Recording Audio to Make CDs
I am the sound guy for our church here in Houston, and I am trying to move us into digital recording. I want to get a Mac Mini to record Sunday morning services, and I need a program that will not only let me record the 70-90 minute service. It needs to allow me to select points from within the wave-form to designate track markers for a CD and then burn a CD (or at least export to a CD burning program like Toast. I want to be able to have separate tracks for each worship song as well as the sermon.
I want to be able to do the finalizing and burning of the recording within a few minutes after each service so that the CD duplicator will have CDs ready for those who want them.
Any suggestions?
The Mac Mini
Just FYI, unless you only do hymns in the Public Domain, it’s technically illegal to record the music part of a service without paying royalties. You can find more info about that at CCLI.
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Cali,
Your advice is right on the money. I recommend libsyn.com for hosting the audio if you need inexpensive bandwidth and space. We use it at http://www.rockyriverchurch.com.
We also record on a Marantz recorder that records to Compact Flash. We just connect the recorder to our Macs via USB to copy of the audio.. then edit with Audacity or GarageBand.
Thanks!
I had not considered the copyright issues. Thank you for pointing those out.
It actually make my job much easier, as I will only have to worry about recording the sermon now, and that will fit onto a CD just fine. So a direct to CD recorder will be a much simpler solution.
I had considered the GarageBand solution, but did not know if the separate track exporting was possible.
Thanks Cali
It’s been a while since I read the CCLI license, but I believe they allow for recording of the music for archival purposes, but not for distribution.
Cali, I commend you for pointing out the copyright issues involved with this. So many people just look the other way when it comes to church/copyright issues.
@ Dave Minor, It’s always a little tricky dealling with church copyright issues. There is a sense that church music should be public domain as soon as it is written, but composers have to feed themselves and copyright helps with that. It would probably be good to educate Christian song writers about Creative Commons so writers can choose weather they’re working for money or to provide the church with new songs.