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I have been an audio engineer since 1977 and love everything having to do with music, sound, and recording technology.

The recording industry is an industry in transition these days due to the widespread availablility of powerful computers and recording software putting unprecedented capabilities in the hands of musicians. As a professional from the “Analog Era” I am embracing the new changes and seeing how they can make the music I make and produce better.

This new version of my website has many more music selections and expanded content throughout and hopefully showcases my thirty five plus year career as an engineer at Group Effort Studios in Northern Kentucky, (a fantastic relationship that is as much a part of my professional history as anything else I’ve ever done, except I guess for taking up the trombone at age 10!) and Ultrasuede studios since 2011.

The big news lately is that I've relocated to the Hilton Head Island South Carolina area as of August 1, 2015 to ply my trades to the musicians in the Low Country. I've opened a new studio here called Hilton Head Audioworks. I'm also going to be making the most of the "collaborate thru the internet" capabilities that are available to us all by doing file sharing, remote mixing, real-time collaboration and mastering of finished projects. Actually, I have been doing all this for years already, it'll just be at a greater distance!

"I love using my extensive knowledge of music and styles, recording techniques and advanced audio software to help my clients consistently achieve results beyond their expectations."

I have a no-compromise, surround capable control room environment at home which will allow the freedom to work whenever I need to and since so much of recording these days is done “inside-the-box” a rockin’ computer setup and critical listening environment is basically all you need to do about 50% of the work I do.

Please feel free to look around at the site and see the kinds of services I offer, what I charge and listen to examples of my work. I am blessed to work with some of the finest musicians in the area and I believe that will show when listening to my demos.

the path to Recording Engineering

I've loved music and electronics as long as I can remember. I had my amateur radio license at age 10, back when the only permissible communication method was Morse code, and was fascinated by tape recorders, getting my first reel to reel recorder (from Sears!) about then as well.

One of my first "peeks behind the recording curtain" was playing back at half speed one of my childhood(?) Chipmunks LPs that I had on tape and lo and behold I heard 3 "Dave Sevilles" acting in character verrrrry slowwwwly.

I started trombone in school band but it didn't really light me up in the first few years. It wasn't until I started taking private lessons (where a few nagging "musical mysteries" got cleared up) and by the time I was in high school was playing at the "all-state" level. It was all good fun until I went to one of the summer Stan Kenton big band clinics in Sacramento. After the auditions I was placed in the No. 2 band led by Bob Curnow which was mostly college students and I was clearly in over my head! But I could read well and I was in the 4th Bone chair which, let's face it, isn't all that demanding from a range standpoint and there certainly weren't going to be any solos.

We rehearsed on the stage where Stan gave his nightly concert and during down moments I would look through the book. "Wow, there's the original chart (stains and all) to Artistry Rhythm, City of Glass and other such classics. The band was absolutely sssmokin' and I began to realize, "Ohhh, this is what it can be like!" and was pretty much hooked from there on out.

When I got started, analog reel-to-reel recording was the only game in town but wow, what a nightmare it all was! Recently I've starting running into people that I refer to as the "Analog Zealots" and I gotta say that when analog is at it's absolute best it sounds just fine, these people never actually had to use it! If your were to do a standard benefit/drawback comparison list the column of benefits would have one single entry: sounds great. The "drawback" column would be pages long!

Digital Recording is amazing; finally that first playback sounds exactly like it did when the musicians were playing it! Couple that with good musicianship, fantastic microphones and a great sounding studio and you can make pretty much any sound you might want to hear. 

Couple all that with the amazing sounds you can get out of virtual instruments (instruments that exist as playable synths or samplers in your computer's memory) and you have an unlimited musical vista before you!

One of the things I really enjoy as an adjunct to my studio work is doing live sound at concerts. I have assembled a small but still quite capable, high quality live sound system that you can hire me with. I can cover up to about 1000 people outdoors to a reasonable level and I always get excellent comments on the sound of the groups I do.

Videos

Something that has proven to be a lot of fun and is well suited to my skills is shooting videos of music performances. I have been recording recital and concert performances since the beginning of my career but with the advent of relatively inexpensive high definition, widescreen video equipment there is a whole new dimension of services that I can provide. And of course the best thing about my videos is the sound!

Mastering Services

Mastering is something I have always done on my projects as I mix them but I also offer it as a stand-alone service. Are you doing real work at your home studio and not really sure if you've got it "right down the middle" sonically? Need that extra boost of loudness to be competitive with the rest of the planet but don't want your music to be destroyed by compression? I can give you that extra punch you're looking for and it won't sound completely hammered by processing!