Artist Spotlight: PRESONUS AUDIO GEAR

Pro­lific multi-instru­men­tal­ist Amber Leigh main­tains a full cal­en­dar. When not ful­fill­ing her ambi­tious sched­ule of over 200 head­lin­ing per­for­mances per year, she’s craft­ing com­pelling bal­lads with lit­tle regard for genre bound­aries. While she’s flu­ent in man­dolin and gui­tar, it’s the fid­dle that has fos­tered her unique voice as a song­writer and com­poser. She has become known for boldly mix­ing coun­try, rock, and Celtic influences—without sac­ri­fic­ing the pop sen­si­bil­ity that makes her music com­mer­cially viable.

Leigh and her band have opened for many A-list acts, includ­ing Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, Toby Keith, Sug­ar­land, Keith Urban, Kenny Ches­ney, Brad Pais­ley, Brit­ney Spears, and Christina Aguil­era. She has appeared on mul­ti­ple major tele­vi­sion net­works, includ­ing TCN, USA Net­work, NBC, CBS, and FOX.

Her fourth album, Reck­less, was recorded in Nashville and pro­duced by Billy Austin, Michelle Poe, and Grammy Award win­ner Sil­vio Richetto, and it made heavy use of PreSonus equip­ment. At the heart of the record­ing rig are two Stu­di­o­Live 16.4.2 con­soles, cas­caded for a total of 32 input channels.

Leigh’s audio engi­neer, Hol­land Ryan, pro­vides some insight into the band’s record­ing process. “The Stu­di­o­Live 16.4.2 con­soles were cho­sen because of their ease of use, com­pat­i­bil­ity with Pro Tools, high qual­ity, and clear sound­ing mic pre­amps,” Ryan explains. “The abil­ity to instantly hear the record­ing using Cap­ture made it a very use­ful tool for the band. Any changes that needed to be made were instant and very easy to achieve with these con­soles and software.”

Onstage, Leigh’s band employs a PreSonus AudioBox USB inter­face, tak­ing advan­tage of the device’s porta­bil­ity and ease-of-use for a slightly unusual appli­ca­tion. “We’re cur­rently using the AudioBox USB for pre-sequenced tracks and a click track,” says Ryan. “The AudioBox USB fea­tures easy plug-and-play func­tion­al­ity with our Mac­Book Pro. It allows us to get high-quality sound for front of house and in our in-ear mon­i­tors, while not occu­py­ing a big foot­print on stage.”

Con­tin­ues Ryan, “The AudioBox USB is used as our in/out to front-of-house, which is con­nected from our Mac­Book Pro via USB, where we are using Logic Pro 9 for the sequenced play­back dur­ing the show. The lap­top is set up with all the pre-sequenced loops and clicks so our drum­mer, Matt, can cue the entire play­back dur­ing the show. The AudioBox USB has only two chan­nels, so one of the out­puts is used for loops, and the sec­ond out­put is used to send the click track to front-of-house through two active D.I. boxes, and then it’s sent to the five band members—all of which have stereo in-ear mixes.”

The band is plan­ning to stick with PreSonus for Leigh’s upcom­ing record. “We are about to go back to the stu­dio and fin­ish the remain­der of our new CD, where we will again use a pair of Stu­di­o­Live 24.4.2 con­soles and Cap­ture to lay down all of the tracks. The tracks from our last batch of songs were so clean and pris­tine com­ing from the Stu­di­o­Live that we will never use any­thing but a PreSonus Stu­di­o­Live from now on for mul­ti­track­ing.”
Ryan con­cludes, “Hav­ing used many dif­fer­ent options for track­ing in the past, rang­ing from the very expen­sive and eso­teric to inex­pen­sive mul­ti­track devices, the PreSonus Stu­di­o­Live con­soles have been hands-down the best sound­ing, and the eas­i­est to use.”