Rehearsal

With a full band line-up in place early 2011 the project could move forward. Rehearsal sessions were planned and a 1st Oct recording date was fixed as all musicians had other commitments.

I will not bore you with the details of rehearsal sessions but must say that we all got along, and over the months the music improved. One point worth making at this time is that the “Nick Mackay Highland Dance Band” on this CD has only been possible with the goodwill of the musicians who joined me.

Pre – Recording

I planned to have my son Marcus record the CD, but as his studio is in Glasgow it would be easier for him to record it in Inverness rather than take the whole Band to Glasgow. I then had to find a good sounding venue in Inverness. In life we often look for a difficult route when the answer is very close by, this was the case when I came to realise that the local Kinmylies Church might be the solution. Peter Humphris, the Minister, was agreeable for the Band to try out the venue, this was done and the live sound was very acceptable. Peter then agreed to the recording being done in the Church.

Recording Session

May I introduce the sound engineers for the CD

Marcus & Ramsay 

On the 30th September Marcus, with another engineer Ramsay Miller travelled up from Glasgow with the necessary equipment for the recording, and were able to set up most of the equipment on that night. The Saturday recording session found us all gathered ready to start about 10am, the engineers still had to run sound checks therefore the first two  hours progress felt rather slow. A break for lunch was good as the afternoon session flowed a lot better and by late afternoon all the tracks were captured by the sound engineers. 

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