Berklee Press Music Books; Hughes & Kettner Red Box Pro

Berklee Press music books

Three new books have been produced by Berklee Press, the publishing arm of the respected Berklee College of Music in the USA, to accompany particular courses that are run at the College. However, their content and style give them a far wider appeal. The first of them, Peter Spellman's The Self-promoting Musician, provides a range of advice on strategies for maximising the impact of your musical efforts. The material is split into four parts. Part 1 gives a very up-to-date account of the basic structure of the music business and discusses why being self-managed can have its advantages. Part 2 explores the practice of 'networking' within the music business -- how to develop and maintain helpful contacts. Part 3 moves on to producing a publicity plan and getting radio play, and also looks at the power of the Internet as a promotional tool. Finally, Part 4 provides a directory of help resources. While some of the material is clearly more relevant in America, the book is still full of solid advice for UK-based musicians. If you have designs on being an 'independent' musician, there is bound to be something of use for you in here.

The Complete Guide To Film Scoring by Richard Davis is, again, split into various sections. Part 1 provides a brief history of the use of music in film (an interesting read) before Parts 2, 3 and 4 cover the film production process (who does what and when), the creation of the music itself and the business aspects of film scoring. Part 5 presents a series of interviews with 19 individuals who earn their crust in the film score world and includes some pretty big names. These interviews offer some fascinating insights into the world of music for picture. The book as a whole is not overly technical and would suit someone who wants to get a broad introduction to the process and business of film scoring.

In contrast, Corey Allen's Arranging In The Digital World is a much more hands-on book. While only running to 78 pages, it comes with a floppy disk containing over 50 short MIDI files illustrating many of the techniques and exercises covered in the text. The book attempts to provide an introduction to musical arranging using a typical system of sequencer and synth, and as such covers rhythm styles and how to build an arrangement, as well as providing a host of sequencing and production tips. While the level is certainly introductory, the approach really requires the reader to have some ability with standard notation -- though the MIDI files do help here if you're unfamiliar with the little black dots. The examples are all based on rather traditional music styles, so the book is probably of less interest to those working with dance music.

All these books have something to offer and, as with every Berklee Press publication I've seen so far, are produced to a high standard. The Spellman and Davis texts are probably of the greatest appeal to readers of SOS. There are probably more accessible books covering arranging and sequencing techniques than Allen's, particularly if your tastes lie in cutting-edge music styles. John Walden

information

The Self-promoting Musician by Peter Spellman, ISBN 0-634-00644-4. Complete Guide To Film Scoring by Richard Davis, ISBN 0-634-00636-3. Arranging In The Digital World by Corey Allen, ISBN 0-634-00634-7. All published by Berklee Press and available either direct from their web site or from all good bookshops. www.berkleepress.com

Hughes & Kettner Red Box Pro

The original Hughes & Kettner Red Box guitar DI used active circuitry to emulate the frequency response of a typical guitar cabinet and speaker, enabling guitars to be DI'd rather than miked while still retaining the tonal qualities of the amp or preamp they were played through. It worked very well, but now H&K have completely redesigned the unit using passive components to produce the Red Box Pro.

Housed in a red die-cast metal case, the Red Box Pro can accept inputs at line level (preamp or pedal outputs), or it may be fed from speaker-level signals. A selector switch is provided to choose between settings, as the speaker-level option requires internal attenuation to match the levels. For connection, there's an unbalanced Input jack, and there's also a Thru jack allowing you to insert the device into the signal path. The Red Box Pro has no internal dummy load, so it's important, when you're using a guitar amp, that either the original speaker or a dummy load is connected to the Thru socket -- especially so with valve amps, as running without a load can damage their output transformers.

A second slide switch selects between speaker simulator and a flat response, while a third switch functions as a ground lift. The output stage comprises a transformer, so input-to-output isolation is good. The passive filters used in the design have the benefit of shaping the sound, removing a lot of high-frequency source noise, such as amp hiss or digital preamp grunge. However, these filters are lossy, and the output of the Red Box is designed to feed the mic input of a mixer, where the mic amp gain can be employed to restore the signal level. Another result of the passive system is that the noise performance is similar to that of a dynamic microphone, though it is also inevitably determined by the quality of the mic amp into which it is fed.

I tested the Red Box Pro with a number of sources, including a Line 6 Pod version 2 with its own speaker simulator turned off. The filter makes a good job of emulating a typical guitar cab, but obviously the result has to be a compromise, as there are no alternative settings for different speaker configurations. The unit has a slightly more 'American' sound than some of the other passive DIs on the market, with a little less bite, but also has the kind of high end you might expect from miking a guitar amp using a capacitor mic. As with any DI, you can always tweak the sound using your desk or preamp EQ if it's not completely your cup of tea -- remember that a speaker-simulating DI box like this is only one of the tools required to get a great guitar sound. Still, as a recording tool, the Red Box Pro is both simple and effective. Paul White

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