Auralation Music: ‘Connecting The Dots’ In Sound Production And Beyond

Auralation, based in Knoxville, Tennessee, have been revealing recently how vital Focusrite's Red 8Pre, Red 4Pre and Clarett OctoPre have been in creating a highly flexible signal transport and control infrastructure to support its wide range of projects, from ADR to podcasting to Foley, to scoring dozens of reality shows on top cable networks.

It might not be widely known, but Knoxville is a hub of production activity for today's cable TV landscape, including work for networks such as Lifetime, Oxygen, Discovery and Spike TV. The wildly popular crime-reality shows such as Homicide Hunters, Murder Comes To Town and Killer Couples are just a few of the diverse projects executed by Auralation Music at its studios in the city.

And it's Focusrite technology that lets them connect all the dots and use these studios to their max:

“We use the Red 8Pre for just about everything," says Auralation owner Paul Jones, referring to Focusrite's Red 8Pre 64-In / 64-Out Thunderbolt™ 2 and Pro Tools | HD™ compatible audio interface.

Along with a Red 4Pre 58-In / 64-Out Thunderbolt™ 2 and Pro Tools | HD™ compatible audio interface and a pair of Clarett OctoPre 8-channel mic pres, Focusrite connectivity and interface technology provides Auralation with the flexibility they need across a diverse portfolio to maximise productivity and efficiency.

“We do everything from tracking bands to ADR, foley and scoring for television, to podcasting —all within a single day," says Jones, whose previous career included supervising the music and post-audio department for Scripps Networks. “The Focusrite gear lets us really leverage our entire facility effectively."

For instance, they run Cat 5 cables to any number of the rooms making up the cavernous former concrete plant they've occupied in Knoxville since they formed in 2010, with the Red 8Pre taking in drums or guitar amps in the rooms (now used as ISO booths) over Dante®, with near-zero latency. The Focusrite gear is also used to move sessions between the main, 1,000 sq ft Studio A, Auralation Music's 5.1 mix room (known as the DAW room), and two smaller production rooms: helping keep production churning for what are now over 7,000 underscores for reality-based programming.

“We can bring the Red 8Pre out into the studio with us during sessions and set up a completely separate control station, instead of having to run back and forth between the studio and the control room for many applications, or to let our DAW room act as the master control for both studios," Jones explains. “We're also using the Red 8Pre and Red 4Pre for our Aviom monitoring system that we use as the cue system for recording."

With so many applications for the Red 8Pre and Red 4Pre units, Jones says the Clarett OctoPre 8-channel mic pre is necessary to provide even more I/O for the facility. “The Red 8Pre is the hub for all of it, but all of the Focusrite units together create a flexible environment that really lets us use our studios to the max."