I am old school. I still have a 6 track recorder that uses cassette tapes.

However, I'm a musician and I like real instrumentation, not synthesized.

I'm planning to cut about 10 songs, half original and half covers of oldies. I can play all the parts. My forte is bass and 6-string guitar. Styles are R&B, Rock, Soul, Jazz.

I'm in C.Rai and have spoken with two studios here, and both seem ok, but getting bookings is difficult. Lately they've broken appointments. Frustrating, because I'm chomping at the bit to lay down some tracks.

So that brings me 'round to doing as much as I can at home. What is recommended for an at-home recording software, let's say a minimum 24 tracks. Again, I'm old style, so the simpler the better. If it works well, I'll do all but the drum tracks at home, then take the tracks to one of the studios to do the drums and maybe some added vocals.

There's a lot of free software around. Audacity is probably the best known.

Although for recording from multiple simultaneous sources you also need special hardware, as regular PC's only have 1 audio input...

You might be able to find a lightweight version of Cubase that should suit. All editions allow multitrack audio recording although you'll still have the one track limitation monty pointed out if you use your PC's sound card.

You might be able to find a lightweight version of Cubase that should suit. All editions allow multitrack audio recording although you'll still have the one track limitation monty pointed out if you use your PC's sound card.

Actually, it's one stereo track or two mono tracks ... and with two soundcards in a PC you can readily record four mono tracks at a time (and there are other low-cost solutions that don't involve expensive ''pro'' gear). I would stick with Cubase, though. For a traditionalist who wants mult-track recording like what it used to be, it's the best option (that I've seen, anyway). A nice mic preamp comes in handy too.

thanks for the responses. I looked at Cubase web site and was a bit overwhelmed by the technical info. I'm not so jazzed as to want to learn a host of new tricks.

There may be other software that's more down to earth and fathomable for someone like me who's becoming vintage. I may keep looking.

In the meantime, I'm back to considering trying to book with one of the two local little sound studios I've located in town. It's a bit like a grizzly bear trying to work out a deal with chipmunks. I start trying to explain something, and the others jump in after the first two or three words with a blitz of Thai/mangled English responses - as if they have the answer to my concern before I say anything, and 14 out of 15 times they're on the wrong track altogether (a reference also to recording). They're ways of communicating are more understandable when you listen to half of two Thais having phone conversation - it sounds something like: euh euh (2 second silence) ka euh ka (one second silence) jing euh ka ka ka ......and so on. They speak in little blurts. Do they learn that from TV soap operas? I don't know.

http://www.hitsquad.com/smm/cat/MULTITRACK_RECORDING/

When you thing MS Windows nothing is really affordable, but if you think at quality of sound recording and manipulation software which offers Hollywood capabilities right to the desktop. Audio for movies as Jurassic Park and several other Hollywood blockbusters where made with this software or a very close source related package.

The downside of Ardour is that is only works on Linux or Mac OS X, with less overhead on the Linux... Basically the Microsoft platform has nothing on offer on the same level... http://ardour.org FREE OF CHARGE

For Windows users you can look at http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/audiostudio which is actual the home version of Sony's Audiostudio which is for home use also a usefull package for (Windows users)... it costs 54 Dollar

Edited August 19, 200916 yr by Richard-BKK