what was your first real recording experience?

chris ivey · Post by **chris ivey** » 28 Aug 2010 9:56 am

i was just reminiscing about the past and recalled my first professional (?) recording experience. in the early 70's i had been playing steel for probably about 2 years. i drove up to calgary to visit friends with my little s10 black emmons. i sat in with dave wilkie and foxy john at a gig or two and someone came up talking steel and recording to me. as it turned out, i was planning to head north to my sister's house in edmonton the next day and this guy hooked me up with a studio there that needed one track. it was a canadian singer, jack hennig, and the song was 'the dreams are never ended'. it was fun and pretty easy...first time i'd ever had that kind of opportunity.i heard that the song was played on the radio for awhile.

now, 38 years and a million gigs or so later, this may be the only recording i ever did that got any airplay on a normal station, but 'the dreams have never ended'!

what are your stories?

Jack Stoner · Post by **Jack Stoner** » 28 Aug 2010 11:29 am

The first recording session I did was in 1960. I was in a band that was all Air Force members at Keesler AFB, Biloxi Miss. The band's name was "The Tunedusters". We cut two original songs that the singer had wrote. I was only playing rhythm guitar at the time. It was cut in Carpenter's Music Store's recording studio in Biloxi with Pee Wee Maddox as the engineer. I have no idea what happened with the recording as shortly after that I got sent to Taipei Taiwan.

The first session I did that had any significant air play was for Big K Records in Kansas City, Mo in 75 or 76. The song was "Pin Ball Boogie" and the singer was Bob Bohn from Iowa. That was a strange session as I had been in the studio earlier and did a session with the KC band I was in at the time (did both steel and lead guitar on that session) and Charlie Kellogg, the studio owner heard my steel licks and decided that was what he wanted on "Pin Ball Boogie". They had already done the music part of the session for the song with Jack Hensley on Steel and his son Danny on lead guitar. He had to do the session over as he only had a 4 track recorder at the time and was bouncing tracks to get everything down. The session went well but it was strange to me, doing the session with Danny Hensley and I replaced his dad on steel. The song did well in the upper midwest and went to #1 in Iowa, Nebraska, North and South Dakota and Minnesota (that I know of).

chas smith · Post by **chas smith** » 28 Aug 2010 12:36 pm

Early 70's, I was playing B3 and my first jobs were playing on porno soundtracks in a small studio in Redondo Beach. It was mostly, noodle in the dorian mode, and we were expected to keep time with what the "actors" were doing. We got really good at speeding up and slowing down. I think the 1st one, was The Goddaughter, or it might have been Tower of Love, I'm sure you'll remember them....

basilh · Post by **basilh** » 28 Aug 2010 5:44 pm

chas smith wrote:I think the 1st one, was The Goddaughter, or it might have been Tower of Love, I'm sure you'll remember them....

Nah don't think I've seen them, the only ones that made it over here were Debbie Does Dallas and Baby Face, never really managed to hear much of the musical soundtrack..

Clyde Mattocks · Post by **Clyde Mattocks** » 28 Aug 2010 5:55 pm

At radio station WELS in the mid 50's. They had a Gates reel to reel. The artist was a guy named Horace King, who wrote songs and played the upright piano. The station piano was horribly out of tune. Horace hit a chord(?) and told Jerry Dunbar, the bass player to "Get with this". Jerry said, "I don't believe I can get out of tune bad enough to get with that piano".

John De Maille · Post by **John De Maille** » 29 Aug 2010 6:55 am

My first recording session with the steel was in the late 70's. A guy approached me at a gig and asked if I would be willing to set down a couple of tracks for some tunes he had written. I agreed and did the tracks for him. The tunes were about the NY Jets football team. The session went off well and the pay was good, so, I was happy. Little did I know, that, these two tunes were the soundtrack the NY Jets used during the football games. I remember watching a game and hearing them on the TV. I said Holy $#^*, that's me playing the steel on TV. It was a real ego boost. The tunes were "Sack Exchange" and "First & Goal". A neat experience.

Joe Alterio · Post by **Joe Alterio** » 29 Aug 2010 9:36 am

The drummer of my last band was/is very good friends with the brothers that own the Pop Machine studio in Indianapolis. Our band regularly played the studio's Christmas parties for free, our drummer frequently ran sound for the band those brothers were in for free....so the drummer called in a favor and asked if we could record an album in the studio. They said absolutely!

So...I had my first (and only) studio experience on that weekend in 2006. And wouldn't you know the band broke up shortly thereafter?

I guess the drummer took it upon himself to mix everything...and has even fronted the cost to master it and press CDs which will be released on the studio's label....still not released, but it will be very cool to say that I have an album out there that is not a vanity pressing

Jack Francis · Post by **Jack Francis** » 29 Aug 2010 12:45 pm

Did the steel on commercials for Thousand Trails...then some demo stuff and then my Roadhouse Kings Band CD's...not much!!! $:\$

Mark van Allen · Post by **Mark van Allen** » 29 Aug 2010 1:03 pm

I think around 1975 my first band recorded a demo at Bryce Robertson's "Uncle Dirty" sound studio in Kalamazoo, MI. Bryce had been an assistant through the glory years at Sun, was a gruff taskmaster. Among others we cut an instrumental version of "Wichita Lineman" and he had me double the steel melody. It was a revelation to me how carefully I had to copy the nuances of the first take, and how a "double" sounded.

With my later fascination for recording and engineering, I've always regretted not making a pest of myself and hanging around the studio more. Bryce was a real maven and a true character.

Eddie Cunningham · Post by **Eddie Cunningham** » 29 Aug 2010 4:45 pm

In 1949 , a friend , Ray Schacht AKA Carl Stuart , asked me to back him up on a couple songs he wrote. We went to Ace Recording Studio in Boston where the record was cut on a lathe on a plastic disc by a needle , you make a mistake , you have to do the whole thing again , there was no dubbing in !! It was originally done on a 78 RPM disc but was later released in 1952 on a 45 RPM record !! Things have changed a LOT in recording technology since that early time !!! The Old Geezer , Eddie "C"

John Bechtel · Post by **John Bechtel** » 29 Aug 2010 9:22 pm

My first recordings were made in about ’58/’59 in a small home-studio in Allentown, Pa. with Tex Carson and the Smokey Valley Troubadours. The songs were “Going Down To A Honky-Tonk” and “I've Lived A Lifetime For You”. I still have my copy and back then, that was all anyone got! (Plus the expectation of a bright future in music!) In fact, to this day I don't recall ever getting paid for a session, except for several Custom-Sessions in Jackson, Tn. in about ’83. But, that's OK. I didn't do more than 90-min. of recorded material anyway! I spent a lot more than that amount of playing-time on my own home-recordings!

Dr. Hugh Jeffreys · Post by **Dr. Hugh Jeffreys** » 30 Aug 2010 10:46 am

I had an elaborate experience with WILCOX-GAY, INC.

Johan Jansen · Post by **Johan Jansen** » 30 Aug 2010 10:49 am

Trucker-album 30+ years ago, became nr 1 in Holland, was my 'breaktrough'

JJ

Bill Terry · Post by **Bill Terry** » 30 Aug 2010 11:47 am

A couple of Public Service commercials in Fort Worth Texas; must have been in the late 70's or early 80's.. Funny how some stuff just sticks, this one was promoting a ride-share program, I'll never forget the first line of the jingle:

"Saddle up, join the ride-share roundup,
Saddle up, .... "

That right there is art...

Ron Randall · Post by **Ron Randall** » 30 Aug 2010 1:28 pm

About 1961. Our garage band recorded some of our stuff at SELLERS recording studio, absolutely downtown Dallas down the street from McCord's music.(huge Fender dealer)

I learned that as a rhythm player I should not play the same chord shapes as the lead player.

Later, about '64 we recorded a live album at the Pit Club(aka the Bronco Bowl) in Dallas.
Our engineer did all the hard work. 4 SM57's for everything. 3 singers, rhythm guitar, P bass, Lead guitar, real piano, full drum kit, and crowd noise No overdubs, no tricks.
A few of the songs made the national charts. Played on American Bandstand.

When you record live, you don't have to have monitors! Our sound was well dialed in from playing there every Friday and Saturday night.

I learned that you can get great sound with out a hundred microphones.

FWIW

RR

Twayn Williams · Post by **Twayn Williams** » 30 Aug 2010 1:46 pm

My first pro recording session on guitar was in '89 in Kansas City with the BCR band doing a theme song to a children's program (I forget the name.) The sad thing is that my recording rates haven't changed since then

Must be why I do very little pro recording...

I've only been in the studio with PSG once, at Jackpot Studio in Portland. The RF was so bad I had to swap my nice custom single coil pickup for the default George L's humbucker half-way through the sessions. The guitar player was so out of tune all the time from constant retuning (he used lots of alternate tunings) that we were never in tune together. As an experiment, I had the engineer during playback take the guitar out, leaving the steel, B3, bass and drums and it was beautiful. Then I had him take out the steel and leave the guitar in and it was acceptable. The lesson I drew from this is not to play PSG with a guitar player who's always changing to alternate tunings. (I left that band soon after, it was obvious I wasn't working out...)

Paddy Long · Post by **Paddy Long** » 30 Aug 2010 1:52 pm

I came in from a session last night and was writing up my session log ...funny you should mention this, because I happened to thumb back to the very first session I did in 1976 ... playing guitar on that one - boy it seems like a million years (and sessions) ago

.. If I remember rightly it got very little air play and probably ended up in the cheapy bins about a week after it's release !! I have played steel on a few platinum releases since though.

Bent Romnes · Post by **Bent Romnes** » 30 Aug 2010 3:35 pm

I have a grand total of 2 sessions to my credit.
Not a record thing...
First one was when I attended the Jeffran College and part of the schooling was to go to Bradley's Barn and dub the steel onto prerecorded tracks with Bob Browning as the singer. I did mediocre. Jeff thought I did ok but remarked that I was very nervous.
I did Time Changes Everything. Thinking back, I felt it was so cool that I got to record in the same studio as Loretta Lynn and Hal Rugg.

My second session was here in London around 1978 where I did the steel part on a demo song by a singer who was to participate in a song contest
My pay was a copy of the song. I still have it on a little reel-to-reel tape. I'll be sure to transfer this to CD soon as I get the opportunity to have it done.

Jody Sanders · Post by **Jody Sanders** » 30 Aug 2010 6:56 pm

Prior to this, I had played on song writer demos. The first recording that was released on a label and put on the market was in about 1953 called "Garden Of Roses" sung by Rudy Gaddis. A beautiful country ballad. Got a lot of air play and jukebox play in Texas. I played a S8 Rick. Done lots of gigs with Rudy. Those were truly the good old days. Jody.

Dr. Hugh Jeffreys · Post by **Dr. Hugh Jeffreys** » 31 Aug 2010 4:54 pm

I still have a Wilcox-Gay machine that I purchased in 1953. It records 5/8" tape, reel to reel, as well as real NYLON discs.

Paul Crawford · Post by **Paul Crawford** » 31 Aug 2010 4:55 pm

I played guitar for Jim Kaza in a local studio in Muskogee in 1967. It was that toe stubbing tune, "You Can't Make Hay Pickin' Cotton."

So good I went into the Army the next month and got back in the studio in 1998. $:\$

Larry Bell · Post by **Larry Bell** » 1 Sep 2010 7:14 am

I was fortunate to be in one of Nashville's top rock bands in the 60s. My first session was at Woodland studios in 1966 (I was 16). Our manager was DJ Dan Hoffman from WKDA in Nashville and he knew EVERYONE in Nashville and wanted local rock music to succeed since that's what he played on the radio. Bill Grine (legendary Nashville photographer) was our publicist and photographer and between Dan and Bill we could almost write our own ticket. We recorded six tunes in two sessions a week apart. I've still got the rough stereo mixes on them.

Unfortunately (I guess) very little ever came from those sessions. Our one original tune was never released.

My first session on steel -- like my buddy Mark Van Allen -- was in Kalamazoo, MI at Uncle Dirty's Sound Machine studio. Bryce Roberson was a world class engineer from Chess Records who settled in Kazoo and opened a studio. Even though I taught guitar in the same building, I only had a handful of sessions with Bryce (unfortunately). He knew things that very few engineers or producers had a clue about. Every recording I ever heard him do was spectacular. This was in 1976 and I'd been playing steel less than a year, but Bryce made me sound better on tape than I did live (which was pretty easy to do).

Those are my early recollections -- FWIW.

Ben Jones · Post by **Ben Jones** » 1 Sep 2010 8:12 am

I was 15, coked up 80's metal hair/glam band in Cleveland OH. lyrics were pure spinal tap, but not on purpose.
all I remember about it is that my fingers made this super loud scraping noise on the strings every time i moved my hand and that every one of the studio guys looked like Dr. Johnny Fever or one of the Freak Brothers. far out maaaan

first pedal steel , couple years ago at the studio where Lionel Ricthie recorded Dancing on the Ceiling .

joe long · Post by **joe long** » 1 Sep 2010 9:44 am

The first time I saw the inside of a real recording studio was around 1975 in Dallas. I was playing with a great band in Arlington,TX. The leader of the band had written some orginal songs he wanted recorded. We did not get to hear the songs before going into the studio. The leader wanted something orginal and not rehersed.

It was a great experience and I still have the orginal real to real tape. From that recording I know that at least one of his songs was recored by Charlie Pride on a gospel album.

Scott Henderson · Post by **Scott Henderson** » 2 Sep 2010 5:53 am

Well I was working radio when I was 17...But my first steel session was when I was 18. I did a jingle
for Deans Family Restaurant in Liberal...mmmmm corn dogs....Been ate up ever since...

The Steel Guitar Forum

what was your first real recording experience?

what was your first real recording experience?

In 1949 - 78 RPM - Cut on a lathe