One Percent Better Every Day: Raul Ferrando on String Arranging Tips (Episode 53)

Reliability beats virtuosity.

Anybody can write a string line. What makes the difference is how much time you put into the performance: the dynamics, the attack, the vibrato that swells on a singing phrase and fades away on a held chord. That is how Raul Ferrando opened Episode 53 of The Career Musician, before Nomad had even officially said welcome.

Born in Argentina, Raul has been in the Los Angeles music scene for over 25 years as a composer, arranger, orchestrator and producer, working across orchestral, world and pop music. This conversation is full of string arranging tips and studio wisdom from someone who has done it for decades. Here is what stood out.

The vocal is king

When Raul gets a song to arrange, he has a keyboard full of options like anybody else. What simplifies it for him is the lyric. What is the singer talking about? Then he builds the scenery for that story.

His rules are simple. Stay out of the singer's range. Don't compete with the notes they are singing. Respect the chords, but don't get in the way. Plenty of players have the skills, he says, but if you are not listening, especially to the vocal, you are not serving the song. The arrangement is there to support the story and make it stronger.

One percent better every day

Raul only got about two years of piano lessons as a kid before money got tight at home. His teacher complained he never practiced the lesson. He just played whatever his ears told him to. By 15 he was singing in a male quartet at church with guys in their twenties, and arranging for them on handwritten manuscripts. They gave him a hard time and sang his charts anyway. He never stopped.

When he moved to the States in 1984, he had no music connections at all. Someone at church asked him to help with a song. He found a studio through the Recycler, played keys, programmed drums, added bass and sang. The studio guy who mixed it told him something that only hit him years later.

"The key is that you do it every day... and get one percent better every day."

Raul Ferrando, 14:43

One percent doesn't sound like much. Do it every day for a year and, as Raul puts it, you are more than 300 percent better than you were. Consistency is the key. There's no way around it.

Don't take it personally

Raul has worked for years with an artist who now has some major names behind her, and she still comes to him for orchestral arrangements. His attitude: if I do something I like and she doesn't like it, it's not good. He is working for them.

That takes maturity. You can get attached to an idea, and someone says, I don't like that. A pro asks: what do you want? Do you have a song that does it? Words like "warm" or "fuller" mean different things to different people, so audio references beat descriptions every time. Even listeners with no musical training can point to the record that sounds better.

The artist is the one who has to sing it a hundred times next year and live with it forever. Respect that. It is not about you.

The session is fragile

This might be the most important studio etiquette lesson in the episode.

"The atmosphere of the session is very fragile, and you can mess it up really easy."

Raul Ferrando, 25:05

A musician has to be in the right frame of mind to perform. Talk down to somebody and it shows up in the playing. Raul said he might get in trouble for this, but some amazing players have the wrong attitude, and he would rather call the number two guy with the right attitude. Nomad couldn't agree more. That is Reliability beats virtuosity, and it is Low maintenance / no drama in action.

Raul has seen the other side, too. A singer getting smaller and smaller every time the producer cut in with "no, no, no." An engineer running out of time and covering mistakes with cymbal crashes all over the record. It works, he said, but it is not a musical solution.

Do your homework, then call a pro

Raul often works with tight budgets, so his charts have to be right before he walks in. He writes in Logic, sends his mock-up audio to a copyist who notates the parts and marks the dynamics by ear, and shows up to the session fresh and rested instead of running on two hours of sleep. Better rested means better ears.

The LA string players he hires usually need about two takes. They listen to the mock-up, follow along on the chart, make one pass and they're done. Often he is in and out in about an hour.

He learned about hiring pros the hard way. Early on, a friend brought in a guitarist whose guitar wouldn't hold its tuning. After a dozen takes and a lot of editing, the studio owner kept telling him to call a pro. When he finally did, the pro took 15 minutes to do two takes that were 20 times better. Pros cost more, and they are worth it.

And check the key. One client approved vocal arrangements in C and showed up insisting he had asked for D. It was written right there on his chart. They called in favors and recut it.

No cutting corners

Once Raul starts an arrangement, the budget disappears from his mind. It's like a train. You can't stop it.

"I have to do the best I can because it's my work, it's my name."

Raul Ferrando, 45:17

Nobody hearing the strings will know what the budget was. They will only hear the arrangement. Everything you do is an audition.

That approach paid off in a way he never planned. Years ago, a friend brought him a belly dancer who needed music for her shows. One piece turned into a whole album, and one track from it went viral, with dancers all over the world posting videos to it. Some of those videos have millions of views, and the track has brought him film scoring work. Work begets work. Nomad's point to younger musicians: put your music out there, because people can discover you.

The takeaway

Serve the vocal. Get one percent better every day. Leave your ego at the door, keep the room safe, prepare like your name is on it, because it is. Find Raul at raulferrando.com. And if you want to be the player people call first, start with the free Get the Gig guide.

Get the gig. Keep the gig. Build the career.

Watch on YouTube or find every episode on the TCM Podcast page.