Béla Fleck & the Flecktones
November 18th, 2009
Music Center at the Strathmore
Bethesda, MD

Taper: Timothy Brown (timothydavidbrown@gmail.com)
Source: AKG C460Bs/CK63s (DINa, ~4ft on stand, FOB, LOC)->PS2->Edirol R-09HR (24 bit/96 kHz)
Transfer: SDHC -> PC
Processing: Fade in, fade out, dithered to 16 bit, resampled to 44.1 kHz & tracking using SoundForge 9.0.
Conversion: FLAC frontend 1.7.1 used to align on sector boundaries and for Flac16 Conversion @ level 8
Tagging: Band name, Venue and Song Title in Foobar2000

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********* PLEASE SPREAD, BUT PLEASE INCLUDE SOURCE INFO *********
****** DO NOT SELL OR DISTRIBUTE FOR A PROFIT BY ANY MEANS ******
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Set I
01. Intro
02. Frontiers
03. Flying Saucer Dudes
04. Lucy in the Skys
05. Slipstream
06. Victor solo (Stomping Grounds)
07. Sex In A Pan
08. Band Intros
09. Mars Needs Women: Space Is a Lonely Place
10. Mars Needs Women: They're Here
11. Howard solo ->
12. The Yee-Haw Factor

Set II
13. Intro
14. Nemo's Dream
15. Seresta
16. Futureman solo ->
17. Blu-Bop
18. Bela solo ->
19. Michelle
20. Hurricane Camille
21. Flight of the Cosmic Hippo
22. Sinister Minister
23. Encore Break
24. Sunset Road

Notes:
Thanks to Chris for the ticket!

This recording had to go through some extensive editing and processing to make it even remotely listenable. Almost all actual music has been left as un-processed as possible in order to retain much of it's original flavor. 

There were a number of factors that prevented this from being an ideal recording. The venue does not typically host taper friendly performance. It's a small symphony hall. If the band allows it you are lucky to be able to record openly. The Flecktones have a long standing policy which will not allow recording unless the venue allows it. However, I was able to run a full open recording rig, but in a very low-profile manner. The mics were kept at head height for the entire show, being lowered to below seat level at the beginning and end of each set. In the craziness of setting up without drawing attention, it did not occur to me that the hypercardioid caps were on. Being so close to the stage (~6th row) I think cardioids would have been the best option. Because of the low mic height, there were a lot of very loud applause and audience cheers. These spots have been carefully edited so as not to be extremely startling, but also to retain the flavor of any music that was occurring in the background. At the beginning of Set I you can hear the people whose seats were to my left arrive and scoot past me. They were relatively considerate with regards to the gear. There are also a number of spots early in the first set where you will hear me uncovering the mics. These spots have also been edited to make not as startling. The most offending factor had to do with my recorder's gain settings. I made the near fatal mistake of running the line-in gain at an extremely low setting. After applying a significant amount of gain in post-processing a very obvious hiss was present throughout. Thanks to some smart editing, noise reduction and EQ work, this hiss has been eliminated a decent amount while not sacrificing the high-end of the frequency spectrum too much. The hiss will be noticed when listening to some of the softer segments of the show. I tried a few more passes with the noise reduction tool, but this just took too much life out of the recording making it sound very flat and un-natural. Go into this with the same mentality that you would a fairly low-generation cassette.

The PA sound improved greatly as the show went on. At the beginning, you could hardly hear Howard's piano at all. This was fixed as the first set went on and the second set began.

The crowd for this show was pretty respectful and were there simply to enjoy the music. No crowd chatter, just the occasional exuberant cheer or rogue clap. 

Please keep all of these factors in mind while you listen to this recording. It's not the best recording of this band, but it is likely the only recording from this show that will ever see the light of day. Enjoy!

Personel:
Bela Fleck, banjos
Victor Lemonte Wooten, basses
Roy "Futureman" Wooten, percussion
Howard Levy, harmonica, piano, ocarina & guiro

A 24 bit/96 kHz version exists.

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flecktones.com
timothydavidbrown.blogspot.com

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