The Pigeon Loft Sound Studio
Geert Kliphuis / Ernest Allardstraat 20 (Grand Sablon) / B-1000 Brussels CR, Belgium
Tel: +32(0)2-3507016 / +32(0)0485-294028
Control room Tascam 18-channel 24-tracker Tascam 20-channel 32-tracker
The Pigeon Loft Sound Studio is housed in a top-floor flat - which is quite unusual for a recording facility - in central Brussels, near the Royal Music Conservatory: a cosy, compact, well equipped place to record, with a separate sitting room, housing two settees, a well-stocked library (incl. books about music and the Encyclopaedia Brittanica), a television, landline telephones - and an exercise bike.
Our balcony offers a lovely view over the roofs of the Grand Sablon, where great bars and restaurants abound, like 'Le Perroquet', 'Le Café des Minimes' or 'L'Ami de Claire Fontaine's Delicatessen' across the street, all with lovely terraces.
The studio has two, interconnected recording spaces: 'the bright side', with mostly hard wood - giving a clear, brilliant sound - and 'the red room', lined with books, yielding warm, intimate acoustics.
In contrast with most DAW-run sound studios, the Pïgeon Loft can record bands/ensembles in real-time. We can seat up to eight musicians for such recordings.
We have at your disposal a wide variety of guitar and bass amplifiers, electric (f.e. Gretsch and Ibanez hollow-body jazz guitars, and a Gear4Music electric 12-string), acoustic guitars (incl. a Guild D-245 and a Harley Benton 12-string), electric and acoustic (both Ibanez) bass guitars + 3 keyboards, latin percussion - and a mandolin.
IMPORTANT NOTE: since the Tascam recorders run on SD-cards, these can be taken home by producers/musicians for further work, if the need arises. This, however, would be entirely under their responsibility.
Sound engineer Geert Kliphuis (aka Jay Conrad) is a singer-songwriter and guitarist/keyboard-player, always ready to step in to add that subtle instrumental/vocal touch you might be looking for. (Kliphuis speaks Dutch, English, French, Spanish and German.)
The entire building is under constant electronic surveillance.
The lift to Les Marolles down our street Nocturnal view from the Pigeon Loft balcony:
Royal Conservatory and Synagogue
Our gear:
Recorders & pre-amplifiers:
- a Tascam DP32-track digital recorder/mixer-mastering unit/ 8 mono and 12 stereo channels / 8 inputs for real-time recording (with built-in reverbs + tuner and metronome) - that can be synched with:
- a Tascam DP24-track digital recorder/mixer-mastering unit / 12 mono and 6 stereo channels / 8 inputs for real-time recording (with built-in reverbs + tuner and metronome)
- Behringer X1204 / 1202FX / Q802 pre-amplifiers/mixers with British 3-band equalizers / 20 inputs / 115 integrated sound effects and compressors (the latter on the X1204 and Q802)
- Behringer Ultrapatch Pro
In all, 16 sound inputs can be routed directly to the Tascam 32-track recorder, which makes the set-up equally ideal for recording bands, ensembles and choirs in real-time.
For the recording of live concerts or away-from-home we use the Tascam 24-track recorder and Alesis monitors (see below), those 3 units being easily transportable.
External sound effectors, monitors, microphones et altri:
- Alesis MultiVerb4 / SU9920 Stereo Sound Processor / Yamaha Rex 50 (1985) / Alesis NanoVerb2 /
Behringer Virtualizer 3D2000 sound effector
- 2 KRK RP5 Classic self-powered studio monitors
- 2 KODA self-powered studio monitors
- 2 Alesis Elevate4 self-powered studio monitors
- Technics V500 MkII + Akai AM-102 line amplifiers, with 2 Behringer-302 controllers
- Sony / Fame / Devine headphones / 2 Behringer 4-way headphone splitter-amps
- Shure SM58 / sE X1-A / Behringer XM-1800S / T.Bone RB-100 ribbon, AT2020 and AT818II microphones
- Tascam CD-RW900SL CD-master recorder / Sony ODP XU-210 CD player
- Nakamichi DR-3 cassette recorder (also for, i.e. analogue mastering) / Philips MCM cassette recorder
- Akai GX-4000D reel-to-reel tape recorder
- Lenco L-85 / Nedis (+78 rpm) turntables
- Kenwood KT3050L stereo tuner
- Ardour editing program
- Audacity® editing program
- Bandlab mastering program
- IMac Retina (27-inch) OS Linux 6.5.0 Ubunti Studio 22.04.3 LTS
- ASUS PC +Philips E-Line 24-inch monitor / Black & white printer / Music paper in different formats
- 10 (folding) chairs
- Music stands
- Tuners
Guitar amplifiers:
- Dimavery G-30 bass amp / Fender Champion 20, Yamaha JX 30, Wolf Blues King, Trace Elliot Acoustic guitar amps (the latter 3 are vintage tube amps).
Keyboards:
- Studiologic Numa Compact-2 (Italy)
- Yamaha EZ220
- Casio CTK631 ( a vintage oddity)
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Fees: these depend on the complexity of your project, the standard being 50 € per hour - or the Pigeon Loft's participation (the share being open for discussion) in the publishing rights, if your project is to be commercialised.
(Click on Diagraph Music Publishing)
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Sound restoration: we restore and re-master recordings (incl. cassette and reel-to-reel tapes, as well as 33/45/78 rpm vinyl records), and transfer the results to CD and/or audio files of all different formats. (See Diagraph Sound Restoration)
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Jay Conrad: 'Hey Girl' (Conrad; SABAM), a rough mix recording for 'The London Shuffle'.
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