The Talk Box

The Talk Box is one of the most iconic modulation effects units of all time. Used by some of the world’s biggest live band and DJ acts, the Talk Box has helped to shape and develop the music scene thanks to its range of unique sounds and versatility. However, knowing how to get the most out of your Talk Box can be a bit of a mystery, so ACM spoke to ACM Keyboard Lecturer and Talk Box veteran Brian Henry about how to set up, mic up and get great tone from this compact yet powerful effects unit.

The History of the Talk Box

From its early incarnations through to its modern day siblings, the Talk Box has been about one thing only; creating unique sounds. Controlled by a musicians lip syncing or the shape of the mouth, the Talk Box manipulates the shape of a sound’s frequency applying speech sounds to a musical instrument. The result is only limited by your requirements and imagination Watch the rest of ACM’s Talk Box Tutorial series:

This years ACM Songwriting Competition was a huge success! This is one of the biggest events in the ACM calendar, seeing over 100 entries for the competition. 13 were shortlisted to perform their chosen song live at the music venue, the Boileroom in Guildford. ACM invited down a Music Industry guest to judge the event and choose the winner.

This year we were lucky to have Rich Holly from Peermusic Publishing who announced that George Peploe with his song ‘Phonecall Away’ was the winner. “It was a privilege to judge this year’s ACM Song Writing Competition. The standard was particularly high this year and it was great to see the students being so supportive of each other.

It was really hard to choose a winner but I felt ‘Phonecall Away’ by George Peploe struck an instant, powerful and emotive connection with the listener, which, to me, is a sign of a great song.” Rich Holly Peermusic Publishing

He listened to all the artists and then decided and announced the winner at the end of the evening.

“I can’t believe I won the ACM Songwriting Competition! The Competition was fierce this year. I would like to thank Rich from Peer Music for choosing my song. This is song is very personal to me and I’m very happy other people connected with it. Looking forward to the studio time and spending the vouchers!” George Peploe Winner of ACM’s Songwriting Competition 2012

George has won £400 worth of Andertons Music Vouchers and some studio time. ACM also invited back last years winner Karina Vismara who performed her winning song ‘Only You’ to a rapturous applause! She also performed a brand new song for all to hear.

ACM would like to thank all the artists who applied for this competition and the 13 shortlisted: Amy Gould, Sophy Jansen, Joe Hamilton, Emma O’Gorman, Jonny Winston, Alex Stamp, Lawrie Pattison, Sam Wills, Tamsyn Phillips, Joy Mumford, Martha Paton and Penny Nicholls who performed exceptionally well. ACM is really looking forward to next years competition.

Danny Bowes is best known as the frontman of ’80s rock sensation Thunder and has spent many years on the world touring during the late eighties and early nineties, giving Danny a wealth of experience of music’s highs and lows.

ACM was pleased to welcome Danny to deliver two exclusive vocal class sessions and an extra special Vocal Masterclass on Wednesday 16th May. Kicking off with ‘She’s So Fine’ - taken from Thunder’s first album ‘Backstreet Symphony’ - Danny showed students why he has become one the world’s most iconic vocalists. Speaking with ACM Fellow Jono McNeil, Danny spoke about the lessons the band learned from getting signed to Sony, its impact on their early career and the resulting success after being signed by EMI.

During the hour and a half masterclass session Danny spoke about his time in Thunder, life on the road and what it takes to make it as a vocalist within todays music scene. Danny also commented on the challenges he faced being both the band’s voice on stage as well as their voice in the business world having been managing Thunder for 15 years.

“It was a natural progression really - I got to the point where I knew more than the manager and it just felt natural to take on the role.” Danny Bowes - Thunder.

Earlier in the day Danny had spent time with two of ACM’s vocal classes listing, mentoring and sharing his experience with the students - some of whom chose to sing some of Thunder’s classic hits even adding their own unique twists! ACM would like to thank Danny for taking time out visit the Guildford campus and for the words of advice and support he gave to all our students.

Find out more about Danny Bowles and Thunder from their website www.thunderonline.com

Level 42’s Mark King to visit ACM!!!!

What better way to kick off a new ACM term than with a visit from one of our most celebrated Performance School Alumni - Newton Faulkner.

Following two successful albums, sell-out UK and international tours, Newton returned to his ACM roots to give a very special performance masterclass at Guildford’s Electric Theatre that even a torrential April shower couldn’t dampen.

“It was incredible to have an artist of Newton Faulkner’s calibre come and spend time with the students in such an intimate setting. His performance was inspiring and his personable and down to earth manner made for an enjoyable and highly informative afternoon.” Pete Friesen Fellow of ACM

From the off Newton was only too happy to engage with the students, taking questions ranging from tuning techniques, discussing self promotion and the use of social media & explaining his songwriting and composition methods.

In between the extended question and answer session, Newton dazzled the ACM audience with a series of signature solo performances which included ‘Dream Catch Me’, ‘I Need Something’ plus snippets from ‘Teardrop’ and ‘UFO’ and material from his third studio album due for release later this year.

ACM would just like to say a huge thank you to Newton Faulkner for dropping by ACM and bringing a smile to so many students and tutors alike - we wish him well with the remainder of his tour and the forthcoming release of his new album.

Newton is currently touring the UK and appeared at Guildford’s GLive to a packed out audience.

Follow Newton online by - website, via Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

ACM Students Put Music Recording on Ice

A Surrey ice rink provided the unlikely venue for a captivating string quartet performance, in a YouTube stunt organised by ACM students. The idea was dreamed up by Ben Pitt, a first year Music Production student, after he was challenged during a lecture to find unusual environments in which to record music.

Determined to think big, Ben enlisted the help of ACM pal Terry Seares and the pair set their sights on the Spectrum ice rink, home of the Guildford Flames hockey team.

“The brief was to capture a performance in an acoustically interesting environment, which got everyone thinking about places like churches or underpasses. I wanted to come up with something original, that hadn’t been tried before. The big space and hard surfaces at the ice rink made me wonder what kind of sound it would produce.

A string quartet seemed like a good fit for the setting, playing a slow, graceful piece to give the ambience of the room plenty of space to breathe on the recording. We weren’t required to video the project, but it seemed a waste just to record the sound during a performance that was so great to watch.” - Ben Pitt ACM Production Student

The team had just one hour to set up the equipment, record four complete takes of the composition, then pack everything up again.

“There were still ice hockey players skating around at the start, which was a bit surreal, but once they had gone everybody chipped in with setting up, which helped keep everything on time. The sound was amazing and the quartet nailed it on the third take. There are a few creaking and banging noises from people in the background, but that kind of adds to the atmosphere.” - Ben Pitt ACM Production Student

The Technical Bit

Ben and Terry used just two microphones to capture the performance – a matched pair of RØDE NT5s, worth about £300.

The microphones were arranged in an NOS configuration and plugged into an Apple Macbook Pro, via an M-AUDIO Fast Track Pro audio interface, onto Logic Pro 9, while the whole performance was filmed by Do It Films UK.

Explaining the setup, Terry Seares said: “The challenge was to get the best possible sound in the short time available, using the limited equipment we had to hand. There was a fair bit of guesswork involved. We opted for a spaced pair at first, but found it picked up too much room sound and not enough direct sound from the musicians.

We noticed a low background humming noise from a machine at the rink, which coincidentally was in key with the piece, but we decided to cut that frequency range when mixing it afterwards. Production wise we didn’t add anything; just a little corrective EQ and very slight compression. We’re very pleased with how it turned out and we’ve had some great comments and feedback.” Terry Seares ACM Production Student

The piece, Carlos Gardel’s 1935 tango Por Una Caveza, was performed by students at the University of Surrey.

Look what’s coming up at ACM :)

Great little vid we made on ACM music production student and vocalist Ellie Fletcher from Crystal Fighters. She and the band will be over at SXSW in Texas in March promoting Crystal Fighters too!

Another instalment of our current ACM and alumni features - this time with up and coming dubstep producer Zomboy.

ACM Alumni Focus - Rokhsan Heydari

We’re starting a new series of films here at ACM, to help inspire about what can be achieved through hard work, dedication and a little bit of support from ACM ;)