Like A Virgin - Recording

Recording

Nile Rodgers was chosen by Madonna as the main producer of the album, mostly because of his work with David Bowie on his 1983 album Let's Dance. Rodgers had a reputation of being a man of experience in creating musical personas in the recording studio. With production partner Bernard Edwards, Rodgers had formed the seventies band Chic in 1976. But he left the band after seven years to pursue his own career, and ended up collaborating with Bowie for Let's Dance. Madonna was impressed by the record and its title single, so she wanted a similar approach to the music of her album. She commented, "When I was making the record, I was just so thrilled and happy to be working with Nile Rodgers. I idolized Nile because of the whole Chic thing. I couldn't believe that the record company gave me the money so that I could work with him." Rodgers recalled that he had first seen Madonna perform at a small club in New York in 1983. In an interview with Time magazine, Rodgers explained: "I went to the club to see another woman sing, but when I got there Madonna was onstage. I loved her stage presence and then we met right after that. I kept thinking to myself, 'Damn, is she a star', but she wasn't at that time. I always wanted to work with her and Like a Virgin seemed like a perfect opportunity." The album was recorded at Power Station Studio in New York at a quick pace. Rodgers enlisted the help of his former Chic band mates Edwards, who was the bassist, and Tony Thompson, who played drums; they appeared on several tracks of the album. Rodgers decided to be the guitarist, when Edwards requested him to do so, in exchange of their help.

"Madonna is really sly when it comes to get what she wants. At one point, I had threatened to quit the project, because she had allegedly treated a studio hand unkindly, something I don't endorse. I was actually in the elevator and she walked up and smiled at me and said, 'Nile, I want to know one thing: Does this mean that you don't love me anymore?' And then we both started laughing. Then we both realized how ridiculous we were both being. That was it. We didn't have a serious fight after that.

The recording sessions did not start until the afternoon as Rodgers, who attended late-night parties, was not accustomed to work in early mornings. The schedule was also difficult for Madonna, who recalled that she used to "go to the swim club on the Upper West Side and go swimming and walk from there to the recording studio. It was impossible for me to reach there at morning." Rodgers recalled that Madonna was a real hard worker and incredibly tenacious. He commented: "I am always amazed by Madonna's incredible judgement when it comes to making pop records. I've never seen anyone do it better, and that's the truth. When we did that album, it was the perfect union, and I knew it from the first day in the studio. The thing between us, man, it was sexual, it was passionate, it was creativity... it was pop."

Jason Corsaro, the record's audio engineer, persuaded Rodgers to use digital recording, a new technique at the time which Corsaro believed was going to be the future of recording. To ensure this, Corsaro used a Sony 3324 24-track digital tape recorder and a Sony F1 two-track during the mixing of the tracks. Madonna recorded the lead parts of the songs in a small, wooden, high-ceilinged piano room at the back of Studio C, also known as Power Station's "R&B room". Corsaro then placed gobos around her while using the top capsule of a stereo AKG C24 tube microphone, with a Schoeps microphone preamplifier and a Pultec equalizer. Once the tracks met with everybody's approval, Robert Sabino added the keyboard parts, playing mostly a Sequential Circuits Prophet-5, as well as some Rhodes piano and acoustic piano, while Rodgers also played a Synclavier. Madonna, although not required, was present every minute of the recording sessions and the mixing process, Corsaro commented: "Nile was there most of the time, but she was there all of the time. She never left".