side-chain dynamics

Richard Hulse from Radio New Zealand had a great article in the current Pro Audio Asia magazine on parallel (or side-chain) compression, not to be confused with side-chain triggered compression (as in ducking). Mr Hulse kindly sent me a link to a version of his article on the web.
I first came across the technique of parallel compression in the late 90s in an article in the short-lived Australian Sound magazine. In this case the method was used to create a heavily compressed drum submix to run under the normal drum mix, thus adding density without interfering adversely with the overall drum sound.
Running a compressed version of an audio track alongside a clean version enables low level passages of music to be lifted without effecting the loud transients. Very useful for achieving transparent squeezing for broadcasting of classical music.
Yesterday I fired up Pro Tools and played with the technique for a while, using a commercial recording of Pergolesi's Stabat Mater as the program material.
Further inspiration for my ongoing fascination with audio dynamics processing...

3rd episode of Chartbusting 80s tonight. I'm seriously thinking about using my dbx Driverack as a Swiss Army Knife compressor/limiter tonight. Not ideal, but the only thing I have.