My Personal Hell

Andrea Celeste

(10 min / 58 min)

Al Schmitt

  • Mixing

Step inside the prestigious Capitol Studios C for a mixing masterclass with a true icon of engineering, Al Schmitt. Alongside in-house engineer Steve Genewick, Schmitt guides you through his workflow by mixing the beautifully-recorded song ‘My Personal Hell’ by Andrea Celeste. You'll see how the session is prepared by Steve, who explains the track arrangement, routing to the Neve R88 console, and the selection of outboard gear patched in. Al then takes over to mix the record, using only analog tools for his signal processing. Witness how he sonically enhances raw recordings of vocals, shaker, drums, piano, synth, guitar, horns, and strings! He demonstrates the impact of each insert and effect on the material, then reveals how he subtly polishes the entire mix with multi-band compression and EQ.

Subtitles in English, Spanish


Al Schmitt

About Al Schmitt

During an astonishingly long career, Schmitt has won 23 Grammy Awards, making him the most successful engineer/mixer in Grammy history. During his career, Al has recorded and mixed more than 150 gold and platinum albums and was inducted into the TEC Awards Hall of Fame in 1997. He received the Grammy Trustees Lifetime Achievement Award in 2006. Schmitt’s credits range back to the 1950s, when he worked with Leonard Feather, Marty Paich, and Henry Mancini. His credit list at Allmusic contains over...

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