Everything below is quoted per project. Scope, formats and timing are agreed in writing before work starts, and a quote holds for fourteen days. See the terms for how revisions, approval and payment work.
What can I book?
| Service | What you send | What comes back |
|---|---|---|
| Stereo mastering | 1 stereo mix per song, plus 1 optional second render | Master folder — every format, see what you get back |
| Stem mastering | Up to 5 stereo groups, plus 1 stereo mix reference | Master folder — every format, see what you get back |
| Mixing | Project files from any DAW, or synced raw audio, plus a rough mix | Mix for revision, then the final mix |
| Vinyl pre-mastering | Your final digital master | Pre-master sequenced per side, for the cutting engineer |
| DDP | ISRC codes, exact titles, final running order | DDP with CD-text, sent for approval |
| Restoration | The best surviving source you have | A repaired, listenable master |
Quotes are written, in euro, and hold for 14 days. Two revision rounds per track are included — see the terms for what counts as a revision. Mixing and mastering are not separate price tiers: what sets the price is the material that arrives, not the name on the invoice. Payment by SEPA transfer or Stripe, in full before work begins.
Mastering
Stereo mastering. The standard route, and the right one for most records. One stereo mix per song, optionally with a second render. This is the fastest path and usually the most effective — a mix that already works does not need to be taken apart to be finished.
Stem mastering. Where the balance still needs to move at the final stage. Up to five stereo groups per song, plus a stereo reference of the mix you already approved, so the stems are always measured against the record you signed off rather than against nothing.
Stem mastering is not automatically the better option. If the mix is where you want it, stereo mastering will usually serve the record better and cost less time.
Mixing
Mixing from project files in any DAW, or from rendered raw audio. Delivered as a mix for a feedback round, then revised inside the agreed direction until it is finished.
Frequently taken together with mastering as one engagement, which is how most albums here are done — one pair of ears from the raw material to the delivered master, with no handover in the middle.
Vinyl pre-mastering
I do not cut lacquer. The vinyl master is born on a cutting machine, in the hands of a cutting engineer, at the plant you choose. Vinyl pre-mastering is the stage before that: preparing your record so the transfer happens cleanly, and so the cutting engineer never has to stop, query a file, or refuse it because something in it cannot cross into the analogue medium.
Most of what is written about this online is wrong. There is a great deal of advice about how digital files must be treated before cutting — what to roll off, what to fold to mono, how much level to give away in advance. Most of it comes from people who have never sat in a cutting session, or spoken to an engineer who cuts for mass production.
The truth is simpler. With a quality cutting machine and a good pressing process, your record can sound almost the same on vinyl as it does in the digital domain — on a good playback system, the difference is far smaller than the folklore suggests. The medium is not the handicap it is usually described as.
So for vinyl pre-mastering I want your final digital master. Not a pre-master, not a rough mix, and not a “vinyl-safe” version prepared in advance. The polished sound you already love is precisely the thing to get onto the lacquer intact; my work is to prepare that transfer so a credible engineer on a good machine can reproduce it without surprising technical failures.
There is a practical reason this matters beyond the sound. Plants are overloaded and cutting engineers’ schedules are tight. Material that arrives prepared makes their work easier and the outcome far more predictable — it is the difference between a cut that happens on schedule and one that comes back with questions.
Sides, and why they decide the sound
A record is cut in a spiral, and the space available for that spiral is finite. The longer a side runs, the closer the grooves have to sit, and the quieter the cut has to be to keep them from meeting. That is the one trade-off nothing in the mastering can undo.
| Format | Comfortable | Possible, at a cost |
|---|---|---|
| 12″ at 33⅓ rpm | up to about 18 minutes a side | 20–24 minutes, with audible level and low-end sacrificed |
| 12″ at 45 rpm | up to about 12 minutes a side | 15 minutes, and it is the better-sounding option if the running time allows |
| 7″ at 45 rpm | about 4–5 minutes a side | — |
Two consequences worth knowing before the running order is fixed. The inner grooves of a side are the most difficult part of the record — high frequencies and sibilance suffer most as the spiral tightens — so the quietest, sparsest song is usually the kindest way to end a side. And the two sides do not have to be equal: an eighteen-minute side and a twelve-minute side will both cut well, whereas two sides of twenty-four will both suffer.
So the side split has to be decided before the pre-master is made, not after. I need the running order divided into sides, with a running time for each. That single decision sets the level the record can be cut at, and it is the most common cause of a late and expensive surprise at the plant.
What the cutting engineer receives. One continuous file per side, at the resolution the master was made at, with the track starts marked and a side-timing sheet listing each track, its start time and the total for that side. Anything the cutter needs to know travels with it in writing.
Where my part stops. I prepare the transfer; the cutting engineer at the plant you choose has the final say on level, sibilance and low end, and may still ask for a change on the day. That is their job and their machine, and the fact that they can ask is what makes the result good.
Sequenced per side, and quoted per side.
If you do not already have a cutting engineer, I work with several and can put you in touch. Sidney Claire Meyer, who heads the vinyl department at Emil Berliner Studios in Berlin, is one I would send my own records to.
DDP for replication
DDP with CD-text, ISRC codes and the final running order, sent to you for approval before it reaches a plant. Once a DDP is manufactured, an error in it is a pressing, not an email.
Restoration
Older recordings and archival material brought up to a state where they can sit next to current work — noise, damage, and the artefacts of the medium they survived on.
This is restoration proper, not a second pass at a finished record. Where an existing release simply needs a new master, that is mastering, and it is quoted as mastering.
How a project runs
- You send the material and a sentence about what you want from it.
- A short conversation about direction, and through your references and mine — so the work starts from common ground rather than from a guess.
- The first master, or the first mix. This is the one that matters: it shows whether we hear the record the same way. If it turns out we do not, you can walk away with a full refund.
- Feedback rounds. Most projects are where they need to be by the second pass, occasionally the third.
- Delivery — every format, in one folder, with the specification on the files and deliverables page.