In this first interview we talk with noted recording engineer Tom Jung. Tom’s credentials are impressive and his record label DMP is known for providing the highest quality recordings commercially available.

RPG
Tom, can you explain your approach to recreating a musical event that was recorded in a studio, but listened to in a living room or home theater?

Tom Jung
My goal is, and always has been, to capture a musical event as realistically as possible. The recording studio should provide a fairly neutral acoustical environment for musicians and singers to perform. I like to choose a recording space that is acoustically matched to the ensemble being recorded. By that I mean the group size and acoustical output should fit the room size. If a recording space is too small for the groups output, I feel that a sort of acoustical compression occurs, and the sense of openness and air is diminished. Conversely, if you record acoustic guitar and vocal in a huge room it can sound pretty cavernous, without much support from the room.

The listening room, be it a home theater, control room, or living room, should ideally have the same kind of neutrality, without too much of an acoustical signature of its own. The speakers should connect to the room not unlike the musicians did in the recording space. If the listening room is live or reflective and has frequency response abnormalities, those characteristics are superimposed on the recording and any chance of accurate reproduction is destroyed.

RPG
We are trying to raise the awareness of the project studio community to the importance of the room in the recording and mixing process. Can you explain how you have addressed this issue in your work?

Tom Jung
Over the years I have found that the more attention I’ve paid to the fine tuning of the listening room, the better results I get. The room should be looked at like any other important component or piece of gear in the system. Working backwards, the room interfaces with the speakers in a similar way the speakers interface with the power amplifiers and so on. Because the room doesn’t come in a box like many shiney new studio toys it does not share the excitement of a new piece of equipment and often gets put off, sometimes indefinitely. To my way of thinking this is a big mistake.

Recently, I built a new mix/edit/mastering room and started with the monitor system. First room acoustics (dry and uniform), then speakers, power amplifiers, quality cabling, D to A converters, etc. Of all the rooms I’ve built, this one has turned out the best, which I feel is due to the fact that room acoustics was such a priority in the overall plan.

RPG
Creating recordings that transfer well to other listening environments is one of the key issues in project studios. Can you share how you address this issue?

Tom Jung
I feel that the more neutral the monitoring environment, the better the recording will hold up in other listening environments. An example, if the mixing or mastering room has a 10dB peak at say 60Hz, most likely the recording itself will turn out light in that same area. Unfortunately, there is no typical room, all rooms have resonant modes, and the key is to have the mixing mastering room be as free as possible from these ugly modes.

RPG
We understand that you have moved to a new studio. What acoustical design changes have you made between your last studio and your new one?

Tom Jung
As I get older, I find myself monitoring at a lower volume. Consequently, I am able to use smaller, more accurate monitor speakers. As long as I’m comfortable with the sound of the speakers, that’s what I want to hear, the speakers, not the room. My new room is much dryer or more free from colorations than any room I’ve built to date. The important thing to remember when treating a room to be dry is to make sure the treatment is uniform with respect to frequency. Some of the worst sounding rooms I have ever heard are rooms where foam has been applied to walls attenuating only the high frequencies, leaving the low end to boom around. The Westlake Lc8.1 speakers measure in my room almost the same as they do in an anechoic chamber. That’s not to say my room sounds like an anechoic chamber, but I do hear the speakers more directly than ever before and that seems to translate to a greater percentage of other listening rooms.

RPG
Is there any design advice you can give to project studio owners to improve the quality of their recordings?

Tom Jung
The best advice I can give is to make sure you know what you are listening to in your monitor system before you start tweaking the EQ. You may very well be just compensating for problems in your room. RPG
What role have RPG® products played in your studio designs?

Tom Jung
Over the past ten years RPG® products have allowed me to achieve a higher degree of acoustical accuracy both from the recording and monitoring perspective. I can’t think of another company that has such a complete line of problem solving acoustical products.