass through. The role of the mastering engineer is almost unknown and often unheard of. This status of the mastering process has over the years gathered itself an almost mythical status in the industry. The art itself is quite …show more content…
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Around this time larger record companies dealing with pop music were prioritizing the automation of the tape to disk transfer as much as possible in the interest of production efficiency. One of the biggest advancements this brought about was the possibility to determine the thickness of the grooves using analog computer circuitry. It eventually brought about the possibility of having record sides of up to, and in some cases beyond,
30 minutes.The equipment being used for the mastering process also had to be specifically developed for use in record production. The idea behind this was to protect the companies from the expensive cutter heads blowing up as well as to ensure a more quality consistent product.!
The birth of the Mastering Plant
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It was not long before a few engineers in this industry realized that there might me a market out there for mastering that is done with superior care and skill. This brought about the birth of the first independent mastering lab in Los Angeles during the late 60’s.
The art of mastering became more about the attention to detail, skillful use of the …show more content…
“A significant step in this extension of the role of the mastering engineer, even if ephemeral and exclusively linked to a specific musical style, was the dance mix fad, today devolved, in a modified form, to the DJ. A rhythmic pop song is delivered to the mastering studio with, along with its official mix, a series of excerpts, sub-mixes of rhythm sections, solo voices, etc. The mastering engineer constructs an extended version of the song, destined for, among others, nightclubs, adding as required supplemental effects and even sounds from other sources.” (Dominique Bassal, 2005)
Mastering today
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Mastering is still very much a part of the industry, although most of them no longer cut master discs from analog reel tape. The CD generation has definitely caused a huge change in the mastering process. This process is now known as mastering where the recording in its final stage is brought in recorded on to a digital medium and is then sent for pressing. !
In the older days, each record company would have its own in house engineers working to a pre determined standard set by the company itself. These standards were