lesson 5 - Posted on 2013-04-10 by Matthew Lutchman

this week's lesson was about signal flow and patch bays.  i have personally never used a patch bay before and all i knew about them was that they were an organized way to connect a bunch of inputs to the recording console.  after reading the text i had a vague understanding of the four connection types of in/out jacks but, as usual, it took a real world explanation from joey to understand why these exist.  sometimes the technical jargon and diagrams in the text actually make it harder for me to understand a concept.  im glad joey is able to give me practical world application and say, "ok, if you want to split a signal, you need a normalled connection jack." also, a highlight of this lesson for me was learning about a balanced vs unbalanced 1/4 inch cable.  i knew that an XLR cable was grounded because of the 3 pins, but i was under the assumption that all 1/4 inch cables are the same.  ive been playing guitar for 14 years, the whole time using 1/4 inch instrument cables, but ive never really understood how they work.  joey showed me how some have 2 rings and some only have 1.  since the rings are isolators, it makes sense, 2 rings= 3 signals (balanced) and 1 ring=2 signals (unbalanced).  i love how this program is teaching me about music in ways i didnt expect.