In April I had the opportunity to do a live recording with the local branch of Rock Choir in The Rothes Halls in Glenrothes. This came about after making an approach to the head office of the Rock Choir who then put me in contact with Rachel Leach, the choir leader who was more than happy to assist. After a discussion talking about the possibility of doing a location recording with them I was invited to meet her and the choir for an evening in March, during which a brief video recording was made for my own reference to how the evening is conducted.

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The Rock Choir specialise in choral vocal performances consisting of bass, tenor, alto and soprano split into segments with works based upon popular pop and rock, for this session Erasure’s "A Little Respect" and Danny Wilson's "Mary's Prayer"

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The setup involved for the recording was a Stereo Spaced Pair using the Neumann U87 Microphone in a matched pairing.

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The challenge involved for this recording was in making sure an ideal distance from the performers was in place so that the recording would be able to make use of reverberant room sound (RT60) while making sure the vocalists could still be heard in a clear and blended way. On the evening of the recording, what was based on the plan where using Hall B was available that is a very reverberant hall this was no longer available due to external factors so the location was moved into a conference room. This had the effect that the 75 members were tightly fitted into the room and that the Mics were placed next to the wall, thus losing the reverberant room sound.

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Health and Safety requirements had to be considered as well before recording could start, thus safe cable routing between the mics and the portable recorder was made sure of, by routing the cabling along the wall that the mics, the main doors were kept closed to stop anyone coming into the room while cables were along the floor. There was also a rear door to the room thus easy access was maintained if anyone required to leave or enter the room, this was all done so that minimising the chance of any trips from happening while maintaining a safe way to exit in case of emergency.