Produced by
Lawson Rollins, Shahin Shahida and Dominic Camardella
Rollins set the bar high on Infinita, but his lofty goal with Espirito was to surpass the first disc by stretching further beyond his comfort zone while elevating the performances, songwriting, cultural exchanges, production and fidelity on the record. While the album showcases extraordinary musicianship, scholarly composition, and an around-theworld alchemy of culture, Rollins has a humble way of never overwhelming the music. By setting a variety of accessible moods, such as infectious dance rhythms bursting with joy, somber ballads that stir emotion and provoke thought, love songs that embrace and ignite imagination, and intricate pieces that stimulate adventure, intrigue and mystery, the guitarist provides an inviting passport to a musical journey that promises to captivate, romance and entertain.
Technical Notes on the Recording of Espirito:
On Espirito, Lawson's guitars were recorded by Dominic Camardella using a Klaus Heyne modified Neumann U87 and an older AKG 414EB run through two vintage Neve 1064 mic preamps directly into a ProTools 192-HD interface and recorded at 88.2kHz sample rate and 24 bit resolution. No compression of the guitars was used during the recording phase. Mixing was accomplished using a hybrid digital/analog method, where certain sound shaping and EQ was achieved using plug-ins by Waves and Sonnox in PT-HD. Multi-tracks were outputed for blending and analog processing into the Rupert Neve Designs 5088 high resolution analog mixing console. The output of the Neve summing buss was then sent directly into a TubeTech SMC-2B whose output was recorded to a vintage ATR102 half inch stereo tape machine running at 30ips with Dolby SR Noise Reduction onto Michael Spitz's Analog Tape Formulation (ATR Services) for maximum fidelity with minimum noise and distortion. Bernie Grundman personally mastered the album.
Watch this interesting video from engineer Dom Camardella explaining the new state-of-the-art Rupert Neve 5088 mixing console used for Espirito on YouTube.