2014 International Songwriting Competition Judges announced

14 Record Label Presidents and CEOs Join Recording Artists To Judge The 2014 International Songwriting Competition (ISC) Sarah McLachlan, Tom Waits, American Authors, Pat Metheny, Sara Evans, Bastille, Avicii, Wayne Shorter, Casting Crowns, John Hiatt, and Many More To Select ISC Winners.

Click here to enter!

July 2, 2014 — The International Songwriting Competition (ISC) today announced its judging panel for the 2014 competition which is now accepting entries. This year, ISC has expanded on the participation of music industry executives, offering the opportunity for artists to have their music heard by the highest level of decision-makers in the music business. Judges include Presidents and CEOs from Republic, Atlantic, Warner Bros. Elektra, Columbia, Virgin, Sony Music Latin, Mercury, Wind-Up, Tommy Boy, Alligator, S-Curve, Blind Pig, and Concord Music Group.

Coupled with additional high-profile industry executives and a notable group of recording artists - many of whom are currently dominating the charts ISC offers the opportunity for artists to have their music heard by the most impressive and elite panel of judges yet.

"This year we decided to invite more record company executives in order to open up more opportunities to songwriters & artists," states Candace Avery, Founder and Director. 

"It is so difficult for up-and-coming artists to reach these elusive music executives, so this is an incredible chance for artists to have their music heard by the people who actually make career-changing decisions. We are very excited and honored that so many high-level industry professionals want to participate 

- this is truly unprecedented in any competition."ISC gives away more than $150,000 in cash and prizes 

(shared among the 68 winners) including an overall Grand Prize consisting of $25,000 (US) cash and much more in merchandise and services. 

Open to both amateur and professional songwriters, ISC offers 22 categories to enter, representing all genres of popular music. Past winners have included Grammy winners, chart-topping artists,

 amateur songwriters, and everyone in between, including Bastille; Gotye; Lindsey Stirling; Kimbra; The Band Perry; Andrew Bird; Passenger; Gin Wigmore; Missy Higgins; King Charles; and many more.

Studio Monitors - are these Presonus E8s underpriced?

Like the Cd & DVD Burning software we discussed last month at ProCopy we often get asked about recommendations for studio monitors for an indie studio or by people that realise the reference speakers they have been using are just not good enough for the recording they are doing.

It's a very subjective matter so generally the answer is - find something you like, fits your budget and suits the type of recording you need to do. However recently I'd heard about some new speakers launched by Presonus called the Eris series. There's a 4.5 in, 5 inch and 8 inch version available along with an additional sub woofer. Having used an expensive pair of Genelec speakers for a number of years I was keen to see how they would perform up against my reference speakers.

Courtesy of Kerry at Kosmic in Osborne Park I was able to pick up a pair of the E8s for the weekend, quite honestly 8 inch near field monitors are about as small as I would want to go, unless space is at an absolute premium I really can't see the point of 5 or 6 inch monitors, With digital recording these days I don't think you can make the right judgements in the audio with the smaller styles, but of course it all comes down to personal choice.

Presonus Eris Speaker Range

I was in the middle of a couple of tricky restoration jobs and a mix down of some music tracks so I had a good cross section of work to assess the speakers.

I sat the Presonus E8s next to the Genelecs and was able to switch sources to either or both sets of speakers via the Monitor Station. The Genelecs & E8s are roughly the same physical size and sit easily on regular speaker stands. They're a 2 way configuration with separate Class AB amps for the speaker and tweeter. They have a soft turn on feature so you don't get that annoying or potentially damaging pop through the speakers when they are powered up. 

What was immediately obvious after some level adjustment was that they two sets of speakers were remarkably similar. - That certainly was a good start.  Connecting them to a system is easy with separate Balanced XLR, Tip Ring Sleeve or RCA connectors,

There's a variety of controls - Gain, Mid & High adjusments, Low frequency cut off for when a Sub is added to the system and the "Acoustic Space" adjustment which helps adjust for the postioning of the speakers in a room (Close to a wall for example).

Observations

Upon more detailed listening I'd say the clarity in the low mids of the Eris speakers was more defined than the Genelecs, particularly around the vocals where it was easy to hear what was going on with slight eq adjustments.  The top end was smooth, not brittle sounding or over emphasised like some smaller monitors and the low bass was clean without being "lumpy". 

When pushed fairly hard the E8s handled the bass and top end remarkably well, and still maintained a great balance in the mix. 

Overall I believe these speakers would make a stunning addition to any studio whether Pro, Demo or home based - Why? The price stuns me... Presonus have made these powered speakers with great attention to details and their usual musical knowledge and in Australia they retail for about $530.00 a pair! Quite frankly I think these speakers should be selling for a minimum of $2,000 a pair - The Genelecs I was comparing them to are considerably more than that. 

So my recommendation this month is the Presonus E8s (Click here to learn more technical info) I'd suggest sending Kerry at Kosmic Sound an email to arrange a demo at [email protected]

I'm sure you'll be as happy as I was to hear these remarkable speakers and their excellent value for money.

Nielsen analyse the demand for Audio in the USA

Audio is an integral part of the daily lives of most Australians and Americans and this is a fascinating insight in to areas that audio is consumed.

According to Nielsen's Audio Today report, more than 244 million people in the USA (aged 12+) listen to radio each week; that's nearly 92 percent of the U.S. population. But in addition to the widespread reach of radio, today's audio landscape offers a large variety of options for listeners to choose from.

Click through to see the 6 main categories for audio demand

Would you be happy if we lost large parts of our cultural history?

The budget cutbacks at the National Film and Sound Archive will result in 28 staff being made redundant. 

While some may be employed elsewhere it's my belief that this demonstrates a complete lack of understanding by all Governments - State, Federal (and of all Parties) to the significant amount of work that's being done by skilled staff to maintain a programme to digitise our cultural history for future generations to enjoy and use for research purposes. 

Geoff Gardner a former Melbourne Film Festival director who blogs at Film Alert  has criticised the decision to make redundant 28 staff members before a new three-year strategic plan is completed, 

In part his comments mirror discussions that I have had with several Government Departments over many years.  This comment highlights the enormity of the project :-

“If large scale digitisation is not addressed, the majority of the national audiovisual collection will be rendered inaccessible in a digital environment. At the current pace of in-house digitisation (as of June 2013), and based on the collection size established in the revaluation in 2012/13 (2,064, 000 items) the timeframes for comprehensive digitisation range from 67 years (for audio) to 93 years (moving image) to more than 260 years (documents and artefacts). However many of those analogue formats would have deteriorated beyond usability at this point.  

Consultation meetings will conclude in September and a strategic plan will be released before the end of 2014. A separate consultation process around the new business model for screening loans and nontheatrical lending collection will begin shortly.

The Archive also encourages people to email comments to [email protected], or write to the NFSA at GPO Box 2002, Canberra ACT 2601.

Have your say soon folks! especially if you want access to audio, video and documents in the future. 

Important audio cassette with a sound problem?

Do you have an old oral history project with some problem audio? 

Have you got a music tape that seems to run at the wrong speed?

Has the tape stopped mid sentence?

Before you throw it away as a lost cause let us try and retrieve your audio and transfer it to another format before it's permanently damaged.

Here's a case study of a recent project with wobbly audio.