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"TALK OF THE TOWN"
BY CHRISTOPHER WALSH: Billboard Magazine, Oct. 20, 2001
Right Track Recording, a multiroom facility with a 25-year history
in New York City, hosted the first session in its new facility at 509
West 38th St. Oct 8, as the CenturyMen, a chorus made up of
musical directors from Baptist churches across America, christened the
studio with the majestic power of some 100 voices.
The talk of the New York recording industry for the past year--when construction
on "Studio A509" began--Right Track's newest room is nothing short of
breathtaking. A mammoth 85-foot-by-55-foot main tracking space with a
35-foot-high ceiling. Studio A509, located just a block from the Jacob
Javits Convention Center (site of the upcoming 111th Audio Engineering
Society Convention), is the latest addition to a city that, more than ever,
can benefit from such a statement. The studio, designed to host orchestral
recordings,
is an auspicious and timely assertion of New York's continuing
history as the artistic and cultural capital of the U.S.
Designed by Dennis Janson, managing partner of the New York-based
Janson Design Group, the palatial Studio A509
is surrounded by five large isolation
booths and an equally impressive control room,
itself measuring some 1,100 square
feet. The control room features a 96-channel Solid State Logic 9000 J Series console
customized with a removable SL 956 multichannel monitoring panel.
Not only does Studio A509 further signal a return of colossal, magnificent recording
spaces in Manhattan--joining Hit Factory's Studio One, Manhattan Center Studios'
adjacent Hammerstein Ballroom, and Sony Music Studios' main stage, largely used
fro TV production--it is also emblematic of the economic might of the city.
Right Track owner Simon Andrews explains that the New York City Investment
Fund, conceived by financier Henry Kravis to identify and support New York
entrepreneurs, was instrumental to the project, as were partner Frank Filipetti--
an engineer/producer with a long affiliation with Right Track's 48th St. location--
Fleet Bank, and the building's leasing company.
"We've been thinking about an orchestral room for eight years," Andrews explains.
"The firm decision to do it was made at the end of '98. Then I started looking for
suitable premises, because the key in New York is real estate.
You're in two
businesses in New York: your own, and real estate--it's just the nature of Manhattan.
Then in February '99, I found this.
We started demolition in August 2000 and construction
in October. Here we are in October of 2001, and we're open. It's very exciting.
A room of this size has not been built since the days of the old RCA, back in the
late '50s."
With ample natural light, multiple microphone and cue lines laid along troughs under
the floor, and clear visibility between tracking room, iso booths, and control room,
all provisions for film scoring, Broadway cast recording, and orchestral dates
are in place.
At the inaugural session, producer Buryl Red, musical director and arranger
for the CenturyMen, led the chorus from the conductor's position, some 100 men, music
stands, and pairs of headphones arrayed in front of him. Above were positioned four
Neumann TLM170s, a pair of B & K 4006s, a Calrec Soundfield, and a Decca Tree
microphone array holding Neumann M50s.
"The control room is spacious," Andrews notes. "You can get 20 people in there without
feeling on top of each other. And we're getting rave reviews about the sound, which is,
obviously, the ultimate test in the end."
Inside the A509 control room, Nashville-based engineer Dan Rudin sat at the
96-channel SSL 9000, recording the CenturyMen to Pro Tools. During a break, Rudin
and Red reviewed passages of the track, the resonant, thundering chorus filling the
room as Andrews exclaimed, "Unbelievable!"
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