Aspiring recording engineers including SFCM students and alumni recently got tips from two industry experts on how to make a great classical recording - even on a budget. San Francisco mastering engineer Piper Payne led a master class in recording techniques along with Leslie Ann Jones, Grammy Award-winning recording director at Skywalker Sound and a visiting faculty member with SFCM’s program in Technology and Applied Composition (TAC). The event was sponsored by the San Francisco Chapter of The Recording Academy. Participants attended a live recording session with SFCM’s Thalea String Quartet and then circled through the Conservatory’s new TAC recording and sound studios to compare how different mics, mic placements, pre-amps and software determine what comes out of the speakers. The general conclusion: you get what you pay for. Top-of-the-line mics provided by Jones and the Conservatory outperformed a much less expensive set, although the experts agreed that DIY recording engineers can still produce excellent results by relying on correct recording techniques and a producer with attentive ears.