Hi John and Russell

Thanks for taking the time to comment, it is much appreciated. This journey is about learning, learning and more learning!!!
To answer your question John, all the instruments are generated using Real Tracks however there are a couple of tricks I use before rendering to give me
more control over the final mix. Firstly I pan all the instruments to the middle and then remove all the reverb to give me completely dry tracks. The drum track is stereo by
default so panning within the kit is already done. I then render all the tracks to individual .wav files in stereo with the exception of the bass and solo tracks which are rendered
in mono. I find it's particularly important to have the bass in mono as this helps it sit comfortably with the kick drum in the final mix. Most bass guitars are played through a mono amp
in a live situation anyway. I then import all the tracks into my DAW, Nuendo 4, where all the tidying up is done and the vocals added. Nuendo comes bundled with a great
selection of VST"s however, after doing a bit of research on the net, I decided to invest in a VST package called Mercury Waves Bundle. It wasn't cheap but boy was it worth it.
This package is used by most professional studios around the world and the results speak for themselves. I probably will never use most of them, however, those I do use
have made the investment worthwhile. For guitar and bass I use a plugin called Amplitube X Gear. This allows you to build your own amp and speaker box combination to suit the song
as well as an array of effects pedals that guitarists use. Outboard hardware consists of a Phonic Helix Board 8 channel fire wire desk which has zero latency and a Samson CO1
condenser Mic....surprisingly inexpensive but it dose a great job. Once the final mix is done I then import it into Wave Lab for mastering. One thing I have learnt is that you
can have the best gear in the world but you have to learn how to get the best out of it.

Russell, your comment regarding vocal harmony is spot on. Norma, in spite of her obvious vocal ability, just don"t have an ear for harmony....something I consider a gift. In all her
years as a professional singer she has always had backup vocalists. Unfortunately my vocal ability leaves a lot to be desired so I have not been able to contribute in this area.
We have put the word out around town but so far we have not found anyone suitable, however, the search will go on. For this reason the mixes you have heard are
not set in concrete and are open to interpretation.

Once again thank you both for your comments they are much valued. We will keep on rockin' and see where the journey takes us.

Best regards,

Paul