The Recording Studio

[Ralf11]

You'd think it would be High-Tech (for whatever that meant in the era of the recordings), but apparently not.  I have at least a couple of examples, but will start with...

 

Rudy Van Gelder

 

His parents' living room was used for many recording sessions in the 1950s.  The Coltrane '58 collection has a large booklet and this is described on p. 22.  The living room, "with its cushioned furniture,  curtained windows and a floor lamp," in Hackensack, NJ "was in constant demand" and became "one of the most important recording studios" of the 1950s.

 

Rudy Van Gelder had started his recording service as a hobby, and despite already having a career as an optometrist had built it into a profession, becoming as "important a player in the modern jazz community as the players themselves."  

 

He was the choice of all the main jazz labels and was respected by musicians, label chiefs and other recording engineers.  Phil Ramone (co-founder of A&R Studios in midtown Manhattan) said that Van Gelder had a little bit more aggressive, or non-conservative than others.

 

Donald Fagen, of Steely Dan fame, said that Van Gelder's work had a lot of clarity without reverb or echo to cloud or muddy the sound: "studio natural," "dry but live sound" and used it as a model for their own work.

 

There is more in the Coltrane '58 booklet - several pages worth.

[Ralf11]

The Laundromat

 

Another interesting and significant recording studio was Cosimo Matassa’s J&M Recording Studios, which is often regarded as the birthplace of Rock & Roll.  Located (of course) in New Orleans, on N. Rampart St., near Congo Square, it served Fats Domino, Little Richard and 'Fess, among others.  The Studio was said to have a special sound quality, but I forgot where I read or heard that.

 

https://acloserwalknola.com/places/jm-recording-studio/

 

[semente]

What about this one?

 

 

[Ralf11]

nice Funk House