April 2016

Greetings:-)

It was another busy week at Engine Sound! Mixes were wrapped. New work in television and advertising arrived. Clients had big birthdays. Many beautiful voices were heard both in and out of the studio. Performances were given on stages and in vocal booths. Fish were caught and cooked. Andy Karl moved me with his talent. Parties were attended. Productions ensued. New leases were signed. Epic cab rides were had. Johnny and The Cult kicked serious ass at the Wellmont. Caves were explored. And tonight Odiseas Georgiadis is attending his premiere of “All We Had” directed by and starring Katie Holmes at the great Tribeca Film Festival.

That is all.

Hi All,
April is off to a very nice start:-) It was a busy week at the studio working on quite a diverse palette of music…

-Composing was done for a new ad campaign which looks like it was signed off on mid week. More to come upon true final approval:-)
-There was post production for Michael Kors done mid week with a lovely group of folks having a good ole’ time at the studio!
-More final mixing was done on the songs that were recorded last week for Laine. This will continue into next week as well…
-The writing team of Kathy Sommer, Alex Forbes and Noel Cohen wrote a very cool song which we produced and had the pleasure of listening to and recording the amazing voice
of Kim Viera grace the vocal. What a voice. She always impresses me and anyone else within earshot!
-More production was done with Odiseas Georgiadis and Kathy Sommer and Michael Guerriero on a song we wrote together that’s coming out bad ass:-) Congrats to Odiseas on
his spot in the Tribecca film festival for the premiere of the film “All We Had” where he appears with Katie Holmes.
-I escaped the studio to have the pleasure of listening to my long time friend and colleague Dana Calitri perform the songs of Joni Mitchell’s “Blue” with the very talented Ira Siegel on guitar and Jeff Franzell on piano. So much talent in that trio! Dana was incredible and effortless:-) The show sold out and they added another coming later this month. Go see her!
-A hot new dance inspired track for a brand new client was finished up yesterday as were a few tweaks some recent mixes.
-Another “out of studio” experience was had as I got to chat a bit with the talented Melissa Otero to discuss producing her new record:-) Very excited about this! Melissa is top notch
and as cool and sweet as they come. We are going to have a lot of fun making some incredible music in the coming months!

I’m off this weekend to meet up with old friend and rock and roll veteran Johnny Tempesta to hang a bit and watch him perform with The Cult tomorrow night! Good times y’all!

-M

Today marks my 24th year as an audio professional! On April 1st 1992 I was officially hired as assistant engineer at Zen Music on 26th Street in Manhattan by the good folks Craig Hazen and Julie Dansky. I had the opportunity to learn from some of the most talented engineers, producers, writers and musicians in the city and the world for then next 10 years of my employment there as I worked hard and worked my way up branching out into production, composing and sound design .

I am very fortunate to have been able to turn something I love so much and am so passionate about into such a enjoyable and rewarding career. I am thankful for all the incredibly talented people I’ve been able to work with and call my friends over this time. I think that the creative and artistic people I’ve spent my days with are some of the finest and most intelligent, open minded people you will ever meet and I’m grateful for each and every one of them.

A lot has changed since my first day as an assistant but the things that really matter the most have remained a constant. There is no replacement for a great song. There is no replacement for a great voice, be it sung or performed through an instrument. There is no replacement for hard work, determination and creativity. The way we produce, record and package all these things has changed an incredible amount and it always will, but if you listen to the music that is inspiring and rising up at any time you will always find the same core elements. Let’s continue to strive for them. I’ll keep up with the new software and gear for us:-)

Enjoy the weekend!

M