Journal 2017

JOURNAL [2017]

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December 2017

• Over the years we have worked with Howard Shore on numerous films. This month we recorded his music for a Chinese mobile phone game “Honor of Kings” with him at Abbey Road. This game is huge in China, and we recorded a very large orchestra with featured Chinese flute. It must be one of the few mobile phone games ever to commission a symphonic score from an Oscar winning composer. [kw]

• We are working with Japanese composer Shigeru Umebayashi for the first time. He is recording the score for a Chinese game (yes, second one this month!). We are recording in Studio 2 Abbey Rd and the score features guitar, bass and drums along with orchestra. [pc]

• I had a lovely trip to Paris to see Gabriel Yared’s concert at La Philharmonie with the London Symphony Orchestra. The concert was beautiful and it was nice to see so many friends there. Here’s a little behind the scenes video (in French!). [kw]

November 2017

• Last year we recorded a couple of albums with James Morrison - one of which recorded overnight with his quartet !

  We have had the pleasure of mixing this recently at Sweet Thunder. The quartet comprises of James, his two sons William and Harry along with drummer Patrick Danao.

• We are also thrilled that the other album we recorded and mixed with James and the BBC Concert Orchestra has just won an ARIA award for best Jazz Album. Congratulations James !! [pc]

• As avid lifetime students of audio and recording techniques Pete and I have always been very much aware of the work of Alan Dower Blumlein in developing stereo recording and reproduction techniques (as well as many other inventions and innovations). His work is almost unknown to people outside the audio and electrical engineering community, and his family have been working to have his achievements more widely recognised, and we have been very happy to support this endeavour. As Alan was a former EMI employee, Pete has done a lot to encourage EMI recognise his groundbreaking work. I’m sure we will expand on this subject in a blog soon, but in the meantime we thought we would celebrate the recent posthumous technical grammy awarded to Alan. We were both honoured to be invited by our friends the Blumlein family to a reception at the House of Commons to mark the occasion. [kw]

• We have been working nearly the whole month on the new DC Comics Film - “ Justice League”.

  Danny Elfman has composed an epic score for this film, using his famous Batman theme and other DC comic characters’ themes. I have been recording long days at Air and Abbey Rd, and Kirsty has been at Sweet Thunder mixing ready for a very swift dub delivery schedule. Cécile Tournesac has done a great job of score editing for us again.

  This is the first time Danny has been at Sweet Thunder to mix, we loved having him with us and he enjoyed the tranquil vibe and hanging out in the lounge despite the hive of activity going on around to meet the deadlines ! [pc]

August 2017

• Nearly a year in and we are loving having our own mix room - but it never stops giving you ideas for improvements and new innovations, for creativity, sonic quality and also for efficiency. We are always learning and experimenting! To this end we’ve been doing lots of work in the studio, including the installation of our prototype thunderDesk mkII. We’ve been beavering away at this with the help of Pop Whalley (Kirsty’s dad) and expert custom work from Sebastian at Towersonics. (There’s even been a special school holiday helper - Kirsty’s son Theo!). [pc]

July 2017

• We are excited to be attending the London Premiere of “Valerian and the City of A Thousand Planets” Directed by Luc Besson with score recorded by Pete and I at Radio France, Paris and mixed at Sweet Thunder and Guillaume Tell Studios. [kw]

• Recording and mixing the score for Xavier Dolan’s “Death and Life of John F Donovan”, with music by Gabriel Yared [pc]

June 2017

• Something a little different this month ! Pete and I just finished doing the live sound for “Touching the Void” - LIVE at the Barbican. Alex Heffes reorchestrated his score for this fantastic film, and played it along live with the film. The director Kevin MacDonald and Joe Simpson the climber featured in the film were also there for a fascinating Q&A. [kw]

• A highlight this month has been working on ‘The Shape of Water’, this film is directed by Guillermo Del Toro, with a wonderful score by Alexandre Desplat. We had a great time recording this score, (produced by Solrey) which features no less than 12 flutes, and accordion with whistling (from the composer himself!) along with the LSO. The film is amazing and the score is fab. Recording was at Abbey Rd Studio 1, and mixing at Sweet Thunder. [kw]

• Joe Hishaishi is in London to mix an album of his concert works with us. Pre-production at Sweet Thunder, then taking our computer and lovely analogue chain into the Penthouse at Abbey Road for playback and final tweaks. [pc]

May 2017

• At Air again - this time with the LSO and producer Nick Patrick, recording some orchestral accompaniments to some famous Pavarotti performances. We will then edit these new recordings to tightly match original performances to make a new version of these classics. [kw]

• We have been recording and mixing for the frequent collaborators George Clooney and Alexandre Desplat as they come together to work on the score for the dark thriller “Suburbicon”. It’s always fun and full of good humour when Alexandre and George are in the studio together. We recorded jazz and ladies vocal group at British Grove Studios (using their amazing vintage EMI desks), followed by a couple of days with the LSO at Abbey Road. The score was mixed at Sweet Thunder. [pc]

April 2017

• Last year we recorded an album for James Morrison with the BBC Concert orchestra. We are now editing, mixing and compiling these at Sweet Thunder - it sounds great ! [pc]

• We love recording at British Grove Studios. We have been there recording James Newton-Howard’s score for Kathryn Bigelow’s new film “Detroit”. We’ve brought our matched trio of Chandler Red mics which we love - and recording them through the original vintage desk that their preamps are modelled on tickles our fancy very much ! Red on Redd !

March 2017

• This month sees the release of the 2CELLOs new album “Score”. Recorded at Air with the LSO, we mixed this album at Sweet Thunder with Nick Patrick producing. This was such fun and we really enjoyed watching the accompanying videos! [kw]

• Kirsty and I have been in Paris for a few weeks mixing Alexandre’s score for “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets”. After some preproduction and initial mixing at Sweet Thunder we have been at Guillaume Tell studio doing final mix tweaks with Alexandre. One of the fun things about working in Paris is the little treats Alexandre brings to mix reviews !! [pc]

• We arrived back from Paris on one train, and early the next morning were on another to Manchester with a case full of microphones and mobile recording gear. Our Redd microphones and soundfield mic we put to good use recording the sounds of the fabulous old steam engines at the Manchester Science & Industry museum with Matthew Herbert. These sounds have since been edited, manipulated and mixed to form a composition to be played as part of the Manchester International Festival. Check out the video below to see what we were up to. [kw]

February 2017

• It’s been amazing to hear the sounds of outer space coming to Sweet Thunder as we mix the score for Alien Covenant. Really enjoying all the hard work coming together - Jed and the team have done a great job !

• Kirsty and I have been working at Radio France for the first time. We are recording the first large scale film sessions there ever, working with Alexandre Desplat and Solrey.

  Music creative director Solrey knows this place very well having played in the orchestra here, and has organised these sessions and the musicians brilliantly, and Alexandre is enjoying conducting his music in this concert hall environment. The Radio France facility is impressive, huge and fascinating - and has a fantastic panoramic view of Paris from the top of it. It’s been a challenge adapting what is essentially a broadcast record facility to be able to work through the rigours of modern day film scoring but we are happy with how efficient it is in the end and how great it sounds !

January 2017

• Pete and I met up with Australian composer Jed Kurzel and engineer Matt Lovell to discuss producing the score for Ridley Scott’s new Alien film “Alien Covenant” at the beginning of the month. We spent most of January in pre-production with them before heading to Air and Abbey Road to record Jed’s super cool score combining mad Aussie soundscapes with hints of classic Jerry Goldsmith ! [kw]