Tucked away in the Somerset countryside some ten miles south of Bath, The Wool Hall is a residential studio with a distinguished past. The historic building was originally converted into a recording studio in the 80’s by Tears For Fears, initially for private use. Later the studio became fully commercial installing an SSL 6056 analogue console and playing host to a number of leading artist including Joni Mitchell, The Pretenders, the Smiths, 808 State, Stereophonics, Paul Weller & Ash.
In 1994 The Wool Hall was acquired by Van Morrison who, having already recorded five albums at the studio was one of it’s most regular clients. For the past five years the studio has been in constant use for in-house projects but this year they are proudly re-opening as one of the countries leading residentials.
In the summer of last year the studio was upgraded with the installation of a brand new SSL MT+ 96 channel digital console. David Conroy, Technical Manager at The Wool Hall explains, “We had decided to upgrade the control room and as long term SSL users, we decided to check out their current range of consoles. Our primary needs were for a console that could be configured to our way of working, changing quickly from recording to mix setups. As we now use hard disk recording as our main multitrack medium, we decided a digital console was the way forward.”
“The MT+ has the look and feel of an analogue desk and is familiar to recording engineers who would otherwise be faced with learning a new operating system and mode of working. The desk layout has all the ergonomic styling one expects of SSL and with the usual support from technical department, the transition has been smooth as could be expected. With the installation of the MT plus I feel that The Wool Hall is fully prepared for new developments within the recording industry for the foreseeable future”.
tel: +44 (0)1373 830731
email: tristan@thewoolhall.co.uk
web: http://www.thewoolhall.co.uk
Pictured below, you can see the removal of the long serving SSL 6000 series console being expertly handled by Pulleyn's.
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