This was my first published album as a mixing engineer. The composer is a senior modern music composer. Since he was in Taiwan for only a short time, we had less than one day to record all three version of his song, which was composed for the Chinese instrument ensemble, the Western instrument ensemble, and the Gayageum and Changgu Obligato (a Korean traditional instrument).

Mr. Chou emphasized the concept that music should be like poetry, an idea that was too deep for the band and me to fully understand. So we had a lot of interesting discussions during this production!

To get the clarity and sharpness of contours, I set microphones for each individual instrument besides the main mic (an AB pair). I wanted to achieve better sound attack and attenuation, and with this approach, I gained Mr. Chou’s approval.

After the first recording, Mr. Chou was impressed by the fluent performance of the Chinese instrument ensemble, but he still wanted them to play more accurately in tune. We did another recording later, and while the second recording was perfect in tune, Mr. Chou thought it had lost the feeling of poetry. Then it became difficult to choose between the two versions.

In order to let Mr. Chou have a better idea for comparing the two recordings, I tried different styles of mixing for each recording. For the first mixing, I tried to put the instrument farther behind to let each instrument blend into the environment. I did this to restore the feel of poetry. For the second mixing, balance and clarity took priority, but it still sounded well blended, so that the tune problem of single instruments would not be too obvious.

For three months, Mr. Chou gathered opinions from his friends and finally decided on the first recording as the better one. And Mr. Chou’s intensions also became clearer. I had left the mixing style intact, so I could continue to get the final details done when the decision was made. I carefully adjusted the balance between each instrument and complemented the inadequate, automated balance. I also paid special attention to the execution in crescendo and diminuendo, a detail which Mr. Chou emphasized a lot.

At last, Mr. Chou was very satisfied with the final mixing. This was a precious experience for me.