The module content can be divided into four main sections:

The history and ethnography of recording technology and industry participants.
Aside from looking at the affects on the sound of recorded music that the well documented change from disc-based recording to analogue tape and then to digital media had, you will be examining the different ways that this changing technology spread around the world. Why did British records sound different to US ones in the 1960s and 1970s? What differences did developments such as noise gates and ‘live end / dead end’ studio design make to the sound of recorded music? You will also examine the social, economic and cultural reasons that drove the spread and use of recording technology. Why did Atlantic Records, with their state of the art studios in New York, send so many of their recording artists down to the ill-equipped, converted cinema at Stax Records? How has the market for amateur and semi-professional equipment affected the sound of record production over the years? Who were the important female figures in record production?
The analogue versus digital debate
How should we define these terms? We’ll examine this issue in terms of Kvifte’s distinction between the discrete and the continuous. On a more practical level, we’ll be looking at different types of analogue and digital technology (and treatments). What does analogue tape saturation actually do to a sound and how is it different to valve amplification? What is the difference in sound between solid state electronics and digital sound? Why and how do people form personal preferences about this and do issues such as perceived authenticity, nostalgia and snobbery sometimes overrule audio considerations?
Training, professional practice and communication
How have Kealy and others theorised the changing models of training and professional practice? We will also look at how Theberge has discussed the comsumerisation of production: the pro, semi-pro and amateur products and the industry that has grown around them. Zak’s theories on the influence of recording on the compositional process will also be examined as will the work of scholars such as Porcello and McIntyre on the forms of communication and relationship found in the studio.
The ergonomics of recording technology
The design of the interface between the mechanical and electronic technology of record production and the human agents involved has a major impact on the way the process unfolds. On the software side, the difference between parameters that can be found on the same ‘page’ and those that involve a shift to another screen also influence working patterns. How much are these conventions the result of conscious design as opposed to historical ‘accident’? Do some pieces of technology leave a ‘sonic imprint’ that relates to the forms of working practice that their interface encourages rather than the nature of the processing that they involve?