AES Student Blog

Tell us a little bit about yourself. Where are you from? Where and what do you study? What audio field are you in? What initiated your passion for audio? When did it start?

I was born and grew up in Southern Germany in a little town (Ansbach, probably no one knows it). I studied jazz piano at Carl-Maria-von-Weber University in Dresden and am currently in the last semester in my studies as Tonmeister at the University of Arts in Berlin. I think I’m specialized in jazz and popular music but in general I’m interested in various kinds of music recording. 

I’m a musician myself and it's my passion to play piano and saxophone but I also want to have a global view of music and music production. 

With my piano trio Lammel | Lauer | Bornstein (lammel-lauer-bornstein.de ) we play what we call "contemporary acoustic music“. This year, we recorded our second album with producer Wolfgang Loos at Traumton Studios, Berlin. It will will be released in November at Traumton Records, you can watch our release video here :-) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNaymlsPRDM

Tell us about the production of your submission. What is the story behind it? What was it inspired by? How long did you work on it? Was it your first entry? 

I spent a great extended weekend at the recpublica studios in Poland last December with the band KITE (kitejazz.de) We were recording a complete album, it will be released this November @ UNIT Records. My submission I got Along without You very Well is part of the album. It´s a completely re-freshed version of that well known song as sung by Frank Sinatra for example. The version of KITE has a completely new, contemporary background in harmonies and other elements, the constant pattern of the upright bass, for example. The style is very smooth but indeed intense - what I really like. My approach when mixing this song was to bring back the clarity and pureness of a pop song to this contemporary jazz version and I spent a lot of time to find the perfect balance.

This submission was my second award at AES Recording Competition. Last year at Warsaw I took part with Tristan Kühn with What´s left by the piano trio Seng|Kühn|Jentzen.

What was your most significant/funny/inspiring experience as an audio engineer? 

I find it most inspiring to work with people with a mixed cultural and musical / artistic background. This inspiring context enables to embed various ideas and elements in one production. 

What was your biggest mistake in a production and what did you do to redeem the situation?

I really don't know what you mean! But if you update the whole audio project to your backup hard disk, you should keep an eye on which direction you transfer dates and not  replace the latest session with an old version. Otherwise you’ll have the chance to do the edits from one ore more days once again…

What’s your advice for engineers who are just starting out?

Always  pay attention to the kind of music and the artist. Use your technical and musical knowledge to support them. At the end of the day, it’s the music that matters, so use your various skills to support the idea of the production.

What are your favourite pieces of equipment (microphones, outboard, plugins), and why?

My chair - it is very important to be comfortable while working. A studio with sunlight is also very important (unfortunately I don’t have one...). Jokes apart, I really like the PSP Vintage Warmer, also when mixing classical music (thank you, I won one at the competition!) and the (original) Urei 1176 compressor. 

For most studio productions and live recordings I work with Magix´ Seqouia, I enjoy various opportunities when crossfading and cutting there. For popular music productions I usually work with Pro Tools. 

Talking about miking, I often have a basement stereo AB-system with two „real“ omni-pattern condensator microphones e.g. when recording drums as Overhead mics oder a Grand Piano. I like the balanced sound of this type of microphone and the authentic recording qualities of low frequencies. 

Can you name one or multiple of your favourite recordings or productions and tell us why  you like them/what you like about them?

I like productions that you can listen to casually and that have also depth and thousands details to explore. Good examples are the productions by Quincy Jones and the well known album by Daft Punk.

What/who made you join the AES? 

It’s pretty cool to have a worldwide audio connection for making experiences and  discussions. Meet and connect with people, who do same / similiar things, but might have different backgrounds and various views. Bringing that global pool of audio engineers together is an important point. Last year I was the first time at the AES convention at Warschau. Some colleagues from university prompted me to go there and I really don’t regret it :)

Tell us about your favourite experiences at the 140th AES Convention in Paris!

I had a lot of fun spending time in Paris with other audio engineers. People with a similar passion, perhaps different views - great discussions and not just about audio.

What is your favourite frequency?

I only have frequencies that I don’t like, for example around 500Hz (and 1000 Hz as harmonic) when you have a microphone system close to a grand piano.

What do you do when you’re not in the studio or doing anything music related?  

I like to travel and meet friends. Nature is cool - and also the dust and flair of impressive cities.

Where do you see yourself in 10 years?

Making interesting productions, playing my own music.

Could you provide us with some closing comments?

See you at next AES convention?!