Having previously installed two SSL Origin mixing consoles on its main campus and at Ocean Way Nashville Recording Studios in 2022, Belmont University has now added two further Origin desks in its Mike Curb College of Entertainment & Music Business Quonset Hut and Columbia Studio A on Nashville’s Music Row. The aim is to bring consistency and efficiency to the teaching environment.
‘All of our studio production classes that use these facilities learn now on the same console,’ says instructor Michael Janas, the Chair of Audio Engineering Technology. ‘That allows us focus just on production techniques, as opposed to having to teach a new mixing console signal flow or a new workflow every eight weeks.’
As well as the 32-channel Origin consoles, the school’s teaching tools include SSL E Series Dynamics Modules in 500 Series format, which are integrated into three of Belmont’s studio classrooms.
‘We’ve been very pleased with Origin at Ocean Way Studio B and on the campus at REM Studio A, Janas says. ‘Origin has helped us clean up some of the things that we do in teaching and has really helped students understand signal flow and allowed them to focus on producing music or audio. The Origin has much more of a modern flow, because nowadays people are really using direct outputs.’
Second-level audio students have been enjoying the creative possibilities enabled by having separate inserts on the small fader and the long fader on the Origin. This dual-path signal flow also allows students to be creative with Origin’s PureDrive mic preamp.
‘Having the two meters – channel and monitor – above each input makes that much more useful,’ Janas says. ‘You can pull your small fader down, hit the Drive button, crank it up and push it into the DAW. Bring it back on the large fader to listen to it and it’s almost like having input/output control of distortion.’
The Quonset Hut and Columbia Studio A are almost identically equipped, including DAW and converters, outboard equipment and microphone collection. The only significant difference is the acoustic signature of the respective live rooms. When Quonset Hut was built, control rooms were generally not very large, so the outboard equipment is housed in front wall soffits. ‘But we needed a place for the patchbay, so Ocean Way Nashville technicians Travis Moore and Eric Vogel came up with the idea to custom-build a rack that has the same angle and profile as the SSL console,’ Janas says.
Nashville’s Music Row can trace its roots back to 1955, when brothers Owen and Harold Bradley set up a recording studio that would become the heart of the country music business. Columbia Records acquired the brothers’ Quonset Hut studio in 1962, constructing Studio A in a new building that also absorbed most of the hut, which was renamed Columbia Studio B. Over the years, the facility’s client list grew to include Tammy Wynette, Johnny Cash, the Byrds, Bob Dylan, Roger Miller, George Jones, Elvis Costello, Gene Vincent and Simon & Garfunkel. Mike Curb’s foundation purchased the complex in 2005, refurbishing Columbia Studio A and Studio B – the Quonset Hut – to serve as classrooms for Belmont University’s Audio Engineering Technology offerings.
More: www.solidstatelogic.com
