HeightstoDepths

This one goes back to 05…Paul Jordan wrote on 11/10/05:

> Hi Brian,
>
> Looking for a word of advice…
>
> I want to get my hands on something that
> - allows me to play with MP3s a bit like audacity did
> - allows me to read in from line in and record direct to MP3 a bit like MP3 Direct Cut did – although – I never got that to work again, once I left the US…
> - allows me to add effects, esp. my own reverb ideas
> - allows me to mulitrack inputs, vocals, guitar and mix em…
> - imports and exports multiple formats
>
> Any quick words or ideas?!
>
> Think I’d spend a couple hundred…
>
> God bless bruv,
> Paul,

Quick reply without doing that much research:

Of course MP3directcut is the best for recording in MP3 if you’re only going to do one track:
www.mpesch3.de/

For Multi-track, everything you BUY these days is going to import and export a lot of different formats… but it won’t record direct to mp3 because you can’t do any effects right onto mp3. Everything works in WAV and then exports to MP3 or whatever (this is what audacity did).

Another trick is that software seems to break down into these four areas:
1. Single Track WAV audio editing/tweaking (CoolEdit, GoldWave… noise reduction etc)
2. Multi Track DJ Remix type software (Acid. This will also record a song… but maybe not so well)
3. Pro audio multitrack suite (protools, etc… will do everything but is too expensive)
4. Multi-track home studio (Apple Garageband - cheaper, designed to record songs like you’re trying to do, effects, but a little weak on the single track editing)

There are so many options that you could spend a lot of time looking around… and one could try to get away with just using some freeware, but you have money, and I haven’t been into this stuff in a while… but here a couple that I think could work:

1. Get a macintosh and use the built-in GarageBand program because I think it does exactly what you’re looking for.
channels.lockergnome.com/media/archives/20050401_windows_xp_needs_a_garageband.phtml
www.jakeludington.com/ask_jake/20050401_garageband_for_windows_xp.html

2. I think you could get away with a Goldwave/Multiquence combo for about $100.
www.goldwave.com/

3. I’ve used Acid Free a lot from Sonic Foundry (because it’s free and to me seemed really user-friendly like Apple’s GarageBand) but if I were to buy something I’m not sure I’d go with acid or not.
www.acidplanet.com/tools/?p=acid
www.sonymediasoftware.com/?keycode=7777-4701

4. cakewalk used to be standard, and is huge…and they have about 50 names for all their software now…
www.cakewalk.com/homemusicians.asp

Have fun,

-Brian

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Well, I have to start posting sometime… why not start with techie stuff?

One use for this blog that I’ve had in mind has been to post different techie solutions that I’ve come up with to help people.

The form of the posts will be question-and-answer since the answers usually follow the questions… isn’t that the way it usually works?

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Some pictures as promised:

Here’s the house

 Front room view

 Me and some gappers on a cliff in Glenariff (I’m the one in front holding a frisbee *grin*).

 Another Glenariff view, you can just make out Scotland on the horizon.

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I’ve been here almost exactly a month now, and have definitely grown to appreciate the household life round these parts. For one, it’s not a bad place. 23 Wellington Park was in one of it’s former manifestations an art gallery. Right now there’s quite a collection of Jamie Treadwell originals about. Jamie is a brother who spent years living here and serving with YI (Youth Initiatives, cross community youth work). He used to retransform the house into a gallery periodically to sell some of his works to fundraise for the ministry.

Much more important then the bricks and mortar are the brothers who live here. There are eight of us here in the house. Four life long brothers, one fully committed (that’d be me), and three gappers. I’ll have to let you know what the gap program is more fully in the future, but the short description is gappers are young men and women taking a year to do volunteer missionary work and seek personal growth in discipleship.

Peter DeMarais is my roommate. The youngest guy in the house comes in at a trim 5’11 and ¾, just shy of nineteen years, born and raised in Minnesota. He was on the varsity wrestling team since the eighth grade, so I’m careful to maintain a good rapport between the two of us, it just wouldn’t do to get pinned in two point three seconds by a guy nine years younger then me. He’s serving mostly with YI and is also the main weekday cook and shopper at the house.

Noel Delgadillo is a Nica (Nicaraguan) from Miami. He just finished his degree back in Florida at FIU and is serving here in Belfast with both TEC and YI. Along with leading his high school youth group and the small UCO back in Miami he managed to run a couple years of cross country at university. Noel is our houses secret weapon in the fall of aught seven servants of the word ten K challenge. The houses here, in Ann Arbor, Detroit, and Monterrey are going to get their top three or five members to run an official 10 K race and compare the times. I’m supposed to be much faster then I currently am. My training has been hampered by a bothersome chest cold that doesn’t want to let me go (there are much worse things in life).

Georges Farhat is a giant Lebanese, six foot and a couple few inches, and nearly half that width at the shoulders. He would be an intimidating sight if he wasn’t always grinning, laughing, and full of joy. One of the inspiring things about living with Georges has been seeing his response to adversity. A few days after he arrived we were hiking in a place called Glenariff. Georges and I were checking out a ravine down into the glen different from the way we had hiked up. We decided it looked passable, but you couldn’t see far enough to be sure. I left Georges taking a little nap in the sunshine and went down the way we came up. He decided to go for the new route, got to a tricky bit where he couldn’t go backward, slipped while jumping across a wee chasm, wedged his leg into a cleft, and found himself face to face with a bleached sheep’s skull testifying to the frequent use of his chosen route. After screaming to no avail for a half hour he hauled himself out and hobbled his massive frame down the rest of the cliff side bringing along his skull. Upon arriving back an hour and a half late he was still in good spirits and thankful for being protected. Later he came down with a cold, fever, and all around nasty bug which knocked him out for much of a week and thanked the Lord for the great opportunity he had for extra prayer.

Georges is also a wonderful cook. He spent the better part of two days preparing a Lord’s Day feast for us last night. It included three full courses (the first including six dishes) and arak. I can’t remember all the names but it included homous, baba ganoush, fatoush, schwarma, and several other exotic sounding tasty dishes. Not being fully Lebanese we rushed things and only took about two and a half hours at table instead of the customary four.

The life long brothers here are really an inspiring bunch, and I’m learning a tremendous amount about living this life well from them. In the interest of not going on forever I’ll have to describe them later, but their names are Dave Quintana (aka Q), Bruce Yocum, Doug Smith, and Martin Steinbereithner.

The life we share together is rich. We have morning prayer together throughout the week, evening prayer four days a week, night prayers five days, and a regular Saturday prayer time and celebrative meal called a Lord’s Day celebration. The house is a bit of a hub for all kinds of activities. A couple mornings a week I’m helping to run some training for gappers. There’s a prayer meeting every other week, various small groups for TEC, and periodic events for Charis community all meeting here on various evenings. All told it’s a great house to be a part of. This is a great place for me and I’m grateful the Lord has put me here for the year. I hope to show some of you what’s going on here in person over the next year (hint hint).

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