Andra Suchy grew up on a farm near Mandan, North Dakota. Both her parents are folk musicians, and Suchy grew up going to folk festivals and performing at an earrly age. She has studied classical voice, and has lived and worked in Minneapolis with numerous bands and performers.

Her recording credits include Soul Asylum's The Silver Lining, The Honeydogs' 10,000 Years and Amygdala among others. She has shared the stage with such artists as The Honeydogs, Dave Pirner, Jonny Lang, Chuck Suchy (her father), Ben Suchy (her brother), Tina Schlieske, Peter Ostroushko, and Jeff Healy. Her solo debut CD, Patchwork Story was released in August of 2006.

She is currently playing shows and working on a new solo record.

Patrick Ogle: Tell me a little about you and your music. Especially about how you think it sounds and what you are trying to get at musically?

I have been making music my whole life. My dad, Chuck, is a folk singer and my mom, Linda sings as well. I grew up on a farm in North Dakota. I think some of that comes through in my song-writing. I try to make my own music very sincere. On the flip side, I also do a lot of jingle type work and we put my vocals on commercial work from internet sessions from our home studio.

How do you go about choosing the gear you use to record and use live? Will any old microphone do or are you particular?

I guess you could say I am particular. As far as live goes, with the range of gigs I do, you never know what you are going get so I usually bring a Shure SM58 or a Beta58 because that is usually what most live sound engineers are most comfortable working with and they sound good. I also like this EV mic, I think it the RE 410. For recording, We try to make it sound as good as we can on a budget, and for that I think the Rode NTK is a great sounding tube mic for the money. In making my CD, Patchwork Story, we also used borrowed a friends Neumann M49. It stopped working while we were using it (after we got 1 song out of it). We were HORRIFIED. It turns out the capsule had never been replaced and just happened to burn out while we had it. I guess it's common. We also used an AKG C-414 B-XLS. We use a Universal Audio Solo 610 preamp/DI. It is affordable, portable and a serious workhorse.

I am particular because vocal work is my profession, but sometimes you just get put in front of a mic you have so sing into and it's out of your control.

The why part, is just trying to the best mic for what we can afford or borrow. Tube or Condenser, or what we do with the pre-amp can vary depending how much we want to warm it up. It varies depending on the song or job.

How do you place the microphones in the room when recording? How close do you get to them when you sing?

We (Andrew Pierzina and I, my hubby/producer/guitar player) converted a bedroom closet into a vocal booth of sorts. I use a pop filter and tend to start about a hands distance from the mic but sometimes for really quiet work we crank the pre-amp and get right on it. I often back off a few more inches if i am loud, too.

Has a microphone ever improved or harmed your performance?

Well, yeah, but there are lot of variables besides just the mic. The monitors,stage volume, the engineer, and the house gear all can come into play. I am pretty sensitive about how my monitors sound, but sometimes you just have to roll with it.

Do you use effects WHEN you record or do you add them after?

After. We like to work with a clean track that is a good performance on it's own.

Any gear tips for vocalists?

Bring your own mic because house mics can be REALLY smelly. Get one that you know every engineer will be cool with. 58s are usually the standard.