Last week I got a call from an Indian Music concert promoter asking if he could bring some musicians to my studio for some recording. We set a date and in comes the great Tarun Bhattacharya! I was amazed. He had me mic his Santoor on the top and bottom, (for bass) and I sat spellbound as he performed Raag Saraswati, (a flat 7 and 9, I believe). His Alap lasted 24 minutes and when the Tabla finally came in it was just magical. I was praying for one of our 4 black labs not to bark outside the studio door...and only once - 14 minutes into his Alap - Lucy, our older one, let out a soft yelp. It's way different than recording a 4 minute or less pop song for 2 reasons: 1) it's not 4 minutes long so I can't just say, "can we do that again?" and 2) it's the EXTREMELY QUIET FIRST PART OF THE RAAG! I jumped, closed the blinds and happily nothing more happened but I learned that next time I have a true genius recording my studio - I'm bringing all dogs to the downstairs backyard and out of earshot! At the MINIMUM, I should be providing silence for these musicians as they are trusting me with my equipment in my studio to record them.
