I downloaded manuals from the various music equipment makers web sites.

I have printed all the manuals for my music equipment and have begun to read these manuals. It really is a lot to learn. I was able to get some signals through to the computer this past weekend but I have not done more than that. I need to read the manuals of the compressor/limiter/gate, the USB audio interface, and the mixer.

I have test recorded the bass and guitar so far this weekend.

I hooked up the bass and mic'ed the guitar and both record but the signal is low. I don't really know how to use Garage Band yet and am just trying it out. I did read my mixer manaual once talking about learning. I need to read my Compressor manual now. I read about basic effects for recording eailer today.

Recording this weekend.

I just hooked up the mixer, the USB interface, the bass, the microphone, and power amp and that's all I have cables for right now. I put the control room mix into the power amp. I put the bass into channel 1. It seems channel 3 is dead on the mixer as the microphone won't work there. It did work on channel 4. But I also changed the cables so it may have been the microphone cable. I patched the mains out to the USB interface. I just tested the control room to power amp and room speakers so far with the bass and microphone. They work but it was past 11 so I did not do more. I am setting up for a weekend off of work and study so I can use the equipment. Jenny wants to record and that is what we will try to do this weekend. I got an email from a former music teacher of mine yesterday.

Read about microphones and more general mixer and home studio stuff.

I read about how microphones work. I now understand what phantom power is about. I also read about patch bays and how these work for normalised and non-normalised patch bays. The normalised are for effects sends.

I am interested in buying a Behringer Patch Bay 2000. I can afford one of these new but there is no rush to buy one just yet. I am buying a compressor, limiter and gate all in one Behringer Composer. I am slowly cleaning up my office and thinking of where I will place my old eMac, the mixer, and monitors etc. etc.. The idea is to place all the stuff in accessible locations so one can operate all the connections. The patch bay means you don't have to go behind everything to change cables. There is room for this gear but there may be limited space for performers.

But this has got me thinking that perhaps the home studio is one set up and the rental PA will be another set up. Then combined, these would be a larger single set up. I will see about picking up a Peavey Unity mixer this week for the rental PA. Also I need to buy some balanced cables for all this meaning short cables for the patch bay and also cables for the rental PA system. Also the eMac will need an external USB hard drive for recording and archiving but this item can wait and it would actually be cheaper to wait for these hard drives to come down in price. Also I have investigated receivers and monitor speakers from Future shop. I would use this for play back in the home studio.

Speaking of stereo set ups, I have set up our living room stereo fine now. I can also listen to my iPod on the living room stereo. The cassette player, the DVD/VHS, and TV are all working fine.

Labour song books photocopied.

I was able to take the small 4" X 6" song books and copy two pages to one page. I now need to take these pages and print them two pages on opposite sides and I will have some larger songbook copies for our musical therapy group.

M-Audio pro quattro is going to be my interface device.

For converting my analog music signals to digital and getting them into the computer I am purchasing an M-Audio Pro Quattro USB device. Here is the blurb for it from the store's web site:

MANUFACTURER: M-Audio

DESCRIPTION: Genuine pro-quality sound, up to 24-bit/96kHz, through your computer's standard USB port. Pristine A/D/A converters. Multitrack recording and mixing without PCI card installation, zero-latency direct monitoring for simple recording and dubbing, balanced 1/4" TRS connectors, and selectable in/out levels to accommodate different instruments. 1x1 USB MIDI interface. Includes cable, power supply, cd.

Kustom 16 watt practice bass amp home. It does sound nice.

I had layed away a small 16 watt Kustom practice bass amplifier. It has a Celestion speaker. I got it paid for this week and have been playing it today. It sounds nice. I will take it to our self help group and leave it there for playing my bass at the music therapy group. That group is meeting again tomorrow so I will be attending tomorrow.