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Studio News |
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Studio News |
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June 2009
Frank Lizarraga was back to work on the mix of one of the songs for this the latest CD project for Luvtaxi. We worked over the mix but had to call it a night after two hours as we were both burned out from both the heat and having already put in a full days work. We'll get back together next to complete the process which will include recording some additional vocal tracks and finishing the mix. 6-29-09
Ric and Jody Hornor reappeared this morning to record the final installment for their Ghosts of the Gold Rush project. We had a lot of laughs as Ric read through some tough scripts in several historic sounding characters that he has invented along the way to completing this large project. Now Ric and Jody will continue to edit the sound files, organize the material that is to be printed into books covering the Gold Rush era. But they are well on their way to getting it done. 6-29-09
Many people have asked what I do when I'm not in the studio. Well I have been playing three nights a week at the historic Delta King located in Old Sacramento. In response to an ad that I placed on Craigslist & Face Book, pictured here is Cody Jackson, a seventeen year old blues guitar player who came down from Placerville to jam with us in the lounge of the King. We had a fabulous time and Cody has assured me that he will be back for more of the same. In the last several weeks I have been trying to get Peter Munday's CD finished. I needed to do some additional mixing on one of the songs and get it re-mastered. I have done so and now after getting Peter's approval, it's on to duplication. I have been working with Andrew Pratap and that project is nearing completion. I had a visit from a songwriter named Glenn Frost. We worked on one of his songs and he was very happy with the results. Glenn is scheduled to return early next month. 6-28-09
Julian Shorter (on the right) has completed the Recording Audio Engineering class that he has been studying with me for the last seven months. Julian showed up with his cousin to write and record a song for his class final. We shared some laughs and generally had a good time as he prepares to move on with his career armed with some valuable knowledge of both the equipment and the business. As I have mentioned before Julian has been a fine student and I am confident that he will do well in his pursuit of a studio engineering career. 6-18-09
Lloyd Banks (left) stopped by to have me create a sound track the he
could sing to from his booth at a farmers market in Lodi today.
I
went into action and recording a guitar, bass, drum and string track for
him. Then Lloyd stepped into the booth and recorded a scratch vocal guide
track. We both agreed that he had pushed his time limit to the end by
waiting so long to contact me. But in the end,
Frank Lizarraga
and Jamie Zuniga from Luvtaxi graced
the studio this week to tweak some mixes. It's hard to believe that it's
been almost a year since their last visit. We ran
short of time and scheduled another session for next week.
The Fijian-Indian musicians were in the studio for a mixing session yesterday. Once we were able to get a handle on the blend of the music, we moved smartly through all nine songs. There were several areas that required some digital editing, but for the most part it was smooth sailing. Andrew Pratap who is the producer of this project, booked another session in two weeks. This will once again be a mobile recording at his home in South Sacramento. 6-3-09
Rev. Robert Chatman
paid me a visit on Tuesday to have me transfer some
audio of his sermons. Robert is a pretty happy guy as you can see from his
picture. We laughed and joked a lot during the transfer. He now has his
material on CD's. 6-2-09
Peter Munday
was in the studio so we could do some additional work on five of his songs.
It seems that after mastering some frequencies masked others and the mix was
changed.
We made the corrections and I have a date to return to
the mastering studio in a week.
Peter scheduled a date in two weeks to explore some of
his newest music and look to the next project. Peter explained that working
on his music helps him to relax from the stress of his day to day job.
6-2-09
Dave McAsey dropped by yesterday to jam with me for several hours. It's always fun to get with Dave. We have a long history that dates back to the mid seventies. We played very intensely and concentrated on some very interesting rhythms. Dave is also a very fine percussionist, playing congas and bongos. Here's Dave in my kitchen showing me a new song that he had written. Here's a link to Dave's web site. http://www.davemcasey.com/ 5-29-09
Stephen Healy is back and
sounding better than ever. Stephen also known as Psycotic, recorded
three songs. After which he mentioned that these were the best sounding of
his collection. I had to agree. We had a good day in the studio and he is
ready to place these recordings on his myspace. Go to
www.myspace.com/psycoticrecords69,
for a listen to his music.
Composer Mark Butterworth is shown here with Elise Baker, a classically trained soprano singer, Elise who is also a practicing attorney in Placerville aspires to get more studio singing gigs. If yesterday is an example of her singing ability, she will do well. She was prepared and preformed well in the booth. We were able to record two of Marks songs in only one hour. 5-28-09
The New Helvetia Theater descended upon Pudding Stone to record a song that is to be used as the sound track for a demo video that will to be shot the next day. On the left Chris is working out an arrangement with Ghram the pianists. The next photo is of Ghram and a friend. He called her his blond bimbo. 5-28-09
Sean Bahry has returned to the
"Pudding Stone Fold" after more than a years absence. I have been
working with Sean since he was fifteen years old. Sean is now eighteen years
old. He has continued to pursue his first love, music, in the interim
period. He has been working with a software program called Reason. So he
wanted to do some loops during this session. We were able to get the job
done and he will be back for another round. Today is my son
Zackery's seventeenth birthday. I just want to wish him all the best and
encourage him to reach for all the gusto he can get his hand on and his head
wrapped around.
Ric and Jody Hornor were
back for another installment of Ghosts of the Gold Rush. Ric seen
with Voice over talent Philip who is from England. Philip's accent
was a welcome addition to the ever growing cast of characters that are
telling these many stories of the life and times of the Gold Rush Era of
1849. Jody is going over some adlibs with Al who also did a
fine job in the booth. We have one more session scheduled for Monday
morning. The stories told are real and much better in many ways because they
were true tales.
Almost a year to the day I was at the Presentation Catholic Church prepared to record this years Loretto High School Girls Choir. Under the able direction of Mr. Anthony Lien, this will be the last choir due to the closing of the all girls school in June. I was so impressed by the skill and focus of these young ladies singing complicated harmonies while maintaining a blend and singing as if they of one mind instead of forty voices. Sadly because of our economy the school which has had a long history is yet a another victim of the times. Tony told the girls at the end of the recording that they have enriched his life and he will truly miss them and the school. The spirit and exuberance if these young ladies is a joy to behold. They will carry that spirit with them and the remembrances of Loretto high for the rest of their lives. This the best example of our youth being shaped by their environment. I wish them and Tony, "God speed and smoothing sailing". 5-14-09
Andrew Pratap contacted me to do a live recording of Fijian musicians playing traditional Fijian-Indian music at his home. Before beginning we were all blessed and an orange paste was smeared on our foreheads. Then the musicians all sat cross legged on the floor and began to play. Some of the songs were over ten minutes long. After the marathon song they would take a break as the drummer said that his wrists would get stiff and sore. They would all go into the garage and smoke cigarettes to relax before beginning again. They introduced me to a drink called kava that when drunk produces a mild buzz but is said to be good for the body. It was an interesting experience for me to meet and work with these people from half a world away. We have scheduled more sessions 5-11-09
Sister Swing has just finished their new video demo and it is displayed on their web site. Go to www.sisterswing.com for a look see. They can be very proud of this quality video. I watch as Valerie worked on the project which started about six months ago when she and I put together a sound track that was about five and a half minutes long. That was followed by a video shoot lasting half a day and endless hours of viewing and selecting the best shots from the video shoot. Then she reviewed hours of live performances videos, and still pictures from other live performances. Then she scripted the whole thing and met with the video editor for many grueling six hour editing sessions. I am guessing that she has invested over 70 hours into this short video lasting less than six minutes. Many people just don't understand how much time and effort goes into a project of this caliber. It's totally professional and costs many thousands of dollars as well. We see videos on both TV and on the web every day and take them for granted never truly understanding how much time, effort and money goes into producing them. And so it is that Valerie Marston has once again proven herself to be a fine producer and my hats off to her. She has also produced all five of the Sister Swing CD's. Go get em' girl, I love you Hunky! Happy Mother's day to her and to all you Mom's. 5-9-09
Psycotic AKA Stephen Healy was back in the mix and in the booth slammin' his rap and creating some general mayhem. The tracks turned out well and he was a happy camper when he left. He did leave me with his myspace URL in case you would like to check out his music. Try www.myspace.com/psycoticrecords69 5-8-09
Ric and Jody Hornor are back in the studio on another project. This time it involves the history of the Gold Rush and several books about events that took place in our area during that 1849 era. They are also making an audio CD describing those events taken from the book in the vernacular of that time. Pictured on the left is Ric, Jody and Carolyn, one of the voice over talents that have adopted certain characters from the books. Next is Carol, another VO talent discussing the script with Jody. The next several is yours truly with the producers of this project. Jody has booked several more sessions and the beat goes on. 5-5-09 April 2009
Today I finished preparing Peter Mundy's mixes for mastering. This involved bouncing the mixes at 44.1KZ /24 bit to achieve the best possible quality in the music. In doing so I did some additional tweaking on some of the mixes to tighten them up a little more. This was my last chance to do so. On Monday I will go the mastering lab located in Citrus Heights to put the finishing touches on this project. Looking back, we began recording in November of last year so it has taken us six months to complete these fourteen songs from scratch. As I have mentioned before, it has been a fine ride. Soon it will be a finished CD and Peter can begin thinking about the next project after we have a big party to celebrate. 4-28-09
Stephen Healy has been a client of mine for several years. Recently Stephen AKA "Psycotic" returned to California from New York where he had moved to see what he could do to further his career. In New York he teamed up with another rapper who called himself Delirious, the two of them wrote and recorded some songs together. Now Stephen has returned to the Sacramento area and is back in the booth adding to his collection of rap songs. Stephen is serious about his music and mentioned that he plans on coming to the studio at least once a month. More later. 4-20-09
I want to focus on my audio engineering student Julian Shorter. Julian came to me about five months ago wanting to take the audio class I teach. He is a young man of eighteen years, but he displays a maturity that appealed to me right off the bat. He and I have been getting together every week to study and record. He is a willing student who takes direction well. We are more than half way through the class and I want to display some of the short projects he has recorded during our class time. I always try to challenge Julian to see how he will measure up and to prepare him for the music/studio scene once he is on his own. Here are three songs that he recorded of me playing various instruments. Have a listen. "The Funky Julian", "Rainy daze" and "Last-O-March". 4-15-09
On a rainy day in April BSL other wise known as Black System Lyric made their way to the studio to give up their rap and try to make a name for themselves. Under the watchful eye and ear of Julian Shorter (student engineer), the group stepped into the booth to lay down their tracks. Each took their turn while the others laughed and encouraged the rapper in the booth. The group consist of Tiana, Alex and Zack. They had Christina holding down the moral support position. I slipped out to get a giant pizza and was greeted with cheers of delight when I returned. All in all it was a great way for the group to have some extra fun during spring break from Rosemont High School. Check out "Gass Re-Mix" & "Cannon" 3-6-09
March 2009
Rich O'Day (seen on the left behind me) is a composer who wanted to have several of his songs recorded. He has a fine baby grand piano in his living room, so it was decided that we would do the session at his home. I arrived at 10AM for the 12 noon session and set up the mobile recording rig. The musicians arrived and began running through the songs. The players were; Mark Stivers (piano) Valerie Marston (vocals) Ron Jones (drums) and Shelley Denny (bass) The arrangement for the first song was discussed, worked out and we would began recording. We worked through and recorded three songs in just two hours. Valerie will come to the studio for a vocal session on Wednesday evening (as we had decided to have her just record scratch vocals) and I will mix and master the tracks soon after. It was a delightful day and we all enjoyed ourselves at the in-home session. In many instances, I have found that to record in someone's home yields very good tracks as the atmosphere is always very relaxed. Here is a rough mix. 3-30-09
Peter
Mundy's mega project is drawing to a close. We have completed the
tracking and most of the mixing. All that's left to do is some minor
tweaking of the mixes and mastering. What can I say, I have had so much fun
working with Peter. This has to have been one of the most enjoyable
recording experiences that I have had in my over forty years of recording.
To me it has felt like I have known Peter all of my life. We have had an
unusual meeting of the minds and the work was most enjoyable for both of us.
The time passed so quickly that it seems like we just started the project
last week instead of five months ago. Peter and I have reached a comfort
level that will live on long after the project is finished. Check out the
samples above. 3-27-09
Diane and Mark back for another vocal recording session. We met on Sunday and went through several songs. Mark decided to have the soprano vocalist come in next to see how the two vocal parts will fit together. These are demanding parts for a singer to sing. There is a lot of angular movement in the vocal melody and the ranges of the singers are being tested. Also the notes are close together and don't allow much time to snatch a breath. Not to mention the songs have very scant support. Guitar only on most songs and piano/strings on others. This is proving to be a very interesting project. 3-23-09
Mark Butterworth and Diane Walker were back
in the studio on Monday evening for the first of several planned sessions to
record the alto parts on some of Mark's compositions. We worked for two
hours, then it was time to call it a night as we were quickly reaching the
point of diminishing returns. I always try to schedule sessions earlier in
the day for most people when they are fresh. It can be hard for an artist to
be on for the session after they have already put in an eight
hour day at work. Seldom have I seen good results in that situation.
Therefore I often suggest that we try to schedule a day off or a weekend for
our sessions.
When I get the call, I respond. Dr. Barry
Weiner is the force behind the BC Project. (formerly called the
Bluez Catz). So last Saturday while I was working in the studio the
good Dr. called me to ask if I could mix for the band that night. I was free
so I said sure. They were playing at Zigato's on the corner of
Auburn Blvd./Fulton Ave.
This is Gunshy the band that I have
been playing with for the last year. We play mostly around Sacramento but
have also been doing a gig in San Jose. Last Friday night while at the
Rodeo Club in San Jose, I hooked my digital hard disk recorder in to the
main live console and recorded the band live. This shows that live
recordings can be pretty good if the performance is good. Here's one of the
songs we played that night.
Cynthia Douglas has been wanting to record a new CD project for a while. Cynthia wants to have some product for this years Jazz Jubilee at the end of May. We have made plans to record the rhythm tracks with my mobile recording rig on April 4th, then follow up with lead vocals and the post production in the studio. We are under the gun to get it all finished in time for the Jubilee but I feel confident that we will prevail. Cynthia has a great voice and style that has been honed through years on many stages. I will post more on her progress later. 3-11-09
Cory Norris stopped by today to pick
up his finished masters. Cory told me that he has been playing with two new
musicians and is eager to get out, play some shows and sell his CD's.
I am happy to have been able to help Cory realize his dream.
Fourteen year old Hayley Torris entered a song writing contest and came to the studio to record her song. It was her first time in a studio. First she recorded the piano part then she sang her vocal part. The tone of her voice is very pure. If she continues to study her craft I have no doubt that she will blossom into a fine singer/songwriter. Her song is titled. Click to hear. "The sound of a heart beat". 3-5-09
Mark Stivers (on the left after his recorded performance) was commissioned to perform three songs written by Mark Butterworth. We met at the home of Mark Butterworth where he has a piano that he wanted to have the music played on early Tuesday morning. I was assisted by my audio engineering student Julian Shorter. I was pleased that Mark Stivers had done his homework and was able to play each piece only once and we were finished with that mobile recording session. It was a nice setting early in the morning as the rain was pouring outside. It is rare to get quality performances on the first take but those are usually the best takes. I just love it when things go as planned. Remember "Luck" is when preparation meets opportunity. 3-4-09
February 2009
Tools of the trade. Here are some of the tools of the trade that I use to make and record music in the studio. There are many others, but these get a regular workout in the process. Old school guitars, bass's and amps as well as more modern sounding synthesizers help to shape some of the music that comes through the studio. The joy of making music is alive and well at Pudding Stone. Come on down and record something, I'll treat you right. :) 2-25-09
Rich O' Day and I have been trying to work out
the details of a mobile recording session that will take place at his home
on March 28th. Rich is a song writer and needs to record some demos that are
to be copy written and then sent to buyers. The line up of musicians for
this project so far are, Valerie Marston on (vocals)
Jimmy Spalding paid me a visit on a rainy Sunday afternoon last week. Originally we were getting together to do some jamming as we used to do when our lives weren't as complicated as they have become. Jimmy and I have always been able to connect when we play. He told me that he has been working with his wife Tracy on a couple of songs, and needed to record a quick demo for her to practice with. We did the demos and hope to re-establish our getting together on a more regular basis. 2-23-09
Studio drummer Greg Ayala continues to turn in fine drum performances as he nears completion of Peter Mundy's seventeen song project. Greg has received several CD's with a rough mixes of each song. He then loads the material into his digital recorder at his home studio and records the drum tracks. Yesterday he told me that several times he thought he was finished with a song or two, only to come back the next day and decide to re-record the songs over. I can relate. Once it's recorded it is forever and our artistic egos demand that we leave behind the best performances that we can. Live is forgiving, recorded performances are not! 2-20-09
Composer Mark Butterworth and singer Dianne Walker pose for a picture after completing a rehearsal in the studio. The picture on the right is of Mark and pianist John Cocuzzi at Marks home. John is looking over the score preparing for a mobile recording session on two of Marks pieces. We had to stop the session after recording one piece because time was getting tight and John felt he could give a better performance given some extra time. We re-scheduled for next week. Marks piano sounded wonderful when paired with John's talent. The hardwood floors and the sound of the room will yield a fine recording when finished. 2-19-09
I have been mixing (like a mad man on a mission) the music of Peter Mundy. This is a large project encompassing seventeen songs. In the mixing phase I am reminded of the joy both Peter and I shared while we were putting the music together. He had the songs already written, but we put our heads together to work on the embellishing of each song. Now as I hear each piece and the work that we contributed, I am able to relive those moments of discovery. Music is truly God's gift to us, and those of us that are able to construct that music have been given a very special gift. There's a certain pleasure that I have never gotten over in spite of the number of times I have been involved in the writing of music. It's always new and rewarding and that good feeling never gets old. 2-17-09
Yesterday I met with Mark Butterworth to discuss working on his project. I imported his music and midi tracks into Pro Tools and listened to what he had previously recorded at another local studio. Then we formulated a plan of action to get his project moving again. The project will include some mobile recording of a piano located in his home and bringing in and recording two female singers. Mark has composed seven songs many of which are of a Celtic nature. I look forward to working with Mark and getting his project off of the ground. 2-11-09
Only two weeks into his Audio Engineering class, Julian Shorter has had two audio classes, sat in on a session in the studio and gone with me to provide live sound support for a concert that was held in Rocklin on February 5th. This concert featured jazz heavies Bob Dragga (clairnet), Ron Jones (drums), Shelly Denny (upright bass) and Jason Warner (keyboards). Julian is on the fast track and enjoying learning to become an engineer. He is a bright eighteen year old that has his eye on the prize. 2-6-09
Geneva Garrett is back in the spotlight having commissioned me to go to her home and record her singing and playing. Once there, I quickly set up my mobile recording equipment, got a level and began the process. After several tries we had a good performance. Now I will digitally transfer the tracks to Pro Tools and edit, mix and master them. It's all in a days work at Pudding Stone. 2-2-09
January 2009
Cory Norris returned on Saturday with drummer Russ Lundgren of the group "Fish Out Of Water" http://www.myspace.com/FOW to record drum tracks as was previously planned. I could tell that Russ had done his home work as he played through eight songs in an hour. Because Cory is on a tight budget, we wanted the songs to have a live feel. Russ delivered and we have the tracks in the can. Then Cory recorded an instrumental track for the record. Now on to mixing. I will post a mix as soon as I have one. 2-1-09
Andre' Aldridge and I have been communicating back and forth for several weeks. Andre' is an aspiring singer the is in need of songs to complete his first album. He sent me an Mp3 of a song that he had purchased to have me write some lyrics and create a melody line for the song. Andre' came to the studio yesterday listed to my ideas and has signed on to record the song. I made some additional suggestions for songs from my recently released "Sly Fox" CD and he's considering using some of the material. 2-1-09
This is Anthony Trujillo. He is a very focused young man of thirteen years. His father called yesterday to book some time for Anthony to record three classical pieces for an up coming competition. I could not believe how well this guy could play. But after speaking with his mother who told me that he practices four to five hours everyday, I began to understand. He began playing violin at age three. He also plays soprano and tenor sax's. I know that somewhere down the road I will see this young man on the world stage. Listen to (L'abeille). 1-28-09
THINGS ARE GETTING FUNNY IN HERE! I was called today by a lady named Denise Godfrey. Here is a blurb from her web site. Denise Godfrey PhD is an internationally known intuitive and instructor. She specializes in perceptual skills training and understanding the chakra's power in every day life. Her work is popular throughout the United States, Canada, Japan, Europe and South Africa. Denise and her husband Niels needed to have me do some digital editing along with some synthesizer tones during a voice over that was recorded by Niels in Dutch. I was moving smartly through the work and playing the single tones when I noticed that before my finger touched the "A" key, the note sounded. The material was dealing with chakras and Denise is very tuned in to the vibrations that surround us all. It was so strange to hold my finger one inch away from the key and the note would sound. None of the other keys did it, only the "A" key. This odd situation was also observed by myself, Denise, Niels and my new audio engineering student Julian. The ghost of Pudding Stone is alive and well in the studio. Boo,,,, 1-27-09
Here are some up dates on works in progress. Peter Mundy and I continue to work through his project. We have five songs with drum tracks provided by studio drummer Greg Ayala. Peter is happy with the tracks and is looking forward to finishing the last several songs before mixing. Cory Norris has finished his basic tracks and has a CD to give to his drummer. Then it's on to mixing and duplication. I have been taking a class at the Apple store to learn Logic Pro 8 and have purchased the software. It was one of my New Years resolutions. I want to learn Logic for the midi and looping that it offers. I will still be working in Pro Tools as my main recording platform. I am looking forward to the super bowl party that I will attend this weekend. Go Niners? :) 1-28-09 Ric and Jody Horner called to book some studio time after and absence of over eight years. In that time they have been busy building a business where they write historical books about early California living. Yesterdays session was to record voice over's that pertain to one of their books titled "The Golden Hub". It's a 19th century accounting of life in and around the Sacramento area in 1849. It deals in part with John Sutter's building of Sutter's fort as well as life as a gold minor, commonly referred to as 49'ers . The reading was difficult because the original authors, whom Ric and Jody quoted, had writing styles typical of the times. It took three hours to finish the VO's. I am reading the book now and I find it to be an interesting read. It was nice to see and work with the Horner's again. 1-23-09
Peter Mundy writes,
I waited a long
time to find a place like Pudding Stone Recording Studio and a person
like Bruce Bolin to help me to turn my solo songs into complete
music. It wasn’t that
December 2008
It's
the last day of the
year 2008. I am sitting here reflecting on this past year. Once
again I am filled with
many memories of the people that I have had the joy to have come in contact
with. Both new and old, I am truly blessed to be in a business that allows
me to touch the dreams of so many artists. Each bringing their own
special talent to the studio to be recorded. I can't think of any other job
that would bring me so much happiness. So to all of my friends that started
out as clients, I raise my glass to you in hopes that your path to
musical happiness will be as sweet as the time that we have spent together.
When the bell tolls at 12 midnight to the sounds of "Auld Lang Syne", our combined memories (yours and mine) will be resonating in my mind. I wish
you well in the coming New Year. May Health, Wisdom and
Happiness through music help you to live a more contented life on your path
to where ever your music may take you.
Pete Droubay returned to Pudding Stone to
begin a new project. Pete has been coming to me for over five years to
record his motivational words of wisdom for companies seeking to
improve their business relationships and become more successful. Pete was in
the booth for more than two hours non-stop. I will now do some cleanup
editing and give him a couple of CD's to review. Once he has reviewed the
edited material he will inform me where to make the break points to make
four CD's. I will then add bumper music at the beginnings and endings of
each CD. After five years we both know the routine and the job is
finished in short order. 12-31-08
Sly Fox
has landed. Sly Fox is the songwriting team of Bruce Bolin and
Greg Ayala. We have been working on this album project for more than a year.
We get together once a week and write music for the joy of doing it. This CD
is our first effort and we're as proud as anyone would be of getting it
finished. It has truly been a labor of love. But we are already
working on the next album and have started several songs. The title track on
this CD is Scattered Devotions, here is a sample of the song.
"Scattered Devotions". (There
are more music examples on the Hear Music page) 12-16-08
Peter Mundy
has continued to
be a regular at the studio recording his CD project. We have reached the
half way mark in his seventeen song saga. It has been both challenging
and rewarding to say the least since many of Peter's songs are in unusual
6/8 time signatures that are often syncopated and some have tempo changes
that we have to contend with. The reason for the difficulty is that we will
be handing the songs off to Greg Ayala, studio drummer at large, to
record live drums onto Peter's tracks. Greg likes to work in his drum
studio from solid click and bass tracks as well as having all of the other
rhythm tracks be in time. Peter is excited to be in the studio and we have
formed a bond of unity and we are having a great experience in the studio.
12-15-08
November 2008
Crystal Starr
called to book time as she needed to record a one minute
demo for a singing contest that is to be held in Los Angles in early January
2009. She came in with a friend Berit-Brewer-Bakken, who attends the
same modeling agency as Crystal. My first job was to edit their music down
to one minute. Both young ladies were nervous as they entered the booth with
Berit going in first. After a few tries and some instruction both were able
to finish their songs in about an hour each. Last week another young
lady named Jane Campbell, came in for the same treatment as she was
in the same contest but from a different agency. I wish them all well and
hope they get the opportunity to compete in L.A. Here are their songs in
order.
(Crystal's song),
(Berit's song) and
(Jane's song)
(I wasn't on my game and failed to take photo's of
the other two girls) :( 11-30-08
I got together with my old friend
Bob Lobner over the weekend to discuss
plans for a new CD project. The plan is that I will to go to his house
located near Georgetown, CA to record he and I playing together. Then
I'll add bass and hand off the files to Greg Ayala to add drums. I
have found that it is easier to get well played basic tracks from Bob at his
home where he is most comfortable playing. It helps a lot that I have a good
mobile recording setup. It is always fun for me to play with Bob as we
have known each other for many years and there aren't any ego's to contend
with. Bob is seen here toasting the new project over dinner. Here is a song
from his prior album.
"She's so tuff".
11-25-08
Lourie Neely
returned after a two year absence to record several
songs. It was nice to see her again. We got right to work and
had her in and out of the booth and mixing in an hour. She rode in on
the back of a Harley with her friend Larry Stroh who was her chauffer
for the day. They had been on a motorcycle toy run earlier in the day. It was
going to be a cold ride back to Ione, but she had her songs in her
pocket to keep her warm. I got them to pose for the last picture as if they
were on the bike. Here's one of her songs titled.
"Who knew". 11-23-08
Manny Rodriguez
called to book some time. He told me that he needed
to get into the studio to record his music. He had put it off long enough
and today was the day to get it done. Once in the booth he played and sang
for over an hour. When he emerged he was soaked with sweat and exhausted.
but he was happy that at long last he had a record of his music.
Manny's music was well played and sung. He plans on returning after he has
had a chance to work out some bass and lead lines. At that time, I will post
some of his music. 11-22-08
Felice Bois (left) came in to record her
seventeen track CD. I found her subject matter to be interesting as her
material was directed at black folks and mostly young black men. Her
message, "clean up your act, your language and make your life be a
productive one"! Bill Cosby would be a person that I could
compare her to. I wish her success because her message is very
powerful. Sean Childs stopped by to interview me as part of a
business class that he is taking at Sacramento City College. We talked for
over an hour and it was interesting for both of us. 11-20-08
Geneva Garrett
returned yesterday to do another of her annual spiritual readings
interspersed with her singing and playing her original Gospel songs. She
will return on Thursday to finish up this project before handing it off to a
distribution company. 11-18-08
Peter Mundy
has been coming to the studio four times a week
and enjoying the process of recording. Both Peter and I have had a wonderful
time putting the songs together. Here is an interesting and unusual
point. All of Peter's songs are in 6/8 time. That is unusual, but the songs
each take on a life of their own with interesting melody's and lyrics.
Peter said he has had this project in mind for many years and is happy to be
finally seeing it through. Typically Peter will lay a scratch track with a
click for timing reference. Then Peter will record several guitar tracks and
a vocal. I'll record a bass track and a guitar solo, followed by Peter
doing a comp lead guitar track. As I mentioned we have been having to much
fun in the studio. 11-15-18
Nat's back!
Nat Brown returned with four back ground
singers from his church. The singers are Lisa, Felicia, Johnny and
Marcus. They moved into the booth and we worked on the blend
the concept and dynamics of the songs to be recorded. The songs were
difficult but the years of singing in the church choir came into play and
they blended well and delivered the goods. Lisa mentioned that it was the
first time she had ever heard her voice recorded. Felicia told her to
"Get over it"! It can be a bit of a shock the first time you
hear your own voice. But in time you get used to it.
11-7-08
Nat
Brown continues to forge his way through his project. Last week
he brought in Phyllis Harmon to play congas on two of the songs he
will be playing for Stevie Wonder. This week Nat brought in
Cynthia Douglas, his first call background singer to sing on three
songs. Cynthia had done her homework by listening to the music before coming
to the studio. She was prepared and delivered strong solid vocals in a short
time as Nat looked (and listened). Cynthia smiles in the second picture as
she has completed singing her parts before departing the studio. All of this
was done as the rain was pouring down outside. Be sure to vote your
beliefs today as an American. 11-4-08
October 2008
I met with
Peter Mundy on Friday (Halloween) to discuss
his project. We agreed on a plan and a schedule to begin work on
Peter's music. He feels that this has been a long time coming. Now is
the time for Peter to have his musical dream come to fruition in the form of
a finished CD. 10-31-08
On another note, Steve York sent
me a DVD of his movie The Orange Revolution and I found it to be an
exciting account of the revolution in Ukraine in 2004.
At that time there were more than one million people in the
street protesting the election. At Steve's website, I linked to some
of the bands that provided music in the film and found that they were good
strong bands. Rock and roll is alive and well all over the world.
This movie was well done and shows what a truly professional filmmaker
Steve is. The trailer for this movie can be down loaded and viewed by going to-www.orangerevolutionmovie.com
Or the movie can be purchased on DVD for under $15.00 until the end of this year. If
you think our political system is corrupt, look at theirs!
Seeing this commentary shows with all of it's flaws, how free and open our system is.
10-21-08
Nat Brown came
back to the studio to begin another CD project. Like clockwork, Nat
does a new CD every year. He does this because he returns to some of the
same venues to perform and his fans want to buy new CD's. Nat had me play
guitar on several of his new songs. Nat also mentioned that he has been in
contact with Stevie Wonder who has shown interest in having Nat
record some of his music. Nat will be back soon to continue the
process and I'll keep you in the loop. 10-17-08
Steve York is
a movie producer. He has been shooting documentaries for 30 plus years.
Steve (shown here in the middle) lives in Maryland but needed to come to
Sacramento to record voice over's for his latest film. I was contacted two
weeks ago to do a session with Steve on October 5th. Our session lasted
eight hours and used six different voice over talents but yielded many
tracks of Vietnamese language for this film. Steve's films are usually
completed with three to five different languages and shown all over the
globe. On October 4th Steve was in an LA studio recording voice over's in
yet another language. To say that Steve gets around in an under
statement. 10-6-08
Duane Thompson
AKA
Mickey Cartel stopped by to have me transfer
some tracks from his synth into Pro tools for mixing. He is new to the music
game and needed some guidance on getting his beats from synth to CD. He'll
be back to lay some vocals once he's satisfied with his rap for his vocal
performance. 10-3-08
September 2008
What a difference a year makes. Almost one year
ago to the day the American River Music Festival was held for the
first time in Coloma California. Sadly it rained all three days. The
show went on as scheduled but the attendance was scarce because of the
weather. This year September 19,20 & 21. the weather cooperated fully
and the festival was the place to be. The music was great as was the sound
and the scene was one of fun and frolic. It reminded me of the outdoor
concerts of the 60's and 70's. I was working on the sound crew and from my
vantage point, "a good time was had by all". The festival drew twenty
six acts from as far away as New York and Michigan. The music was stellar.
There were some magic moments where the musicians had the crowds on their
feet cheering, dancing and chanting for more. It's easy to see that this
festival will continue to bring good music and a good time for all who
attend. Like many, I plan to be back next year for more of the same.
Mark Tyler
called me two months ago as he was planning a Make-a-Wish foundation fund
raiser to be held Sept. 13th in Elk Grove. Mark had seven bands lined up to
play in the parking lot of Cassidy's Restaurant. Mark wanted me
to set up the sound and mix the bands. I agreed and this last Saturday we
held the function. There was a Corvette car show, and many vendors
including food, a rock climbing wall and a jump house for the kids. The rock
music ran from 11am to 7:30pm to the delight of all who attended. It
was a good function for an even better cause. Thanks Mark for getting behind
this event and to all of the bands and volunteers that participated. It was
good fun and the weather was just right.
Mike Lounibos is a Nashville produced
country artist that has been playing with our band from time to time. Mike
and I got together last Friday to demo a new song that he wants to present
at the Northern California Songwriters Association next week end. The
song is a nice country ballad that caught my ear from the first time I heard
it. I used a click track and recorded a rhythm guitar on my Gibson
335, then I laid a lead track and a comp. track with my Fender Strat. Next
came a bass line and lastly some drums to round out this country song. Then
Mike stepped in to the booth and sang his heart out. Here's
"If I had a heart" 9-8-08
August 2008
Bruce and Greg
continued weekly their songwriting mission. Now we are in
the final fix-n-mix portion of our project. We have been mixing for the last
six weeks and are nearing completion of this album. Frank Lizarraga
came in for another mix on his project. Frank also recorded some
acoustic guitar track for a new song for Luvtaxi. 8-29-08
Frank Lizarraga came in to finish the mix on a song for the new
Luvtaxi CD project. As is Frank's way he
had yet another song that he wanted to get started on. So it was into
the booth where he recorded several acoustic gut string guitar tracks. He
requested and got a click track for timing purposes. Once he was satisfied
with those tracks, we began to finish the mix on Check your Text.
It's a love song sung by Luvtaxi's percussionist Jamie Zuniga.
We managed to get it all finished in just 2 and a half hours. Here's
Check your Text. Click to
hear. 8-19-08
Tanjia Harris and David Carmiol
have completed the Recording Connection Audio
Engineering course and they are eager to take what they have learned in
the last twenty weeks and begin to fulfill their recording aspirations. We
have enjoyed the learning process and it gives me a great deal of pleasure
to have had a hand in helping them to get a foothold in their dream of
working in the recording field. I wish them well and trust that they will
begin to make their mark in the music business. 8-12-08
August 2008
He's back......Ilon
Griffin has returned to begin work on his next album project. Hot
on the heels of his self titled album "Ilon", this singer is not one
to rest upon his laurels. Ilon is digging in to begin an all original CD
project. We met last week to map out a strategy for the project. On Sunday
Ilon brought Adrian Jasper, who is a song writer, to the studio to
recorded several songs acappella so that I could get to work on the music. I
have found that when working in this manor, it's a good idea to have the
singer keep time by snapping their fingers. In doing this I have a much
better concept of how they are feeling the time. Now I will get together
with my long time friend Jimmy Malone who is a fine keyboard player
and we will program the songs. Here is a sample of a song from Ilon's recent
release.
"Be mine tonight" (Click
to hear) 8-10-08
Linda Ventriglia was
featured back in February when she needed a bilingual voice over recorded
for her freedom doll project. At that time I brought in Natalie Lariz
to do the voice over in English and Spanish. Move forward six months and we
are back at it again with English and Mandarin being the recorded languages.
This time the VO was preformed by seven year old Angela Tang. Angela
stepped into the booth with her mother giving support and additional help
from a teacher in the control room with correct Mandarin pronunciations. We
were able to get the VO recorded in an hour. Now I need to edit the two
versions together and add some Chinese bumper music to the recording. Then
it will be shipped off to China to be placed on a chip in a playback device
that will play back the recording when a button on the doll is pressed.
7-31-08
Gloria Heidi stopped by to pick up some revised
mixes of her last recording. Accompanied by her constant companion Peter
Shaw, they told me that they have been on a fast track doing shows all
over California. She thanked me for the recordings and is making plans to
begin a CD project. Heidi is always asked for CD's when she performs
and feels it's past time to get that project started. 7-15-08
Mario Williams
AKA Young P.O.V (Point of View) called for a
quick session to get his demo together in order get his name out into the
general public. This was a down and dirty session as time and his bankroll
were in short supply. Basically it was one time through for each of his five
vocal tracks. Here's a sample of his work called
"I'm a boss." As
always click to hear. 7-10-08
Gerard Yun and Rich Krivcher returned to the
studio after a long absence. Rich is the producer of this Japanese haiku CD
project that was begun some four and a half years ago. Haiku is a form of
Japanese poetry that has hundreds of years of history with regards to form and
performance. Rich wasn't happy with one intro segment that was played by
Gerard and wanted to have the part re-recorded before completing the
project. Gerard is a music professor now residing in Canada. After all of
these years Rich was finally able to catch up with the professor and
schedule a session while Gerard was in town visiting his family. We got
right to work after Gerard had an opportunity to warm up with his Japanese
flute called a shakuhachi. After several attempts,
Gerard was able to produce the feeling and sound that Rich was looking for.
"All's well that ends well." 7-1-08
June 2008
The Kids Corporation were
back for another installment of theme show music for a TV show that airs on
Saturday morning at 10:30 on cable Channel 18. Mike Martin is the brain child and producer/director of the show.
he writes and records the music for each episode. The
kids who are now veterans of the recording booth, got right down to business
recording their vocal tracks. With proud mom's and dad's looking on and
snapping pictures, the kids made it through the session in just under
two hours. Now Mike will use the theme music for yet another weekly chapter
of the show. 6-30-08
Tanjia Harris and David
Carmiol are now in their sixteenth week of the
Recording Connection Audio Engineering class.. Both have been working
on Pro Tools recording songs that we have collectively written during
the class. They have been taking home data disks to import into their
respective software systems to mix and process. This twenty week course has
just flown by and I am pleased with their progress. Tanjia is a fine singer
and we have had lots of fun writing songs in the studio. 6-28-08
Just in time for the annual
Sacramento Jazz Jubilee opening today, here is a cut from
Black Tuesdays album. It's titled
"I found a new baby". Click to hear.
Also last Friday I attended and did a live mix for The Bluez Catz CD
release party held at Po'Boys in Orangevale near downtown
Folsom. The band sounded great and a good time was had by all.
5-23-08
The Black Tuesday Jazz Band is an eight piece
traditional Dixieland band. I recorded an album for them about seven years
ago. When the leader Hal Needham called me earlier this year stating that
they wanted to be recorded on May 17th. as one of their members was coming
from Florida for the Dixieland Jubilee. Hal said it was the only time the
whole band would be able to record. I scrambled to find and rent a place
large enough to contain a band of that size. So last Saturday we all got
together at 9am set up and got to the task at hand. We were able to record
thirteen songs in nine hours. We took one half hour break for lunch then
back to recording. Once the music is mixed I will post a demo.
5-20-08
Once again I turn my attention to Frank Lizarraga,
the man who almost lives at Pudding Stone Recording. Frank and I met
early Friday morning to mix one of the songs from one of his current two
projects. I know it sounds confusing but more about that later. We
worked for a couple of hours then when we had the mix in the bag I suggested
we take a lunch break to give our ears a rest. Not that the music was loud
but to relax and come back after lunch with a fresh perspective. When we got
back the first listen revealed some flaws in our first mixing attempt. We
were able to tweak the mix and burn a CD for him to take home for more
scrutiny. This was not an isolated incident, it's a good idea to build in
breaks when recording and mixing to allow for re-generation of your ears. In
other words "Fresh ears". Here's the song
"Ritmo Suavacito". 5-17-08
Week after week Greg and I (Bruce Bolin & Greg
Ayala) get together to work on our original music. If you just
keep at it, in time you will amass a library of original music. We feel that
we are just getting into our stride as a songwriting team. In recent months
these two songs have been the point of our attention. The first is
"Blood thicker than water" and
"She's my Amy". Click to hear. 5-15-08
In the arena of gospel music, Precious Craft is a major icon. She has
been a mainstay in and around central California for many years. She is also
my friend. I have recorded her group, "The Voices of Faith" and have
done several projects for her dating back at least ten years. When she
called me on Monday to request that I come to Cosumnes River College
where she teaches and directs a gospel choir to record the group before the
end of the school year I answered the call. With my two current audio
engineering students in tow, we quickly set up for the session. The choir
was eager and responsive to the task at hand. We were able to record seven
songs in just two and a half hours. Now I will mix, master and get the CD's
duplicated and delivered by next Monday as Precious wants to hand out the
copies to the class at their final meeting next Tuesday.
"Almighty"
Click to hear 5-14-08
April 2008
The Dirk Lang Band is
a rockin' four piece group that play with a "No holds barred attitude".
Dirk contacted me to do a live recording of his band because he is in need
of a
professional demo. I met up with Dirk and the band at the Folsom Hotel in historic
downtown Folsom last night, set up and recorded two sets of raging
Rock-N-Roll much to the delight of the packed house. These guys were non
stop rockers with very if any little dead time between songs. They put on a
fine show. The band features Dirk on lead guitar and lead vocals,
Paul on lead guitar and vocals. Davin on bass and vocals and
Mike on drums. The songs were well executed and the repertoire was
straight ahead rock-N-roll.
Frank Lizarraga
was back on Monday to supervise the mixing of a song from
his jazz group "Amy in the pocket", featuring Ami Sanchez.
Meanwhile Valerie Marston of Sister
Swing (pictured on the left) was working on a tight schedule in
preparation for a gig that happens tonight in the Bay Area. It was a long
day for me, but a fruitful one.
Alex, Jamie Celia and Frank, all from the group Luvtaxi
were back in the studio for a vocal overdub session last Friday. Alex and
Celia sang a duet as did Celia and Jamie. This group continues to record and
produce new music to the delight of their fan base and for their own
satisfaction. Frank keeps writing and the band keeps arranging new material.
They are getting lots of airplay on Internet radio stations which are
drawing larger audiences. We are in an exciting period of time where artists
have many new ways to promote their music and don't have to rely on radio
and record company's to get the material in to the public domain.
4-7-08
Jimmy Spalding
returned to the studio to record a solo guitar on his
song "Arrowhead". First we needed to straighten out some timing errors from
the original recording. Once that was completed Jimmy started searching for
just the right guitar tone for the solo. In about an hour we had the solo in
the can. As often happens, Jimmy wants to augment the song by having another
bass player come in to lay down a new bass part. The tune is coming along
quite nicely and I should have a demo mix soon. 4-5-08
March 2008
Scott Calapp picked up his freshly mastered
project. Next stop is getting the master duplicated. Here is one of the 19 songs on this album.
It's called Legendary Expression.
(Click to hear) 3-22-08
Gloria Heidi
and Peter Shaw paid a visit to Pudding
Stone to record two songs for Heidi's new show. The last time they came in
was about a year ago. Once again we were here to record the music with John Wielder
at the keyboards. John can lay down piano, bass and a combination of string
and horn patches all at the same time. This is not programmed or slight of
hand using midi. This is real time full range all from his fingers at one
time. All four of us were
involved trying to get the arrangement correct for a difficult song.
It took several tries but in the end we prevailed. We ran out of time and
had to schedule another time to finish. More later as this tail unfolds. 3-19-08
Lauren Ona was
the winner of a local American Idol type of contest that was presented
by the Good Morning Sacramento show on cable Channel 31. Lauren is
twelve years old and was the youngest to compete in the contest. She
has a very good voice considering her age. She quickly adapted to being in
the studio and did a good job once she was in the booth. She took
direction well and with the help of her mother Fay, Lauren turned in a good
performance. Now she has a professional demo to present to movers and
shakers in the music business. I have little doubt that we have not
head the last of Lauren Ona.
(Click to hear)
3-15-08
Nat Brown
returned on Monday to have me master the sound tracks less his vocal and
horn parts for his single act. Nat regularly gigs around town to the delight
of his fans and the general audiences. Now Nat will have some new tracks to
perform to. Meanwhile here is a cut from his now completed CD project. This
song is titled "Saturday night before Christmas". Have a
listen.
(Click to hear)
3-11-08
Ilon Griffin
has finished his long over due CD project. But the
finished product is worth the wait. Now Ilon will begin promoting his CD by
performing personal appearances. He has some inside tracks with local radio
stations and the Sacramento Bee news paper. Here is a song that Ilon
wrote both the lyric and melody lines to. I recorded a rough track of him
singing acappella. Then I took his vocal line and wrote, arranged and played
the music for his song. Personally I think this song hits hard and
really shows off Ilon's vocal power. The song also features Dave McAsey
on the bongo and conga drums. I played the guitars, bass and
programmed the drums, keyboards and strings.
February 2008
Geneva Garrett has
been having me record her playing her ebony Steinway Baby Grand piano
in her living room. Capturing her performance on her piano is a job calling
for my mobile recording rig. The sound quality was excellent.
Meanwhile Nat Brown has been in the
studio recording vocals and sax solo's for his up coming album. Nat told me
that he was nominated for a Grammy this year. Nat's vocals are
smooth and he is gifted with a vibrato that really catches your ear.
2-20-08
Lulu's back in town.
Lulu Small (pictured on the left) was a singer and a band mate
in my band Puddingstone back in the mid 70's. She has been living in
Alaska since 1978 when the band did a gig in Anchorage and she felt so at
home that she decided to stay. Lulu came to town for a rare visit.
Along with Lulu was her old side kick and our mutual friend Sally
Alexander. Together we had lunch and discussed old times at Fanny
Anne's in Old Town Sacramento. It's nice to get back together
with old friends and get caught up on what has been happening in our
respective lives. 2-18-08
Mark Tyler has completed his twenty week Recording Connection
Audio Engineering course. We had a good time during our weekly meetings
and now Mark plans to continue recording with his Pro Tools setup. Mark has
several friends who want to have him record them. In addition, another
friend wants to have Mark score a movie that is to be shot in Mexico. He was
even offered a role in the movie. Here is a song that Mark wrote recently
and was used as his final mix for the class. "Se Cavo,
The story of Gringo Loco".
(Click to hear) 2-13-08
Shelly Jagd
stopped by today to have me edit her a demo that she can
put on her web site as well as on Myspace. Shelly had recorded a meditation
CD last year and this Mp3 added the final touch to this project.
(Click to hear)
2-11-08.
The jazz group
"Amy In the pocket",
featuring as pictured Amy Sanchez, Frank Lizarraga and Bill Taylor.
Frank and Amy paid me a visit last week to transfer and then record a
vocal track on one of the groups new original songs. Amy was in the booth
for a little over an hour and when she emerged we had her lead vocal and two
back ground harmony vocals in the can. Frank has been recording basic music
tracks with his Yamaha digital recorder. Then he'll come to the studio
and transfer the tracks into Pro Tools. After which we record vocals and
sometimes solos as needed. This is proving to be a very cost effective way
for Frank to get his material recorded. It works for me too! 2-4-08
January 2008
Greg Coffin
(seen on the right in the first photo) is a composer and a playwright who
wrote the play
The Corporation Kids under the direction of
Mike Martin came in to record the intro and outro music for a kids
television show that Mike is producing for Channel 17. The kids consisted of
six girls ranging in age from seven to twelve. Their voices were just what
Mike needed for his show. With each kid there was a mom in tow to drive the
kids to the studio. As I have mentioned before I never know what new
adventure awaits me in the studio. But variety is my cup of tea.
(Click to hear)
Darrell Dobbs AKA Pretty Boy Flord came in to
get some dubs copied from his latest project. He's sending off CD's to get
some feed back with hopes that he can acquire some backing and continue with
the entire
CD project . Check out his song "So Heavy".
(Click to hear) 1-12-08
Caught in the act, pictured on the left is
Bruce Bolin working on some guitar lines for a new
original song. Photo taken by Monster Labs mastering engineer Eric
Broyhill as Bruce turned in surprise to find Eric taking his picture.
Center is 16 year old Vanessa Lopez in
the booth belting out a song for her demo. Although it was Vanessa's
first time in the studio, she quickly overcame her nervousness and performed
rather well. A visit from R&B singer Beverly
Rivers who had been out of touch for several years was welcomed
as we got caught up on the news of her career.
Barry Weiner stopped by for some final tweaking of his mixes
before mastering.
December 31, 2007. The last day of the
year. I am sitting here reflecting on this past year, I am filled with
many memories of the people that I have had the joy to have come in contact
with. Both new and old, I am truly blessed to be in a business that allows
me to touch the dreams of so many artists. Each bringing their own
special talent to the studio to be recorded. I can't think of any other job
that would bring me so much happiness. So to all of my friends that started
out as clients, I raise my glass to you in hopes that your path to
musical happiness will be as sweet as the time that we have spent together.
When the bell tolls at 12 midnight to the sounds of "Auld Lang Syne", our combined memories (yours and mine) will be resonating in my mind. I wish
you well in the coming new year.
Jerry Cook stopped by to pick up another song that
was custom made for his project. Jerry plans to launch his night club
project in the new year. His style is very R & B, blues and funk. But
Jerry brings lots of that old school soul to his music when he sings.
12-22-07
Barry
Weiner and Dave Davis were back to
finalize the mixes before mastering the CD. Barry had me include three
previously recorded tracks to serve as bonus tracks. The guys are seen here
in the booth preparing a voice over track that will introduce the bonus
tracks. Soon all will be finished and the Bluez Catz can begin
distributing their CD's amongst their awaiting fans. This entire process
from live recording to mastering will have taken just about two
months. That's pretty fast! We at Pudding Stone wish you all
a very Merry Christmas and a healthy and prosperous New Year. 12-21-0
Bruce and Greg
are still at the it, writing and recording original
music. Here is a song that Greg wrote and we collectively arranged.
It's called "Say you love me". Give it a listen.
(Click to hear) 12-8-07
Bluez
Catz Barry Weiner and Dave Davis
were back for another mixing session. We moved
quickly through several songs and are almost at the point of shifting our
attention to mastering this live CD project. It sounds good. Ilon has
also been a regular visitor also as we finalize the mixes of his CD project.
12-6-07
Is there a doctor
in the house? Yes,
Dr. Barry Weiner and lead singer
Dave Davis of the Bluez Catz were in mixing their live CD
project last night. We were able to do some cleanup recording and mix four
songs in just three and a half hours. These were rough mixes as we home in
on the Bluez Catz sound. All in all it was a productive session that
included a lot of laughing once the good Dr. stepped into the booth. We plan
on getting back together next week to continue the process. 11-30-07
Jamie and Rudy
who play percussion/vocals and bass respectively, with Luvtaxi
stopped by to continue mixing their project. But because of conflicting
schedules, Frank Lizaragga (leader of Luvtaxi) could not be there for
the mix. We worked of the fine balance between the drum set and the
percussion which is the backbone of the Luvtaxi sound. Then turned out
attention to the rest of the mix. The song sounds strong and clear and is
ready to be added to the up coming CD. 11-28-07
Ilon Griffin has been a regular at the studio as we have been
mixing his project. Ilon has had many balls in the air and is looking
forward to getting this project wrapped up and in the can. The good news is
that the end is in sight with three original songs and eight popular and
classical songs that showcase Ilon's talent as a Lyric tenor.
11-21-07
Jimmy Malone was called into action to record
some keyboard tracks for Ilon Griffin's original song titled
"Springtime". With Ilon standing by, Jimmy crafted a nice piano part for
the song. Then we turned our attention to some strings, after which Ilon
mentioned that he felt the song needed a bridge. Jimmy came up with an
interesting eight bar bridge that gave the song a contemporary twist. With
the addition of a cello string line in the bridge the song was sounding
pretty complete. The next day Ilon and I got together and I programmed a
percussion part for the song and I edited the bass line to work more
smoothly with some of the new piano chord changes. As it now stands all we
need to do to finish the song is to add Ilon's lead vocal and some back
ground harmony parts. 11-12-07
The B Street Theater routinely puts on plays
six days a week, every week for the general public. They also have two programs that cater to
children, exposing them to live performances. One of these programs is
known as The B Street School Tour. An acting troop travels to
local schools within a distance of 100 miles and performs for groups of kids
in cafeterias and gymnasiums at the schools. The troop performs up to
12 times per week. These plays are very popular since many schools have
dropped artistic programs from their curriculums. The B Street needed a demo
of the play to display on their web site. I was hired to record a
portion of the hour long play with my mobile recording rig for that demo.
I have cut together a sound track and imported pictures into a program that
plays both sound and pictures with interesting transitions between the
pictures. It's a time intensive project but the results are worth the
effort. 11-8-07
Mark S. Allen of Channel 31's Good Morning
Sacramento and Pudding Stone Recording Studio have entered into
an agreement. Pudding Stone will record the winner of a weekly segment
on the morning program called "Small Town Superstar". This segment
will run for four weeks. Good luck to all of the participants and I look
forward to working with the winner. A camera man from Channel 13 and
their sister station Channel 31, came by yesterday to shoot some "B"
roll for a small spot that is to be aired during the program. I was
recording a session with Ilon Griffin when he arrived. So the
camera man shot some footage of Ilon in the booth performing his song. Look
for the spot on the morning show from 6 to 10 am. Keep those cards and
letters coming in. 11-6-07
Greg Ayala and Bruce Bolin
(that's me) continue our weekly song writing
adventure. We have been working on a song titled "Gas Ronda".
It's the story of a hot, modern day lady that loves to drive fast and race.
I have to say that it's a lot of fun to have a successful collaboration and
to see your efforts materialize onto a song that brings a smile to your
face. "Hey we still have it"! Check out Gas Ronda.
(Click to hear).
11-3-07
October 2007
Barry Weiner met with me yesterday to pick up
the rough mixes to begin to evaluate the songs that will be on the CD. We
plan of getting back together in two weeks to begin mixing. Barry intends to
release this album by the end of February next year. We're on the fast
track, but that's Rock-N-Roll! 10-25-07
The Bluez
Catz
are a band that wanted to record a live album at a local gig. I got a phone
call from Dr.
Barry Weiner. I was told that four times a year The Catz throw a party at Zagoto's
located in the Canterbury Inn off of Hiway 160 and they wanted to
have the band recorded live. The band consists of
Barry (Guitar), Danny (sax), Charlie (drums), Vinnie (bass), Waylon
(guitar) and Dave (vocals & harp). The band got off to a rousing
start cheered on by a house full of fans that had come for the recording
party. When ever the Blues Cats play at Zagoto's, the band includes a
Mexican style dinner for the patrons. It's a win, win situation for
everybody. Intercept is a popular band from LA who started off
the night with a tight set and features Barry's son Jason playing
drums. It was a good show that included a
guest appearance from the manager of Zagoto's singing a James Brown song. I
recorded two sets and now must get down with the business of mixing and
mastering for the album
10-23-07
Valerie Marston
of Sister Swing (pictured here on the left) has
been burning the midnight oil to produce a new photo demo for the group.
First we cut together a sound track made up of songs from several of their
five CD's. Then we imported hundreds of photos taken over the last ten or so
years. We worked out transitions between the pictures and dropped the whole
thing onto a CD. This is quickly becoming the way to show your group without
having to go through the expense of making a video. Ilon Griffin is
back in the house of Pudding Stone and ready to finish his current project
that was put on hold several months ago because of other conflicting
business interests. Ilon also has his eye on doing a Christmas project
before this Christmas. We will be working many days straight to
accomplish this feat 10-11-07
The American River Music Festival took place
Sept. 22 & 23rd on the banks of the American River near Coloma, CA.
Mother nature didn't
Jerry Cook came in to the studio to master his
songs onto a performance CD. We worked through nine songs, to
get ready for his performance this Friday night (9-21-07). It's been a
long a long road for Jerry and myself. We were pleased with the way
the music sounded and are looking forward to getting into some new songs.
Life is good. Now Jerry, "GET OUT THERE AND
WORK IT!" 9-19-07
Felipe Lariz has finished the tracking
portion of his current CD project. Now I will transfer the tracks into Pro
Tools for mixing and any additional production. Two of the songs feature
Felipe's five year old daughter Natalie. She's very cute and had no
fear in the vocal booth. Felipe has exposed all of his three children to
music and all three can play and or sing. Felipe wants to have a family band
that performs in the area. Greg Ayala and I continue to collaborate on our original
songs during our weekly meetings. We have also recorded some live drum
tracks for Jerry Cook's live back up performance music. 8-30-07
Hillary Garrett has been my audio engineering
student for the past twelve weeks. In that time Hillary has made a major
leap forward in the audio program and in particular the study of Pro Tools.
Hillary has moved to Portland Oregon to pursue her career in the music
field. It gives me a great sense of accomplishment to have helped her to
begin to realize her goal as a recording engineer. Felipe Lariz
continues to make his weekly trek to the studio as we move through his
project. Interestingly, Felipe is playing all of the instruments on this
album and providing his own back ground harmony parts. Lloyd Mason
has finished and picked up his CD masters and is planning to contact
Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney to offer his songs and performance
abilities for the campaign. 8-21-07 .
Nick Vang is a former client of mine. I
recorded his first two CD projects with his group The Loners.
They were a popular Hmong group that hailed from Sacramento back in the
90's. Nick has been doing his own recording with a Roland Digital 16 track
machine. Nick wanted me to record two guitar solos on a couple of his
newest songs. We got set up and were able to get the solos finished in
just one hour.
I had done some solos on his previous CD's. Sean Bahry
returned to work on yet another new song. Sean just keeps crankin' them
out. 8-2-07
Anthony White paid me another visit today. We
tried to get together last week but just as we began to record, my board
blew up and failed. So Monday with a spare board in the temporary position
we got underway. Anthony rapped both free style and from the written page. I
can tell that this is a well read person that is opinionated and has logical
convictions associated with those opinions. I enjoyed both conversing with
Anthony and hearing his raps. His is a refreshing escape from the normal
bang rap artist. Anthony really has something worth listening to. We
were able to record 18 songs in just four hours. 7-24-07
Luvtaxi is back in the mix. Last Saturday we did a mobile
recording at their place of practice. Trying to beat the heat we started at
10 am.
Felipe Lariz
and I have been working on the graphics for his CD
project. We have settled on the pictures and layout design and have
submitted them to the graphics designer that I work with regularly. We hope
to have everything finalized in a week or so. 6-26-07
Christine June called to say that she wanted
to make a quick demo. We got together about two hours later and began
to work on her song. Christine wrote the lyrics in the studio as I
programmed the music. We needed to take an hour break as Shane Kalbauch
came in to record the violin parts for Lloyd Mason's song. Soon
we were finished with the demo and Christine had her first ever recording of
herself. Another happy ending! 6-26-04
He's
back. Sean Bahry has returned with
another song to record. This young man is a song writing machine. We
did not finish it but Sean wanted to hear what we had so far. So here's the
rough mix of the yet unfinished song "You got me singing".
(Have a listen) 6-5-07
May 2007
Noah Agruss
finished the string parts for Mai Cha's six songs.
Noah is a gifted composer and delivered the parts on schedule. Now I will
load the string wav files into Pro Tools and add them to Mai's songs.
Soon after I will need Mai to come in and re-sing his vocal parts. 5-24-07
Greg Ayala made his weekly visit to the studio
and we recorded the lead vocals to Greg's song titled "Is it love". I
find the song to be an interesting mix of modern Reggae with an big 80's
drum sound. Have a listen and judge for yourself. Now Greg and I will get to
work on one of my songs that Greg penned some lyrics for. It's working
title is "Without a clue, but happy".
Here's
"Is it love"
(Click to hear).
5-23-07
Paul Fury booked some
time to record several songs that are to be added to his current project.
Paul has become a veteran in the studio and was in and out of the booth in a
very short time. We had a few laughs, but we got the work done.
5-22-07
Hillary Garrett has signed on as the newest
Recording Engineering student this year. With a music major background in
college Hillary wants to get on the inside track of the recording studio
business. Welcome aboard Hillary. Greg Ayala and I continue to get
together in the studio once a week and the results are promising. Greg's
latest song is asking the question "Is it love". It's a reggae
song with huge 80's style drums. We have worked on the arrangement
and a guitar rhythm as well as two guitar solos. Once the vocals are
finished being recorded I will post it so you may have a listen. 5-17-07
Lloyd Mason decided to have me add a fiddle to
two of the songs that we recorded some years ago. I contacted Shane
Kalbach, a violin player and sent him two Mp3's so he could get prepared
for the session. Here is one of the two songs prior to his parts being added.
Krissi Gray and Kash
Villiani are a musical team that got
together several years ago to collaborate on projects. They work
together on the music with Krissi singing, rapping and playing several
instruments. Kash is the music producer and
programmer. I met them when I bought some software from them a couple of weeks ago. They
decided to come to
Sean Bahry returned for the second week in a
row with yet another new song. We worked on the song and found a nice groove. The song is called "I see the road
ahead". This rocker is a bit of a departure from the two ballads that
Sean has brought to the studio in the past. We really rocked it out and I like it a lot. The big
guitar sound has always been a hook for me. With this song there is
something special about the sound and feel. Sometimes things just flow
together. This is a product of magic in the studio. Can you figure out what
it is? (Check
out the mix) 5-6-07
Sean Bahry and I got back together this weekend to put together yet another song. Sean has been busy implementing some of the concepts that I suggested with regard having his songs ready before coming to the studio. We were able to complete this song in just one session of four and a half hours. It seems to me that Sean's future looks bright as he continues to hone his song writing craft. This song is "A different way". (Click to play) 4-30-07
Fabian Lariz is working on his first CD project. Under the guidance of his father Felipe who is producing this project. On the first day we recorded the drums and keyboard parts and an accordion played by Felipe. On the second day we recorded the bass parts played by Gill. The rhythm guitar will be next on the agenda. So far everyone is well rehearsed and little time is being wasted in the studio. Hey slow down guy's, I get paid by the hour. (insert laughs here) 4-27-07
Felipe Lariz and his wife Maricela came to the studio yesterday to begin work on two projects. The first is Felipe's CD which he recorded in Modesto. Felipe wants to have me handle the duplication of his project. I took some pictures of Felipe for the graphics on his project. We will get the layout completed in the next week or so. Secondly Felipe wants to record a CD project featuring his fourteen year old son Fabian. According to Felipe, Fabian is a gifted singer. More on this project as it unfolds. (Have a listen) 4-19-07
Luvtaxi is back in the news. Frank Lizaragga the leader called me yesterday to inform me that Luvtaxi has been nominated for a Sammie award this year. They will be performing at the Sammie's and hope to garner enough votes to win the coveted award for best Latino band in the area. Their most recent CD project recorded at Pudding Stone Recording, has been well received and is selling well at their live performances. (Have a listen) 4-18-07
Sister Swing was back in the studio this week. No they were not beginning another album project, but were assigned to sing background vocals for Ilon Griffin's song "Be mine tonight". While in the studio the sisters also provided background vocals for several other songs on Ilon's project. Valerie Marston will return tomorrow to record a vocal track on "Love at second sight" 4-11-07
Ilon Griffin
has been making his weekly trips to the studio recording
his vocals as we move through his project. Ilon has given me a new song to
arrange for him titled, "Springtime". Meanwhile G Damage AKA Gino
Jackson has been making his monthly trip to the studio to continue
mixing his project. We are close to mastering time with Gino's CD. Both men
were in the studio at the same time and while both are artists, their music
couldn't be further apart. Gino music is hard core gangster street
rap. While Ilon's music is pop in nature. I love the differences that I am
faced with. Variety is the spice of life.
4-2-07
Rob Farrell is the mastering engineer at JulyRob Mastering Lab. Rob has done most of the mastering of projects going through Pudding Stone dating back to the middle 90's. it's a good thing to have confidence in the person doing the mastering as it is the last chance to squeak out some additional quality from a project. In addition to trimming the beginnings and endings of each song, we balance the frequencies and make sure that all of the songs are uniform in volume. Rob and I have a good working relationship and I am always involved in the mastering process. I believe that, Four ears are better than two. Here is an example of Rob playing with his band (Click to hear) 3-30-07
Jim Roberts project "At the Cross", has undergone the mastering process. Often times once that has taken place you can find little things that need to be tightened up. Due in the most part to the extra clarity that comes from the mastering process, I have gone back to the mastering lab and made those small changes. Jim is pictured here in front of the building with two Mocha's for our early morning meeting. This song features Jim's wife Lisa singing the main vocal. (Hear a sample) 3-29-07
Keith Mello-Hall was in the studio yesterday to continue the Audio Engineering class that he had to put on hold due to some personal situations. Keith is a drummer and has always been very excited about learning the studio business. Keith moved from Modesto to Sacramento recently and is currently employed by The Guitar Center in the drum department. We had an unexpected surprise visit during our class by,
Christian Lozano, a former student who stopped by to bring us up to date on his progress since completing the course some three months ago. In short Chris has been busy working on some albums and is planning to move back to Austin Texas where he came from originally. We had an interesting discussion about the process of trying to recover lost files after having read the last page of Tape Op magazine. Chris will return next week during class time to demonstrate how to recover some of my lost files for me. I always get a sense of pride hearing about these success stories from some of my former students. Also there are some big changes to the building in which Pudding Stone Recording resides. The trees have been cut down in preparation for a face lift in the form of a new paint job. We're moving on up! 3-23-07
Sean Bahry paid me another visit to continue working on another of his songs. Sean gets excited in the studio as the music begins to come together. I started off by having Sean sing the song so I can get an idea of the structure and the tempo. I build a rough drum track and a bass line. Then Sean played the keyboard track, followed by a rough vocal track. Up till now everything was midi triggering the Roland Fantom synthesizer. When the structure felt solid I laid an acoustic guitar track. We re-laid the vocals and concentrated on different vocal effects. Then it was time to get a rough mix and call it a day until the next time we can get together. We covered a lot of ground in just four hours. 3-4-07 Sean Behry returned a week later to continue working on his song. Sean and I changed some of the effects on the vocals, re-recorded some vocals, changed some of the drums, the guitar intro and I played some lead electric guitar parts to complete the song. (Have a listen) 3-11-07
Nat Brown
has returned to the studio to continue his work on the
current CD project. Nat had recorded these songs before, but was unhappy
with the way some of the drum tracks were produced. Nat went back to the
music producer and had new versions of the drums re-laid on to some of the
racks. At the earlier session I mentioned to Nat that I thought the tracks
were sub standard. He followed my advice and now all is in order.
3-2-07
Ilon Griffin continues to work on his project. I really like his original song "Be mine tonight" We have worked on this song and it is coming into it's own. We will be adding back ground vocals and refining the mix. 3-1-07
February 2007
Denise Morey is my wife's sister. Last weekend I drive to her house in Atascadero, CA to transfer the raw recorded tracks from another studio where she has been recording with her band. Now I have imported the songs (tracks) and can begin to mix and do the post production on the record. The first job is labeling the tracks and beginning to get a feel for the music. De has an excellent voice and her harmony back ground parts sound angelic. My 18 year old nephew David Morey played bass on all the songs. He played well. As soon I have something mixed I'll put it up for you to hear. 2-17-07
Dave McAsey came in last week to add conga and bongos on Ilon Griffin's song titled "Be mine tonight". Dave returned this week to record some music for his new CD project. An interesting point came to light during our sessions. Often times the artist thinks that they are ready to record and after hearing the playback they say, "I sounded better at home". The big difference is that at home you don't get to hear your self played back after a performance. You can't be completely objective when your both playing and listening. Many times to prepare for recording the artist needs to slow down the song to be sure that they understand where each note is to be placed and understand the arrangement of the song.
Sean Bahry (pronounced berry) is a fifteen year old song writer. Sean needed some help arranging his song and then wanted to record it. On Saturday we got together and went to work. Sean played piano to outline the structure of the song. Then I added a bridge, drums and bass. After listening, Sean wanted to have some strings. Then it was time to record the vocals. Sean has performed in some musicals where he was required to sing so he had a good grip in the vocals but needed some additional coaching. He wants to come back and do the same treatment on two more of his songs. 2-3-07
I am Bruce Bolin. Timothy Moore was my little brother. He was born when I was ten years old. I watched him grow and loved him a lot. When he died in 2003 and I wrote this song for him. I have been working with a friend named Nancy Merrihew writing songs for the past 15 years. We have hit upon a dry spell in our combined writing and I mentioned that I had written this song several years ago. Nancy is a publisher, and agreed to pitch it for me. The song is "Good bye my little brother." (Click to hear) 2-1-07
January 2007
Jerry Cook
has graced the pages of this studio log many times.
Well now you can have a look at Jerry. Soon we will post some of his music
so you may hear what Jerry sounds like when he sings. Jerry is quite the
singer.
Jim
Roberts came in yesterday to pick up his newly
mastered CD entitled "At The Cross".
1-25-07
Paul Fury
paid a visit to the studio to record his vocals on two songs that will
be added to his CD project. Since the last time when we recorded, Paul
his voice seems to be getting deeper with lots of resonance on the lower
register So we worked it and are trying to capture and explore that newly found nugget
to see where it will take us.
Lorrie Iliescu
recorded two songs as a demo to send to a producer in
Nashville. Although Lorrie was born here on Sacramento, she has sung country
music most of her life. She has a twang reminiscent of country singers from
the south. She liked the recording experience and her husband Alex mentioned
that she would be back for more.
December 2006 Jason Evans is an opera singer. A lyric tenor to be exact. What you have never heard of a lyric tenor? Well your not alone. Neither had I until yesterday. A lyric tenor sings in a higher register than a normal tenor. With all of the required technique and discipline of any opera singer, I was informed that there are many operatic parts written for a lyric tenor. He has studied locally and back east for more than ten years. Jason needed a demo to send to various competitions around the country. This was however, his first recording experience. We were able to record five songs in a variety of languages in just under three hours. It's always fun for me learn something new and to meet new people. 12/28/06. Two Tone Stieny returned to the studio ready to re-record his vocals from the night before. He blasted through the six songs with mostly first takes. Then he recorded his harp parts, all the while Jim (the keyboard player) watched and waited for his turn in the booth. Jim knocked out his tenor sax parts in short order. Now I will mix the tracks and edit together a five minute demo. Things have a way of moving pretty fast around here sometimes. Have a very Merry Christmas and a Healthy New Year. 12-22-06 Mark Steinmetz is a harp playin' blues singer who needs a demo. So he brought his blues band to the studio to record. The band features my old friend Joe Lev on bass, Jim on piano, Anthony on drums and Johnny Knox on guitar. We got underway at 9:30 pm last night. By 1am we had all of the rhythm tracks for six songs recorded. I mentioned to Mark aka Stieny, that on a couple of the songs he sounded like John Mayal. In a demo session, it is important to remember that only a small section of any given song will make the final demo. We had more than enough good songs to cut together a tasty demo. 12-21-06. Roxana Damas was back in the studio along with Frank Lizaragga to over see the recording of some additional percussion parts for her song "Latino's De Fuego". This song is being used as the background music for a video that is being aired on You tube. To see the video, go to You tube and type in Roxana Damas. But, last night was for recording percussion parts for the song. Oliver Camilo aka Ollie, was once again entrusted with finding some good rhythm parts on both Guero (the fish) and Bongos. After playing with the song a few minutes, Ollie found a part on the Guero that fit quite nicely. Then Ollie recorded a Bongo part that had us in the studio, bobbing heads and tapping feet. That's a good sign! 12-19-06 Dave Earthly has been continuing to workout in the studio. We are moving ever closer to finishing the vocals on his song "By my side". We have been re-working the melody and the phrasing of the song. The Jim Roberts project is well on the way to mastering which is the final stage before reproduction. We will be getting together this afternoon to finish up a few items before the mastering. Gino Jackson has returned and as we continue to work on his project. Have a very Merry Christmas 12-18-06 .
Gino Jackson
other wise known as G-Damage, was back in the
studio rappin' for all he was worth. We transferred several more of his
songs from his synthesizer into Pro Tools before having Gino step into the
booth to record his vocals. This project is moving right along and I believe
that we will have it in the can before long. 12-7-06. Jim Roberts returned to Pudding Stone to put in two more days in an effort to finish mixing his project. At this time it is looking like "it's in the can". This has been over a year and a half in the process. But like fine wine, time is what makes the final product sparkle! Stu Goldberg stopped by yesterday to pick up half of the CD's that I have transferred from old tapes. This has been an hour intensive project for me. But I have to say that along the way I have heard many great performances that were originally recorded back in the 60's. Good music is timeless! Have a happy Thanksgiving 11-22-06 Roxana Damas came in to record vocals for a song that will be sent to a producer interested in promoting her career as a Latino singer. This was a good week for the people in the booth. They were able to find that magic in themselves to produce very favorable performances. When that happens, my job is easy. Dave Earthly has been continuing to work on his project. It's always good to see Dave. We have a good time producing music in the studio. 11-10-06
G-Damage
AKA Gino Jackson called me to book some studio
time. During the session everything was going along as planned as we
imported background tracks from two of his synths into Pro Tools. It wasn't
until he stepped into the booth and began to lay down his rap that I was
taken back and realized that here was one guy that had studied his
craft. His demeanor changed from a laid back quiet guy into a raging
pissed off and explosive rapper. Gino is hands down the best rapper
that I have ever recorded. Most of his takes were one time efforts.
He blazed through nine songs in less than two hours. We will get back
together early next month to continue this project with mixing and
mastering.
Stu Goldberg
is a long time friend and a person that was instrumental
in starting the "Jefferson Airplane" back in the 60's. Stu paid me a
visit yesterday because he wants me to transfer many old 1/4 inch tapes to
CD's for him. Many of the tapes were recorded at "The Hungry Eye",
(it was a popular night club in San Francisco's North Beach).
Others were recorded by Stu's music shop. He has known so many people that
went on to become famous. Not the least of which was Janis Joplin,
who had an apartment next to his in the same building.. We spent most of the
day sifting through these old tapes trying to figure out what speed they
were recorded at. Now I will begin the task of digitally recording while
EQ'ing each song to make it sound as good as possible. 11-2-06 Oliver Camilo AKA Ollie, was hired to play percussion on two Latin songs for Roxanna Damos. Ollie played congas on the two songs then re-configured the booth for timbales. He displayed a knowledge of Latino grooves and was able to record his parts in one take once he determined what groove would fit best. I gave him an extra track to experiment with and in each case Ollie laid down exceptional tracks. He later told me that this was his first time in a recording studio. 10-31-06.
Shane Kalbauch
is a viola and violin player. I contacted Shane because one of my
clients (Mike Cha) wants to have some real strings on five of his
songs. The three of us had a meeting at the studio on Saturday to discuss
the project. I made a CD of the 5 songs and now Shane will listen to
the songs and write some string arrangements. Once those arrangements are
finished, the next step will be to record those arrangements including a
cello player. Have a happy Halloween Booo!
10-30-06. David Camperois the latest
Audio
Engineering student to join the program. The class is moving right along
with classes on Tuesday and again on Thursdays. Since joining, David has
been driving from Modesto with Keith Mello-Hall who is now
half way through the audio course. They are good friends and they can
cover many of the course topics during their hour and a half drive (in
each direction) twice a week. Jim Roberts has returned to the
studio with Brian Dutra who is a classically trained vocalist to record
some additional vocal tracks for the second CD in the Jim's project series.
Valerie Marston recorded vocal tracks for me on my song "Rushin'
In". I have been mixing and tweaking the song for nearly two weeks
and am almost satisfied.
Just when I think it's finished, I will
find some little thing that needs my attention. There is no rest for
the wicked. Rick Smith and Jerry
Cook have also been in the studio, each working on their projects.
Joyride had a Joyride in the studio yesterday. The task at hand was to record live drum tracks. The drummer for this session was Jarrett Aitkins who displayed some fine grooves and dynamics during the 8 hour session. I enlisted the help of Eric Broyhill of Monster Labs, who set up the routing of the mics thru various mic pres and EQ's. We were treated to excellent drum sounds combined with Jarrett's solid playing. Though the session was a long one, the energy level never waned. In the end we all drank a beer and enjoyed listening to the playbacks. Rick Smith commented that he felt like this was the last piece of the puzzle and that the end was truly in sight. My audio engineering students were able to sit in on the session and observe from beginning to end. 9-27-06
Jim Roberts and his wife Lisa
graced the studio with a visit yesterday to record
Lisa singing some harmony parts. All went well and now Jim and I will
continue with some mixing. This project was started a couple of years ago
but was slowed down when the couple had a baby and are now expecting their
second child in less than a month. Joyride
is a group headed up by Rick Smith. Rick is a
guitar player and song writer who has been working on this CD since his
brother passed away over two years ago. It all started with Rick and his
brother, who was living in Germany at the time deciding to collaborate on this
CD project. Now the project is in the final stages and today we will
be recording the live drums to add to the rest of the recorded parts. I will
mix and Rick will begin working on promoting the project. 9-26-06. Gloria Heidi needed to get some back ground music recorded for her performing show. After we had met and discussed her needs, I felt that John Wilder was the musician that could best fit the bill for Heidi. Gloria, John and I got together for a recording session on Wednesday. John played keyboards and bass simultaneously as Gloria sang and I recorded. We laid down three songs in record time and we were all pleased with the results. Jay Jackman will not be able to attend his class reunion this year which is happening in two weeks. But Jay wants to send along a song that was written by himself and a fellow classmate that has since passed away. We tried to get some bed tracks recorded but felt that Jay wasn't practiced enough to get a satisfactory performance. Jay went home to work out some of the parts and will return on Saturday morning when we will attempt to finish the song. 9/7/06
Valerie Marston
needed to have me make her some tracks for her group
Sister Swing minus the vocals. It seems they have several gigs coming up
with budgets that couldn't afford the entire band. I scrambled and had to go
back into the A-dat libraries to find some very early recordings from the
sisters first two albums. I transferred the A-dats to Pro Tools and mixed
the tracks. Now the Sisters have several more options in providing for
smaller budgeted gigs. Jordan Limiquin is back as we finalize his CD
project. Luvtaxi has been regular visitor's to the studio mixing as
we close in on the end of their CD project. It all began with Luvtaxi
in early January of this year when I recorded them in their practice room.
The CD is sounding good and features more Latin songs sung in Spanish.
Dave Caldon is the guitar player for The Chris Gardner Band. I
asked Dave to come in and record some harp tracks on a song that I have been
working on for Jerry Cook. We recorded the tracks and now I can
finish the mix and add yet another song to Jerry's song list. 8/16/06
Michelle Webb came into the studio armed with five singers to record vocals for a play the she has been working on for years. In just five hours we were able to record vocals for seven scenes of her play. Michelle plans on having the first live performance in November. I have had sessions with Mike Cha working on re-recording the vocals on some of his earlier material. As well as working with Denny Sacco trying to revive some of his material from the 70's and 80's. Luvtaxi continues to record and mix their CD. Valerie Marston recorded some voice over's and we edited together some music from the Jackie Robinson production "Safe at home" to create the audio tracks for a power point presentation she will be giving soon. Keith Mello-Hall is the newest student of my audio engineering class. Has anyone noticed the weather lately? Ouch!!! 7/28/06 Silvia Britt is the latest student to join the Recording Connection Audio Engineering class that I teach. Silvia wants to work towards gaining enough engineering skills that she can begin to record many of the talented members of her family. Silvia is quite a good singer as was demonstrated on a tape that she gave to me. Although it was recorded over ten years ago, I could hear that she had chops and style. 7/14/06 Jamie Zuniga is the percussionist and one of the led singers for the group Luvtaxi. Jamie and I began yesterday to mix two of the songs for the Luvtaxi CD project. We were soon joined by the drummer Rudy. We carefully auditioned all of the tracks, fixing small issues in pitch and rhythm. Once these were attended to, we EQ'd where needed and added effects to the vocals. It was a good mixing session taking only three and a half hours. In the studio "Time is money". 7/13/06
Kadar Helsmith
is a young student studying genetics at Davis University.
He needed to have some music edited for a talent show in which he would be
competing in New York City. Kadar entered two categories singing and
dance. He needed some quick studio time to make the edits as he was catching
a plane the next day. I was able to squeeze him in and quickly made
the edits. When I had finished I asked Kadar
to show me his dance routine to the freshly edited music tracks and he did. It was cool and modern. Go Kadar!
John Ketelman came in with a drummer named Scott McGinnis to
record drums over some existing music tracks that John had recorded earlier.
We struggled with the recording because the timing was so far off on those
tracks. After
wards John asked if I could play guitar on another song of his. This song
went much smoother because the drummer, John and I locked in and
maintained the time. I then recorded an bass line to go with Johns vocals
and the song was finished in a rough form. 7/12/06.
Luvtaxi continues to work on their project. Frank Lizarraga commissioned Augie who is one of the trumpet players from the Latino group Los Elegantes, to write and record some horn parts for five of the songs slated for this latest CD. Augie and Gabriel laid down the two trumpet parts in a session that lasted over five hours. I was impressed with Augie's writing which struck me as being very melodic and helping to give the songs a new dimension. Adding a sound and feeling of old Mexico to the funky grooves in Luvtaxi's music. I have recorded my share of horn parts, but these were especially unique and enjoyable. Ken Dyer and I got together in the studio yesterday to mix and edit his demo. 6/30/06 Ken Dyer needs a demo. So he hired me to drive to his home in Garden Valley located near Georgetown in the foothills. I set up my mobile recording rig and I began to record Ken singing and playing. We were able to record enough to give him two demos, one pop and one country. Ken will now come to the studio and we will finish the mixing, editing and mastering to complete his demo. Jordan Lemiquin's CD is almost finished. We had to take his mixes directly from his Roland digital recorder in order to get the best dynamic range therefore improving the sound of his project. Jimmy Malone will be joining me in the studio to work on Jerry Cook's project. Jimmy and I always have a good and productive time in the studio. Summer is here, stay as cool as you can. 6/24/06
Jim Roberts
and his wife Lisa graced the studio yesterday
after having been absent for nine months. We quickly picked up where we left
off working on their project. Lisa stepped into the booth and sang two songs
that will be added to their multiple CD project. Jim plans on returning
Friday to keep the ball rolling. Jerry Cook is still excited about
the work accomplished on his multi song live assist project. I have been
seeing Jerry once a week on average as we forge ahead.
Jordan Lemiquin is a former audio engineering student of mine who
is ready to release his first CD. Jordan asked me to master his music
to balance out the songs and help him get his duplication together. We got
together yesterday for a preliminary planning and information session.
Jordan will return today to continue. Bernie Kerns
has finished his two
year long effort and is happily listening to his CD project.
Bernie and I started this project back in 2004 at the old Pudding Stone
location. 6/15/06 Phyllis Stafford has finished recording her vocal tracks. She was inspired by the sound of the back ground vocals that Sister Swing provided. The magic was in the music as Phyllis gave some very emotional gospel performances. The studio felt like church on a Sunday morning. After mixing and mastering we will get a short run of CD's from a local vender to sell at a performance that she has scheduled at that Heritage Festival on June 3rd. Today I am going to the mastering lab (Julirob Mastering Suite) to master Bob Lobner's project. Next week I hope to be back at the mastering lab to finish Phyllis' CD. Last week I was contacted by a company from North Carolina to set up a Voice Over session for their Internet sales department. The VO talent was Trevor Matich, a former NFL pro football player. Trevor played for the Patriots and the Redskins. We met last Friday morning and the session went well. Now I will FTP the files via the internet to Gary Baker who has been my contact at the home office in South Carolina. James Eastman has begun the Audio Engineering class that I teach. Yesterday was his first class and I am sure that today his head is reeling with new terms and information. Welcome aboard James. 5/17/06
Sister Swing
spent three nights in the booth and produced the
necessary back ground vocals for Phyllis' Stafford's gospel CD
project. This was an ardent effort on the part of the three singers in order
to capture the sound and feel of being in church on a Sunday morning.
Meanwhile Lovtaxi's Frank Lizaragga is scheduled to bring in some
horns to be recorded for his album. Things have been poppin' around the
studio. 5/12/06
Nat Brown
needed some back ground vocals recorded for his live
assist single act. Nat brought veteran studio vocalist Cynthia
Douglas with him. She was well prepared and had listened to the two
songs prior to the session. Our first action was to record Nat singing a
scratch vocal. Then with Cynthia in the vocal booth, we quickly got a good
head phone mix and began recording. She sang the first back ground part, the
second and we decided to layer a third part to fill out a phrase on the
first song. Cynthia welcomed cues and direction when needed. The session
went very smoothly because we were all on the same page. The next song was recorded
and finished in less than an hour. By then, we were all working like
a "well oiled machine".
Bob Lobner paid me a visit yesterday to do some additional tweaking on his mixes. We spent about three hours balancing out some of the things that he wanted changed from the original mixes. The beauty of having Pro Tools is the "Total recall" for making small changes like these. I can make volume changes as small as 1/10th of a DB. Now that's what I call a pretty fine line. Mike Cha was also in the studio, he had me transfer a 2" 16 track tape to Pro Tools that he recorded some ten years ago in Denver. Mike wants me to do some editing and to re-record his vocals. Then we will mix and make him a new CD for duplication. 4/26/06
The B Street Theater
has given me the go ahead to begin mixing the music I
recorded back in March. It seems that the theater wants to submit the play
entitled " Safe at Home, The Jackie Robinson Story", to an
organization called Dramatic Publishing located in Woodstock,
Illinois that will offer this original play to other play houses
scattered around the country. Having seen the play, I was impressed and
entertained by the story line and the singing actors. This play was written
by a local actor Tony D'Juan who frequently works at the B
Street theater. Noah Agruss did a fine job creating the original
musical score for the play. All of the lyrics for the songs were also
written by Tony D'Juan. 4/21/06 Trio Capitol consisting of Alex, Henry and Rafael have been singing and playing together for more than fourteen years. Keeping with the tradition of the Mexican trio, these three men put out a lot of music and they play and sing in tune. I have recorded them several times through out the years. Each time we get back together I can hear the improvement in the group since our last meeting. We recorded live in the studio and were able to get through twelve songs a little over three hours. They keep busy playing most weekends for mostly local weddings, birthdays and other events supplying the traditional Mexican music as it once was preformed in old Mexico. 4/17/06 Ed Kremers is a square dance caller. For the last ten or so years Ed has been coming to the studio to record. The songs he records are used as demos of new songs that other square dance callers can buy to use when they perform at square dances. These are like karaoke songs that the callers use at the dances. Ed was in good form and we were able to get him in and out in time to go to lunch on the river (which was running very high given all the rain we have been having lately) 4/6/06 Free studio time for all who need it for a limited time only. That's right, can you believe it? In this time of escalating prices you can receive free studio time. This is a limited offer good only for the early birds that jump on the band wagon. Contact the studio today to reserve your studio time. This limited offer ends soon so don't delay. Oh and by the way we are also selling a bridge that's located in Brooklyn, New York. 4/1/06 March 2006 Studio Hand Shake. It is apparent that studios in the new millennium are becoming more intertwined. Files are moving from one studio to another for different forms of production. Case in point. I needed some other musicians to play on my own current Solo CD project. So I gave a CD of a stereo rough mix of the song to the keyboard player. He adds his parts at home when it's convenient for him. He gives me back a 24 Bit data disk of separated tracks that I can then mix any way I want. I will do the same for the drums, only this time I will give him a data disk of separated tracks so he can drop the drums out and add his parts. Two weeks ago I used this method for recording Sister Swing on Bob Pearce's song. 3/29/06 Valerie, Paula and Leigh AKA Sister Swing recorded some back ground vocals for Bob Pearce of the Beer Dawgs. Bob's new group "Slim Bawb" is putting out a new CD due to release on June 1st. Bob wanted the Sisters to add their church ladies back ground vocals to Bob's song "Marks Goin' To Church". As usual we had a lot of fun and laughed a lot while laying down these vocal parts. Now I will make a data disk for Bob and he will lay them back to his recording device for final mixing. 3/22/06 Happy Saint Patrick's Day. Today I will be singing some Irish songs on the Mary Jayne Popp Radio Show. 1240 on your AM dial. Mary Jayne is an old friend who invited me to join her for her radio show today. She is on the air five days a week. I think I'll wear some green. 3/17/06 Chris Lizano has transferred to Pudding Stone from a studio in Austin Texas to finish his recording Connection Audio classes. Luvtaxi recorded some more vocals and Bernie Kerns has been a regular trying to finish his project. Singer Jerry Cook has commissioned Bruce to arrange several more songs for his stage act. 3/16/06
Bob Williams,
trombone player and former leader of the Wooden Nickel
Jazz Band stopped by to record some tracks for Igor Glenn.
Igor heads up Igor and the Jazz Cowboys. Igor's band is well known in
the jazz festival circuit. We worked through two numbers and came up with
some pretty inventive trombone parts. Trombones in harmony can sound very
good when integrated into the song. Bob is a regular trombone player with
Sister Swing.
Angel Brooks and Koohai,
her singing partner and sister in law have returned to
Pudding Stone.
These two ladies are both very pregnant. They are trying
to get their demo finished before delivering their babies. This is a first
for me. I have seen and experienced many things in the studio but this
situation is new. The ladies got right to work on their song titled
"Secret Passion". We recorded for the next five hours working on getting
tight phrases and pitches. By three o'clock we were all getting pretty
crispy. it was time to call it a day. They hope to return next week to
finish, baring a visit from the stork. Roxana Damas the lead singer
from Luvtaxi came in to work on some new vocal techniques. She will
return next week to re-record some of her vocals. 3/306 Frank Lizaragga and Luvtaxi were back in the studio to record vocals for their up coming CD project. In a short 3 and 1/2 hours we recorded lead and back ground vocals. Frank told me that this time around they will feature horns on several songs. Look for Luvtaxi on the Featured Artist page of this site. Luvtaxi played a showcase in the Bay Area last weekend. They placed fifth overall and competed against some of the Bay Area's finest. Luvtaxi's music is funky and very original. Bass player Frank, percussionist Jamie and lead singer Roxana all contributed songs for this album. Go Luvtaxi. 2/21/06 Bernie Kerns continues coming to the studio twice a week. It seems Bernie's songs are getting more complicated as we work through the music. His songs vary from simple rock to pop and country. Bernie always has a good attitude and seems to enjoy the recording process. Phyllis Stafford has several lady friends that are willing to step up to the microphone in the booth. Under the watchful ear of Jimmy Malone who has produced the music for this project, the back ground singers bring a gospel sound to the music. Phyllis is seeing the light at the end of the tunnel as we move ever closer to the end of this CD. 2/17/06 Bob Lobner and I had a fine session this week. We finished tracking the back ground vocals on five of his songs. Then came some bass overdubs. Now I will concentrate on editing and mixing. This has been a wonderful experience for both of us. Including Bob and I jamming until 1AM in the morning. It was fun! Recording at Bob's with a view of the mountains and a valley right out side of his living room window makes the work all that much more enjoyable. Plus Bob is a good cook so the grits have been tasty. 2/10/06 Angel Brooks and her sister in law Koohai drove all the way from Atwater Ca. to record. They have been in contact with their manager in LA who requested a demo of their music. Once they were in the booth we began to work through the music and to try and capture the elusive good vocal performance. Koohai's voice sounded like Sade. While Angel's sound reminded me of some of the early 60's girl group's voices. We continued on for four hours and after having mixed and burned a CD for the ladies, they were on their way back to Atwater. Angel called me several hours later to comment on how good the CD's mix sounded to them in the car on the trip back home. All in a days work at Pudding Stone Recording. 2/7/06 Luvtaxi descended upon Pudding Stone last Saturday like a herd of buffalo. We began recording percussion parts on all of the songs that we had previously recorded at Frank Lizarraga's home several weeks ago. Jamie was on fire in the booth. Most of his takes were done on the first attempt. Then it was on to two new songs. The whole band played while I recorded. In all it was a very productive day for Luvtaxi and Pudding Stone. 2/6/06 Jimmy Malone and I have been working together on some of my music. This is how it works. I give Jimmy a stereo CD of the songs I need to have him play on. He loads the CD onto his computer then records his part and gives me back a CD of his part only. I load his part back onto my computer and mix his part with the rest of the song. This system works well in this period of tight schedules. I am also working in the same way with Steve Boutte'. Where Jimmy records keyboard parts for me, Steve is a drummer. Both have small in home studios. This is shaping up to be the way things are working out in the new millennium. 2/3/06 Bob Lobner and I have been recording Bob's latest CD project at his home near Georgetown. I have been using my Alesis HD 24 hard disk recorder. As the project progresses, we are streamlining our collective process. This means the quality of the recordings have gotten better as Bob understands how to prepare for the sessions. His puts new strings on all of his guitars so they will sound their best. He is well rehearsed and his voice is in good performing condition. If he has a problem such as a cold, then we will postpone the session until the next week when he is feeling better. It is mostly about capturing the best performance. Bob feels very comfortable in his own home. Mobile recording has it's place and it works well in many situations. 2/3/06 Luvtaxi will be coming to the studio on Saturday to continue recording percussion and vocal tracks on their latest CD project. Pete Droubay is back for yet another session to do a voice over for a new client of his. 2/1/06.
Bernie Kerns has returned to Pudding Stone after a one year absence. Eager to get back to recording his songs, Bernie stepped into the booth and went through his music yesterday. Things went well for our first time back together in more than a year. Bernie needs to keep coming back because he only has one month before he will need to return to his racing schedule. Bob Lobner and I will take up where we left off in December to continue working on his music project. 1/30/06. Rick Smith stopped by to review the mixes I had done for his project. We will get together next week with Rick's singer Kym for the final decision on the mixes. Jerry Cook who is a fine singer and Jimmy Malone met with me to discuss a new project. While in the studio Jerry and I fine tuned a song that I have been working on for Jerry. 1/21/06 Frank Lizarraga of Luvtaxi had the band ready to record when I arrived at his home last Saturday. In just six hours we recorded rhythm tracks on eleven songs. On Monday I transferred the music to Pro Tools at Pudding Stone. I have delivered a rough mix CD to Frank and soon we will begin to record vocals and over dubs. It was a good session yielding clean tracks that were played live and have that live vibe. 1/17/06 Def Jam Records called me back yesterday to have me send them a data disk of Ne-Yo's song "One Chance". Ne-Yo had recorded this song late last month at Pudding Stone. Adrian Muhammad of Def Jam said, "His song is our big push at this time". I had already sent them a priority mailed them the song last month, but they didn't receive it. So I jumped on it and this time I used overnight Fed Ex to send them a them a data disk and a audio CD mix of the song. Terrell Virgil called me back to inform me that he had recorded a vocal session and was ready to have me come and show him how I mixed. So I returned to his studio yesterday. It was a very productive 4 hours. We covered many aspects of mixing and digital editing. 1/11/06 Lovtaxi is headed up by Frank Lizaragga. Frank and I have been discussing recording his group in Frank's rehearsal studio. I stopped by last Friday evening to catch a little of the band rehearsing for the session scheduled for this Saturday. The new Alesis HD24 is a very handy and portable unit to capture the music. Meanwhile Rick Smith and I have been working on the mixes for his project. 1/9/06 Terrell Virgil has a home studio where he composes and produces music for local rappers. Terrell asked me to help him set up his studio in order to make it more efficient. We worked for some time on his setup then a trip to Skip's music to buy a new board made things move much smoother in the studio. Now Terrell is happily recording and is ready for the next phase. I will giving him lessons on mixing. Kevin Norton is another composer that I have befriended. Kevin and I plan on working together to form a team to provide music tracks to Kevin's manager Greg Peters, who will shop the music to potential buyers based in Los Angles and New York. 1/6/06 Brad Hammet (trombone player for Sister Swing), has been enlisted to act as my web master. Brad and I will be hooking up remotely to bring the Pudding Stone Recording Studio site into the new millennium. I look forward to up- loading Mp3's and digital pictures of current clients for your enjoyment. I think it will give you a bigger picture of what is going on at the studio.1/5/06 Happy New Year , well things have gotten off to a stormy beginning for this new year. After all of these storms and rain, I am happy to announce that I am high and dry at both the studio and my humble abode. Brooke Thomas called me to book some studio time to have her friend Althea Moynihan record a piano track for Brooke's son. It seems he needs to perform an audition in order to gain acceptance to a music school. Althea performed the piece twice using two different piano patches. We decided on the one with the best sound and with a minimum of editing (tops and tails) I then burned her a CD and she was on her way. Wham bam thank you Ma'am. 1/4/06
Def Jam Records called me last Tuesday from New York City, to arrange for a session that night at 9PM for their artist named Ne-Yo. Then they emailed me the Mp3 tracks for several songs. I loaded the songs into Pro Tools and when Ne-Yo arrived with his west coast Def Jam contact Brian, we began recording vocals. Three hours later we had lead vocals doubled and many tracks of harmony vocals tracked. Then we recorded some radio drops which are promo's for his latest song titled "So Sick". These were to be aired Wednesday on several Hip Hop radio stations in the local area. This was all in preparation for Ne-Yo's performance at the Avalon Club on 15th street Wednesday night. I then mixed down the song converted it to Mp3 and emailed it back to Def Jam the next day. I also priority mailed them a CD mix of the song as well as a data disk so they could mix the song any way that they wished. All in all I found the experience to be handled professionally and in a minimum amount of time. Meanwhile I have gotten together with Jimmy Malone and he recorded some B3 organ parts on several on my new songs. They sounded good to me. My hope is that you will all have a safe and sane New Year's Eve and I'll keep you up to date on the happenings here at Pudding Stone Recording Studio. Let's all have a healthy and prosperous New Year in 2006. 12/30/05. Bruce Bolin. Rick Smith is an old friend and former audio engineering student of mine. Rick and
his brother set out over three years ago to produce an album. Sadly Rick's brother died of
cancer last year. So Rick has been carrying on to try and finish the project. Rick
came to me to mix the first two songs for a single. Jimmy Malone has been
working with a singer named Phyllis Stafford for more than a year. With
the music completed, it is now time to record vocals for this gospel album.
Phyllis brought
in Robin and Cheryl, two back ground singers, to record their parts. We
will continue working and recording to make a deadline of February 10, 2006. Dave
Earthly and I have finished yet another song titled "Bring
it to the Lord". As always we have a great time producing Dave's songs.
12/13/05
Bill and Dick Rose are brothers and they are also my cousins. They are recording some history of my family as I continue to try and capture some of my senior family members speaking of the early days. Bill is now the second to the oldest family member. Bill and I talked about this last July at a family reunion in Oregon. Last year I recorded an interview with my 83 year old Auntie Tina Laca. I gave a CD of my aunt's interview to many family members at the reunion along with some recordings of my Uncles and Grandfather playing Hawaiian music. The latter were recorded between 1942 and 1949. This will give our younger family members some idea of the history of the Borge Family. 11/22/05. My hope is for you all have a happy and peaceful Thanksgiving. The Morairty Brothers, Dennis and Skip came to me back in January of this year to have me record them. Their band consisted of two guitars, bass, piano and drums. Skip also played flute. Well nine months later we have been able to get together to record some over dubs. We recorded some percussion, guitar and flute last Saturday. We will be getting together again soon to continue. Their music is funky jazz. Jim Roberts and I continue to work on his multi CD project. Jorge Delossantos paid me a visit as he re-ordered 1000 CD's of the album that we recorded several years ago.I am happy to be working again with one of my all time friends and fine musician Jimmy Malone. We are getting together today to make some transfers in preparation for a CD project that Jimmy has been working on.11/15/05 Having received my new Alesis HD24, a 24
channel hard disk recorder, I began doing mobile recording projects. The first is my
old friend Bob Lobner. He is the king of "Foothills
Country Music". Bob and I have been trying to get it together for many years
to get him an album recorded. Now I can drive to his home located in the foot hills near
the town of Georgetown Ca. We have been getting some nice tracks in his living room. Bob
lives on 80 acres of prime mountain land So being out in the country, we are in a very
serene and relaxed atmosphere. It's great. Another plus is that Bob has a nice
garden and is a good cook. there is always a nice meal included.
Pete Droubay is recording another project. This one will be 10 CD's. Needless
to say, we have much work in front of us.11/3/05.
Karl Palachuk is the owner of KP Enterprises. This company that deals with on site documentation for computer systems. Karl recorded his voice giving the seminar last month and decided to make a CD from that program. Karl came to me to have me record some Q&A questions that I then inserted into his previous audio program. We added some bumper music and two short paragraphs of information about the seminar and the CD is now ready for duplication. Pete Droubay is a motivational speaker that has been my client for the last 5 years. We have recorded many voice over's in the past that Pete has gone on to sell. We are now embarking on a giant 12 CD project. Decay of Society and Chasing Hemmingway both came in to the studio one week end after tracking and I mixed both of their projects. Dave Earthly and I continue to record and produce Dave's music. We have the greatest time together in the studio. We always seem to find a creative groove. 10/26/05 Decay of Society is a power trio that contacted me to record a CD for them. These
three young men are all juniors in high school. We began this last Saturday. I was
surprised to hear the level of songwriting from the group. I rented Brighton Sound
Studio for two days to record the tracks and now we will get together
next weekend to mix and finalize the CD. Chasing Hemingway is the second
group that I recorded this weekend. We got together on Sunday and worked most of the
day and recorded the basic tracks on six of their songs. We will do some additional vocal
recording next weekend to finish the tracking. Then mix and finish.10/3/05
Sita Saunders is a former student of mine who was involved in an auto accident shortly before finishing her Audio Engineering Recording class. Well the good news is that Sita returned last week to complete her final recording project. She brought in two of her friends and recorded them performing an old Beatles song. Jim Roberts and I have been working very closely to finish Jim's project. It is a Catholic oriented group of spiritual songs and spoken passages from scenes of Jesus and his Mary on the day of his crucifixion. I have enjoyed working with Jim and we have had many interesting conversations concerning the written word. Derrick Fields was given a gift certificate for his birthday, to record some of his music. We began last week and are scheduled to continue this week. Derrick plays and writes songs that I find are both musical and melodic. As summer wanes in the valley life is good for us here in Sacramento. Considering what many people are going through in the deep south we have much to be thankful for. Sister Swing's Riff Raff and Ruffles CD is in the can and in the replication process as we speak. It seems like a long process but the results were worth it. This CD quickly becoming my favorite album of theirs. Check out their web site at sisterswing.com. 9/21/05 Valerie Marston,
Sister Swing's lead singer and producer has been in the studio mixing for most of
the month of August. Now on the 1st. day of September it is time to master her
masterpiece. It seems like a long road but the end is in sight for "Riff Raff
and Ruffles" the current CD project for Sister Swing. Valerie
has chosen to have Eric Broyhill of Monster Labs master this project.
Monster Labs is located in The Hanger, where Pudding Stone Recording
currently resides. Stephen Healy returned to record yet another of his rap songs as he builds
up his repertoire of music. Dave Earthly has been a steady client
continuing to work on his project. Dave has come a long way in the last
year and is approaching that magic number of ten completed songs. Jerry Cook
has picked up another 100 CD's to sell when he is performing live. The Hanger
is putting on a new face with a new paint job provided by Larry Litz.
Larry is a damn fine guitar player and singer when he is not moonlighting as a
painter. Jim Roberts has been working on his project which are composed
of original songs performed by Jim and his wife Lisa
with a Catholic motiff. Sadly the fallout from hurricane Katrina
continues to mount and we at Pudding Stone will open our hearts with prayer and
wallets to help in the relief effort. I feel that we are very fortunate to live where we
do and I am saddened to see how those poor people are having to cope with having lost
everything. God bless us all. 9/1/05
Daybreak is a five piece heavy metal rock band that have a "Take no prisoners attitude". They mean business every time they launch into one of their many original songs. On Monday August 1st. we had scheduled a session in the main studio. For the next six hours we recorded and over-dubbed until we had the tracks needed to make a fine demo for the band. They will now get a short reproduction run and begin to sell these first ever examples of the bands new music. Nick on drums, Bug on guitar, Josh on bass, Aaron on guitar and MC on lead vocals make up the band. I am sure that you will be hearing more about this group in the years to come. They to have been influenced by the Deftones. But they are forging their own way into the heavy metal mainstream. 8/4/05 .
Juan Arias has been coming back into the studio to fine tune his mixes. But now it is
looking like we have finished mixing his CD project. With mastering just ahead, Juan
will be happy to put this baby to rest. Dr. James Hally booked time to
have me insert some new phone numbers on to an existing track of the CD that we produced a
year and a half ago. On Air has finished mixing their CD. After mastering I handed
it over to them and they are preparing to perform their 20 year reunion gig in Elk Grove
in August. Sister Swing has almost finished recording their vocal
tracks. 7/25/05.
Nat Brown is back in the news. Nat brought Cynthia, a well known singer in the area to record over some back ground vocals that Nat had on one of his songs. Although I had not heard Cynthia sing before I was impressed at her professionally and the quality of her voice. Then I played and recorded a guitar part for Nat. Cameron Watson now has two DVD's with all of the tracks that were on his A-Dats. Speaking of A-Dats, I was contacted by a lady named Robyn from "Good Fellas Records" to rent my A-Dats for a transfer on a project that they had been working on. I met with an engineer named Keys at his studio and we were able to work things out. Currently I am mixing the On Air recording project with hopes of having copies for their 25th reunion/anniversary. Life at "The Hanger" is moving right along and I am feeling more comfortable with each passing day. As June morphs into July, the heat is on and today is the first 100 degree day we will have had this year. Life is good and I hope you have a safe and sane July 4th weekend. 6/30/05 Juan Arias now has his mixes in hand and in studying them for possible changes before mastering. Cameron Watson brought me some A-dats that he wishes to have transferred to data disk so he can get on with the business of running his record label. Steven Hanley recorded more of his rap songs and is thinking about having them re-produced in numbers. On Air is a fine eleven piece rock band that features five horns. The band is headed up by Bob Lang, former radio personality here in Sac-town. One of the two trumpet players in the band named Greg, has a web site devoted to famous trumpet players. He has just about every known trumpet player on the planet on his site. There are both audio and video clips to see and hear. It's called trumpetstuff.com. Check it out. I took the band to another studio two weeks ago for a two day recording session. The studio we went to is owned and operated by Dana Gumbiner. Dana is a fine engineer and lead singer for the band Deathray. You can go to his website to hear and see audio and video clips by the band. Go to deathraymusic.com, it's worth the trip. Stu Goldberg brought me some old tapes that were recorded back in 1973 of his old friend Bill Ackridge. Bill was a gifted songwriter as well as a competent singer and guitar player. His songs were both funny and entertaining. Bill is now diseased and Stu wants to preserve Bill's music on CD. Sister Swing is on the last leg of recording vocals for their latest CD titled Riff Raff and Ruffles. They have been coming in twice a week for the last two months. We will finish the last three songs and begin mixing. I am feeling more comfortable with my new Pro Tools set up. The program has a steep learning curve, but I am determined to counter the old saying, " You can't teach an old dog new tricks"! 6/22/05 Today is my birthday and I (Bruce Bolin), am looking forward
to just freaking freely. I will only do what ever tickles my fancy. That's nice
considering that in this world filled with so much turmoil and misunderstanding that I can
be able to take a day to dig my own bad self. God bless America and God bless us
all, each and every one. 6/1/05
Juan Arias continues to come to the studio two to four times a week as we close in on the finishing of his project. It has been a long haul and Juan told me he has learned a lot in the process. We hope to finish the mixes this week or next. Then I will master the music and we'll have a big party to celebrate. Janeen McKay flew in from Utah to have her daughter Brady Mckay, sing a duet with Eddie (a singer from Washington state). They recorded some Christmas songs. Then there was the 32 Annual Jazz Jubilee that I contracted to provide sound systems for eight of the largest venues. It was the most exhausting five days that I can remember in a long time. But in the end we, (Glenn Dennler of Audio North and I ) came through with a fine crew that worked many fourteen hour days. I personally worked the largest venue at Cal Expo called "The Cove" and heard many fine musicians that have not lost their edge despite many being senior citizens. So now it's behind us and I am ready to celebrate by attending The Heritage Festival this weekend on the River Walk in West Sacramento. In my humble opinion it is the best most affordable music venue Sacramento has to offer. At ten dollars per day, this two day event offers much to take in. I purchased my tickets for $10 yesterday at Tower Records and I didn't have to pay a service charge. Bob Pearce of the Beer Dawgs and Bob's other group "Slim Bawb" came in to record some Banjo and Dobro on a song written by Lloyd Banks. Bob and I always have a good time in the studio since he and I can really communicate well in the studio. Ken Mizak and I were able to finish the music for a scene from his play "Julia" that is scheduled to be performed on Broadway in New York City. Ken is a skilled writer and arranger in an art form that has been for the most part lost in this day and age. Nice work Ken and good luck. 5/31/05 April 2005 Hello again. So things are beginning to pick up steam at the new location. I have been working with some of my regular clients as well as several new ones. Juan Arias and I have been mixing his album and we now have three in the can. I am working with Lloyd Banks again as well as Ken Mizak and Henry Robinson. The music for each one of these artists is very different. All agree that the new setting is comfortable and the view is relaxing. I really need to update my site to include pictures of the new place. But I haven't had a chance to do so. Please bear with me. 4/23/05 The eagle has landed. Well sort of landed. I have finally finished the new control room and am open for business. I have been contacting clients to get them into the studio to finish up projects that were put on hold during construction. I have the new equipment and am feverishly reading and studying Pro Tools to get into the groove with that system. The Sister Swing project is coming along nicely and we hope to begin to record the vocals in the next couple of weeks. The control room is small but very comfortable. I am enjoying the activity at "The Hanger", last week The Deftones were in recording drum and bass tracks for a week. They came complete with roadies to lug their considerable equipment. More later. 412/05
March 2005 Spring Update. Well here it is almost the end of March and I am just getting around to
making another entry in this journal. The new iso booth is now built and I will
begin to wire it up for sound this week. Just in time as many of my clients are itching to
get back into the studio and continue their projects. The new Sister Swing
project entitled "Riff Raff and Ruffles" is coming along quite
nicely. We will be recording again today and tomorrow to try and finish up the
rhythm and horn tracking. Then we will move from the main studio to my control room to
track the vocals in the new iso booth. I am ready to lay down my hammer and get back to
recording. I will be using Pro Tools as my main editing
system from now on. Check back soon as I hope to post some new pictures of my new
digs. Then I will need to up date my web site as it has changed considerably.
3/21/05
Update hello again. Tonight will mark the first session that I will have in the new location. Sister Swing is beginning their fifth CD project and it will be a live in the studio recording. I will be using one of my old students as my 1st engineer. AJ Wielhelm will be twisting the knobs for me until I get a grip on the equipment and patch bay in the control room of "The Hanger". This will prove to be a nice reunion for both AJ and me. I continue to work daily in the new room and have almost finished the sound proof booth that I have been working on. I will be posting some pictures as soon as I get the necessary cable to download them. 2/28/05 New Studio follow up. Hello again, this is week number two. The new room is coming along quite nicely. I have begun to build the sound proof booth that will adorn the room. Paul Fury and his son JoJo have been a great help to me during the building process. The electrical is being run and all is moving according to schedule. I have been meeting other producers and engineers that work at "The Hanger" recording studio. I am planning to do my first recording at the end of this month. It will be Sister Swing recording a live, in the studio album. Their fifth CD project. Check back for up-dates. Have a Happy Valentines Day. 2/14/05 Bruce Bolin that's me, I am in the news for a change. The news is that I moved out of the old location just one week ago and now I am embroiled in working on the new location. I am working every day with hammers, saws and a lot of birch plywood getting the new room ready. I hope to have everything ready by the end of this month. It was very traumatic for me to tear down the old studio after having been there for the better part of eight years. But time and situations change and I am rolling with the punches. I will continue to up date my progress and will have to re-do my WebPages but that will have to wait until I am ready to open up shop again. Wish me luck friends and come back soon for up dates. Bruce 2/6/05 January 2005 Paul Fury returned again yesterday and we revamped his song "Pretty Lady". Bernie Kerns continues to work on his music and we have recorded several more of his tunes. Again we are trying to get as much as many songs recorded as we can before I have to move at the end of this month. 1/19/05 Dennis and Skip Morairty make up the backbone of the Morairty Brothers band. They both play guitar with Skip doubling on flute. They came in last Saturday along with Ed Scola on drums. Jerry Hekhuis on keyboards and Dan Virdier on bass. Collectively they really rocked the studio with some nice fusion jazz music. We recorded for about six hours yielding five songs. Dennis was looking to get nice rhythm tracks then come back in a month or so to work on overdubs and solos. Dennis and Skip purchased the Pre 45 Recording Package that we offer. I thoroughly enjoyed the session and it was great fun for me to be in the center of the storm so to speak. 1/17/05 Bernie Kerns has booked two days to work on his original songs. Bernie wants to get them presentable and begin to circulate them to family and friends. We got together yesterday and worked through "Staring' at the phone". It's a medium tempoed shuffle that just skips along pleasantly. Bernie was pleased with both the outcome and the process. We will continue today and see how far we can get. I was visited by two of my cousins Ron Borge and Donna Webb, whom I seldom see except for family reunions. My cousin Ron brought with him some records that were recorded by my uncles "The Borge Brothers", when they used to play together back in the 40's and 50's. I will turn them over to Rob Farrell of "Record Rescue" to bring them back to life and convert them to CD's. 1/14/05 Juan Areas and company came in for another session as we try to clean up the final stages of recording before moving. 1/13/05 Larry Litz has booked two days with two different drummers in an effort to get some more recording done before I have to begin tearing down the studio and move to "The Hanger". Eric Maxwell drummed for most of the day on Wednesday then Howie came in and set up his set for Thursday's session. The session was a blast and rocked my socks off.1/13/05 Joey Castro is entering the contest hosted by radio station 102.5 and needed a quick recording of his rap song "To many moves". He told me that he had heard that I was the man around town when it came to recording and editing music for the radio. 1/12/05 Roe Theriot came in Tuesday to work on four of his songs. We recorded vocals and arranged a new rockin' song of his. Ron will send his songs out to record companies in search of the elusive recording contract. Ron will return next week to continue. 1/11/05 Desmond Feher and Nathan Croswhite have finished the Audio Engineering course here at the studio. We hope to record the bands each of them has selected this Thursday and then they will have completed the course. They have been good students and I have enjoyed teaching them and sharing some of my knowledge of "Life in the studio as I know it". 1/3/05 Dave Earthly and I put the finishing touches on yet another song Sunday January 2, 2005. That brings the count up to four songs. Things are moving faster now since we have been getting used to each other and have been stream lining our system in the studio. Dave said now he needs to get to work on the next four songs and plans to be ready to continue in April. 1/3/05 Juan Areas has been coming to the studio two to three times a week trying to finish up the recording of his project before I have to tear down the studio to move to my new location. Speaking of that new location, I will be moving into "The Hanger" located at 15th and C Streets. I am trying to tie up all of my loose ends before the move at the end of this month. There is much to do and I look forward to the new digs. 1/2/05 December 2004 Paul Fury and I continue to get together once a week to work on two of Paul's original songs. The songs are coming along and Paul is happy with the results. 12/25/04 Al Escobedo wanted to give his children a very personal gift for Christmas. So he recorded about twenty songs and a Christmas verse for them. Al did the recording with no instrumental accompaniment. It seems that Al used to sing these songs to his kids when they were young. Now they are grown with children of their own and he is passing the baton on to them so they can sing to their children. Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night. 12/25/04 Bill Bowers and Beverly Rivers have both received their CD's and are eagerly dispensing them to family friends and fans alike. Ron Theriot is back working on two more of his songs. Ken Mizak and I have been working on exchanging some new mixes in place of older mixes on Ken's album "Julia". Life is good as we kick into the Holiday Season. Since I have been working on two Christmas projects, I'm really in the spirit of the season. May you have a very Merry Christmas and a safe and prosperous New Year. 12/17/04 Ken Mizak returned with a fine singer named Ray. We re-recorded the vocals on three of Ken's songs. It was nice to hear a strong classical male voice knocking down the vocal lines. 12/7/04 The Bill Bowers Trio AKA Nostalgia graced the studio on Monday afternoon. The players were Parmys on Piano, Bob on a Cocktail drum kit (kick, snare & hi hat) and Bill played trumpet and trombone. Charlie played clarinet on one song written by Parmys called "Sacramento". they booked three hours and played live in the studio for the better part of two hours. We then listened to the takes and called it a day. Their music was old jazz standards. it was up lifting and made me feel good both when I was recording it and when I mixed it. 12/6/04 Juan Arias and party show up at three in the afternoon every Sunday to continue recording their project. We are getting closer to finish line with the vocals. Patience, practice and tenacity yield perfection. 12/6/04 Dave Earthly continues on his quest to put his music into a professional package. When ever Dave comes to the studio, we always have a good time probing the boundaries of creativity. Yesterday was no exception. In less than four hours Dave and I put the sheen on Dave's song "Head Boppin' Party". This song doesn't sound like anything on the market. But it's very rhythmic and very funky. Dave is eager to continue our collaboration in the pursuit musical exploration. 12/6/04 Ann Pudoff called to tell me that she needed a hurry up voice over to go over her power point presentation. I was able to squeeze her in that day. First worked on the script, then I had Desmond Feher (one of my audio engineering students) record me doing the voice over. After some editing to make sure that the timing was correct Ann was on her way to her meeting happy and content. It's nice when things work out right. 12/2/04 November 2004 Paul Fury returned to Pudding Stone again to continue his project. Paul sings country songs and writes his own music as well. We recorded some cover songs then turned our attention to his original song titled "It's been a long time". We reprogrammed the bass and drums and re-recorded guitar and Paul's vocals. Happy Thanksgiving Everybody! 11/25/04 Pudding Stone Recording Studio is for sale. After much soul searching, I have decided it is time to sell Pudding Stone Recording Studio. My needs have changed and it is time for me to change with those needs. I have had a good run with the studio both at it's present location and the former location. A total of fourteen and a half years. I have enjoyed the talent and have made many friends during my tenure. If you know of any one interested in the studio please have them call 916 921-1515. 11/22/04 Steve Jobson returned to Pudding Stone record a Christmas CD. Steve has a wonderful voice that is rich in tone quality and he also has a nice smooth vibrato. While recording Steve I fell deeper into the spirit of Christmas and it isn't even Thanksgiving. But on the heels of Beverly Rivers Christmas CD the mood is thick here at Pudding Stone. I like the feeling and don't mind at all. Steve did well. 11/18/04 Pete Droubay has completed his six CD project and is preparing to begin on another six to ten CD project. Pete typically comes to the studio with an outline of what he will record on his Apple laptop. He goes into the booth and records for an hour. Then I will edit the recording and make him a rough CD to listen to. After listening Pete gets back together with me to touch up any spots that are in question. I then add bumper music at the head and end of each segment and he gets the CD's replicated. Pete's on the move. 11/17/04 Frank Lizarraga who heads up the modern Latino group "Luvtaxi" has finally completed the mixes of all ten songs. We were able to mix that last two songs this afternoon while the rain came down all over Sacramento. I will continue to counsel with Frank on matters including graphic design and layout of his project. This project has so much groove that you can't help but tap your foot and bob your head. It's been fun working with Frank. Especially since were both "Old School Vets". 11/11/04 Beverly Rivers brought in the children that are to sing on Bev's Christmas Album. They range in age from seven to eleven years old. We were able to record vocal parts on five songs. Bev and her gang will return the next couple of Tuesdays to continue recording. 11/10/04 Juan Arias showed up at the studio last Sunday with seven lady singers from his church. We began recording the female choir parts for two songs. we worked for four hours with good results. This will be the mode of operation for the next month or until we finish, which ever comes first. 11/8/04 Chad Kemerzell has joined the Pudding Stone Audio Engineering Society. Chad signed on last month and sat in on a session in his first week to begin his training. This is a comprehensive twenty week Audio Engineering course and it touches on many facets of both the recording studio and engineering in live situations. Chad is joining Nathan Croswight and Desmond Feher, who are in the middle of the course and Sita Saunders who is just completing the twenty week course. 11/4/04 Polly Pearsol returned yesterday to pick up her CD copies. She had me edit her songs for the internet and make Mp3's for her fans to download. I have been teaching Desmond Fehrer audio engineering for the last six months. He is a fine student that never misses an opportunity to be in the studio or go out on a live gig. Desmond has taught me a lot about my Mac computer and some new software. We have a nice symbiosis going on. 11/3/04 Polly Pearsol came in last Friday to complete the project we started a month earlier. She played two pieces on the keyboard and I prepared all of the songs for both copyright and CD duplication. Polly's last project was recorded six years ago, when I went to her home and recorded her live to Dat. 11/1/04 October 2004 Henry Robinson is a singing guitar player that told me he put down the guitar for thirty years. His son Steve became interested in playing music and rekindled the fire in his father. On Saturday Henry, Steve bass) and Bob (drums) came to the studio to begin working on a demo project. We recorded for four hours, ate some pizza then we called it a day. Henry will return soon to do some over dubs and add a harp to one of the songs. 10/25/04 Richard Krivcher,Juan Areas and Pete Droubay continue to come to the studio to work on their projects. I expect to finish Richards project this week. Pete has just finished recording a six CD series and will begin another four CD series soon. Juan has taken a rough mix of his ten songs to work on with his choir before bringing them to the studio to record the vocals. 10/21/04 Fernando Vidales is a songwriter that needed a rush studio session to record his song for a contest. Fernando enlisted the help of "Trio Capitol" who backed him up with three guitars and harmony background vocals. On Friday night we got together and captured Fernando's song in just two takes. I love happy endings. :) 10/17/04 Craig Williams and Larry Litz came bounding into the studio to record several songs. After setting up and getting levels, we began recording in earnest. Four hours later we emerged with some good rhythm tracks. Now we will schedule some more time to do over dubs and finish up the vocals. Looking for that strong finish. 10/14/04 The Sacramento Dixieland Jazz Jubilee has accepted my bid for sound re-enforcement at eight of the largest venues for 2005. I am very pleased to be able to assemble a crew that are professional and truly understand how to mix a band. I plan on helping to make a difference in the way the music will be heard and making it more enjoyable for the people in attendance. 10/13/04 Ken Mizak returned to the hallowed halls of Pudding Stone once again. This time Ken came armed with an old 1/2 inch reel of analog tape from which he needed a rush mix. It seems that one of the actresses from Ken's play "Julia" will be performing in a play in Nevada City next weekend and will be singing Ken's song "Walls". I have had lots of experience with old masters and was able to get an acceptable mix for Ken. While in the studio Ken, a fine pianist, recorded yet another song and will come back today to add some other instruments from my Roland Fantom synthesizer. 10/12/04 Shawn Helwig is an aspiring country singer who competes in singing contests all over the northern California. Recently after having performed at a competition, Shawn was approached by a representative of Cobblestone Records. After a short discussion it was decided that Shawn would give them a recent demo to hear by this weekend. Shawn came to the studio yesterday and we recorded five hot country songs. More later. 10/8/04 Glenn Dennler owns a sound company called Audio North. I first met Glenn at the Eureka Jazz Festival two years ago. He and I met again yesterday to review eight of the larger sites from the next Dixieland Jazz Festival here in Sacramento. The festival happens each year on the Memorial Day weekend. We needed to determine what size systems will be needed at each site. I will now put together a bid and submit it to the Sacramento Jazz Society in hopes of getting the contract for May of 2005. 10/7/04 Nowon/Stiles was a duo that I recorded an album with back in the early 90's. Unfortunately soon after the CD was finished the group parted ways. I had not heard from Harry Stiles in nearly 10 years when I received an email from him. Harry wanted to know if I could transfer some cassette tapes he had given me back then to CD for him. His work is called "The Nowon/Stiles Anthology". I was surprised to see just how extensive the body of music was. Each cassette has between 18 and 19 songs. All were written and recorded within a three year period. These guys were a songwriting machine. Harry mentioned that they worked everyday and most nights on the music. The productions is very good also. I am working on this production now and am about half way through it. 10/6/04 Juan Areas continues to come to the studio twice a week. We have been programming bass lines and recording piano parts with Emily Perez on the 100 year old acoustic piano here at the studio. When the music is completed, Juan will bring in the choir to record the vocals. 10/5/04 Pete Droubay has returned to
the studio to finish his 6CD project . Yesterday we recorded CD #4 in
the series. Pete recorded for one hour straight in one take. The subject of his CD's is
managing employees with regards to sales. 10/4/04
Gerard and the Poets is the working title that I have given to a project that I have been recording. Richard Krivcher in producing this project which features a Shakuhatchi player by the name of Gerard Sun. Gerard plays his Japanese style instrument while various poets recite their Japanese styled poetry. The combination of the spoken word backed by this ancient Japanese instrument produces an very relaxing event. There is an entire community that gathers to experience these events. 9/27/04 Desmond Feher (one of my audio engineering students) joined me at a Sister Swing gig at Del Webbs Lincoln Village on Saturday evening. The event was the annual open house and was like a street party. Featuring more than forty food and wine vender giving out free samples of their goods. There was plenty to eat and drink. Desmond and I also recorded the music from the band live in addition to providing and manning the sound system. 9/26/04 All Hallows Catholic church is the church that I attend every Sunday. Yesterday September 19th was one of a series of concerts hosted by the church. The program featured "The Voices of Faith" a nine member gospel vocal group conducted by Precious Craft. Also on the program was an eight member string section and four additional classical singers. Bass, Tenor, Alto and Soprano. I mixed the entire program and took the opportunity to record the concert. After the concert everyone adjourned to the church hall for a BBQ chicken dinner which was included in the ticket price. A good time was had by all and the Voices of Faith never sounded better. This marks the third time they have performed at our church. 9/20/04 Norman Doucet is a singer/songwriter that is on a mission. His mission is to complete a demo of four of his songs. Norm and I have been playing the scheduling game for a month or so, but yesterday we were able to hook up and begin the project. Norm wants me to arrange and program drums and bass and then to play lead guitar on his songs. We began by programming a drum template on two of the songs. Then I recorded Norm singing and playing his guitar on a scratch track. I will fill in the other instruments and re-record Norms parts, mix and finish the songs. I told Norm that one of his songs reminded me of Seal. 9/14/04 Jimmy "Jet" Spalding is a guitar player who came in on Saturday to begin a new CD project. Jimmy and I have worked together on the Wave Pilot album which is still in the mixing stage. Jimmy recorded two songs for his first volley on this project. I will keep you up to date on his progress. 9/12/04 Ken Mizak has returned to the hallowed halls of Pudding Stone. Ken and I have been working on a scene from his play "Julia" that was eliminated during the Sacramento showing at the Capitol City Playhouse last November. The play has since moved east and has been performed in several eastern cities. The scene that we have been working on is the "Gunfight scene", where the hero gets killed. It's a classical piece with a lots of contrapuntal movement. The new Roland Fantom synthesizer is producing many premium instrumental sounds for this piece. Soon Ken's father in-law Bill will be adding trumpet and trombone to the piece. 9/9/04 The B Street Theater's entire cast from the play Bunnicula was in the studio during the recording of the music tracks. We needed to have them there to be sure that the breaks in the music for the dialog parts were timed correctly. We worked for some five hours recording. Bonnie Otto and I got together the following day and finished up the recordings. Bunnicula is scheduled to begin in two weeks. 9/7/04 Nathaniel Brown has completed his CD project. Nat enlisted the help and talent of Beverly Rivers to record some three part harmony back ground vocals on the last song. We then mixed and now Nat is ready to get his CD's manufactured. 9/3/04 Jerry Cook is a Soul and R & B singer. Let it be known that Jerry has soul and the pipes to pull off songs in a myriad of styles. Jerry has been getting requests for CD's and finally had to bite the bullet and get some produced for his fans and family. I am working with Jerry to fulfill his needs. Jerry will have his short run CD order in just one week. 9/2/04 Frank Alvarado entered an Elvis contest in Loflin Nevada and needed to put together some songs for a CD to sell when he performs. We recorded 20 Elvis songs and Frank is ready to get out there to make his case and to "Run with the big dogs". 9/1/04 Kristy Calloway will be getting married on September 9th in Hawaii. Kristy wanted to record several songs for the marriage service including one of her fathers favorites. Kristy was able to complete all three songs to her satisfaction in just two hours. Kristy sang her songs very well also. 9/1/04 August 2004 Sister Swing performed for a sell out crowd at the Crossroads Community Church in Yuba City yesterday. We ran into major traffic and arrived late with only a half hour to set up and begin playing. I had my full PA rig in the trailer. I was prepared to begin setting up when I was introduced to the music director named Randy. I asked if there were a house system. Randy said there was and I was relieved. We set up using the house system and some of my mics. The show went off well, the audience was very pleased with the performance and I was happy to mix on the house Allen & Heath 40 Channel Console. We made many friends and this might turn into an annual event. Tonight the Sister's will be performing at the Sonora Winery located near the town of Plymouth in the foothills. 8/28/04 George Hickman is a singer that drives a truck by day. His wife Suzie gave him a recording session for his birthday. George and Suzie were eager when they arrived at the studio yesterday. I began by ripping the background music from George's CD's. Then I recorded George singing the songs. Then I mixed and balanced the vocals with the music. The whole session took three hours and now George has a fine demo to give or sell to friends and family. Suzie inquired about some vocal lessons from Beverly Rivers and the two left in a happy mood with the days accomplishments. 8/27/04 Sacramento Taiko Dan is a drum ensemble that was celebrating their 15th anniversary with a concert at the Sacramento Community Center on August 21st. These drums are played in a Japanese style with many rhythms. This group has more than 40 performers in their act. They played all sorts of drums some of which were more than 6 feet in diameter. I was hired by my friend Robert Ansell of Royce Video Productions, to mix the audio that was going to the video cameras, during the performance. I met Robert at 2pm in the afternoon to set up. I set up some mics near the stage, then we tapped into the house lines. The feeds that I gave to the cameras was a mix of my mics and the house mix. The show ran from 7 to 10:30pm. At the end I felt as though I had been thoroughly drummed. Anyone for a "Wipe Out solo?" 8/21/04 The B Street Theater has once again called upon Pudding Stone to provide music for their upcoming play "Bunnicula". Bonnie Otto and I will rough out a practice draft for the actors to work with during rehearsals. Later we will provide the final music arrangements for them to use in the play which begins in two weeks. Desmond Feher will be starting the Recording Connection course that I teach. Along with fellow student Nathan Croswhite, Desmond will be learning the finer points of being a sound engineer in the twenty week course. Freaks & Geeks exploded into the studio last night. Consisting of Stephen on drums, Stu on guitar and vocals, Josh on bass and Joe on guitar, the group rather quickly plowed through the song and recorded a good rhythm track. We over dubbed the vocals and I did a mix. The band members each got a CD and are looking forward to next years Stairway program. 8/27/04 Hiatus is another Stairway to Stardom Band. The band consisted of Greg (from Ultra Corpse) on Bass, Cameron on Drums, Paris on Guitar and Erika on Vocals. We got together last night and recorded their song. The band did well and we knocked out the music in record time. It's always nice to get with people that are experiencing the studio for the very first time. There is much to know and so much to learn, even for a veteran like me. I learn something new everyday. Did I mention that I love my work? 8/25/04 Steve Jobson has been singing for many years. Steve decided that he needed to record a demo and called me. We booked a four hour block and got together this last Monday. We recorded eight songs and now I need to mix them and deliver them to Steve. Did I mention that we had a great time in the studio? 8/23/04 Ultra Corpse was the first Stairway Band to come through Pudding Stone. The band consisted of Andy and Brian on Guitars, Greg on Bass and Zachary on Drums. The guys did very well and we got a nice version of their song "Dead By Dawn" recorded and mixed. They liked the deep sinister effect that I put on the back ground vocals. Unfortunately one of the band members couldn't make the session last night so he will be coming in after the fact to lay his guitar part. 8/21/04 Skips Music "Stairway to Stardom". Each year I record several band from the Skips Stairway Program. I have been involved with this program for over fifteen years. Tonight I will be recording the first of three bands that I have scheduled. It is a good opportunity for my Audio Engineering Students to get some hands on experience and to see how much they retained about the recording process. I also like the eagerness of the young musicians that come into the studio. For many of them this will be their first studio experience and they love it. 8/20/04 Ollie Milligan and Juan Arias have been booking studio time to work on their individual projects. Ollie has tried out two completely different groups of background singers. When she gets the sound she wants we will be able to move forward and begin mixing. Juan came in with Father Hernando Gomez, who is a fine gut string guitar player. We spent four hours recording his guitar parts. Next in line will be the piano player. Juan Arias is associated with a local catholic church, The Immaculate Conception here in Sacramento. Juan approached me several months ago about doing a CD project. He has chosen the Pro 60 Recording Package that we offer. We began by having Juan sing and play some scratch tracks to a dummy drum track (to keep things in time) that will be used as song templates for the other musicians that will be coming to the studio in the next couple of weeks. They will add their parts and I will add bass and guitar parts before the singers come in to record. Juan is very excited to be starting his personal dream and I love being a part of that dream. 8/16/04 I've been sick. It's true friends, I have been out of the studio for an entire week. Flat on my back at home as the doctor requested. But I'm better now and ready to resume both my studio business and this log. 8/15/04 Frank Lizarraga continues to come to the studio each week to mix. Slow and steady we are beginning to see the light at the end if the tunnel. 8/7/04 Liz Hackett is the sister of one of my former Recording Connection students James Hackett. Liz had written a song that she needs help working out and arraigning. With her brother James by her side we have begun laying the groundwork on her song "Why tell me why". As soon as we get a little further into the song Liz will begin recording her lead vocals. More later 8/3/04 July 2004 Brandon Gipson is a songwriter. His music is R&B and slightly Hip Hop. I will be working with my old friend Jimmy Malone on this one. Brandon recorded a scratch vocal to a straight drum track. Now Jimmy and I will put the music to the vocal and then I will get back with Brandon to continue building his song titled "Love is a loosing game". 7/31/04 (This is some of my favorite work to do in the studio.) Ollie Milligan along with six male singers and one female singer, entered the hallowed halls of Pudding Stone. Ollie is beginning her new gospel CD project and this was the second leg. The first leg was Ollie giving me a data disk containing two songs that had been sequenced at another studio. I imported the music into my software earlier and last night we began recording the choir. The singers warmed up and we began to lay tracks. Four and a half hours later we were in the home stretch. I always welcome the challenge to work with new people. You could say that "I love being in the mix". 7/29/04 Danielle Stephenson has been singing and performing for many years. In fact Danielle and I played on many of the same musical circuits in the 70's and 80's. Well now Danielle wants to get back into the music scene and needs a demo CD. Of course she called the Demo King, me! We put together a nice demo that shows off her vocal talents. She was very happy with the product and is off in pursuit of her musical career once again. I just love those happy endings. 7/28/04 Frank Mayer is an young radio announcer that was once in the radio field. Frank wants to get back into the fray and contracted me to put together a new and up to date demo CD that he can shop to local radio stations. We were able to get it all together on about two hours. Now Frank will be making the rounds with 11 new demos showcasing his talents. 7/27/04 Luvtaxi AKA Frank Lizarraga and his son and writing and arranging partner Adam Lizarraga have begun mixing the Luvtaxi CD project. We got together on Friday evening but we ran out of steam and will continue on Monday evening. More later. 7/25/04 Larry Litz will be hooking up with Eric Everett, a drummer to begin the process of recording Larry's music. Both musicians seem excited at the prospect of working together on this project. I'll keep you informed as to their progress. 7/22/04 Stu Goldberg is a truly unique person. At 71 years young, Stu's boundless energy and endless stories can keep anyone entertained for hours. Stu and I will meet next week to begin working on a guitar instruction book that deals with playing guitar rhythms with the right hand. Stu has had a hearing problem for many years, he wears an aid. Together we plan on completing his book so he can make it available to music stores for musicians. I have never seen a book that is as right hand oriented. I look forward to working with Stu and completing this project. 7/22/04 John Millsap contacted me because he needed to have me edit together 11 pieces of music from a VHS, CD's and 33 rpm records. John's mother in-law passed away and he was preparing a presentation for her funeral service. I was able to satisfy John's need in short order and in a timely fashion. Job done! Next? 7/22/04 Amigos is a tribute to Carlos Santana. Originally the band was called Soul Purpose. They played R & B and Soul. They recently made the Santana transition and things have been hopping for them. Consisting of drums, congas, timbales, guitar, bass, keyboards and a lead vocalist, the band is strong in both rhythm and vocals. A good dance combination. We got together to record a demo and the studio was a blaze with music. It was a good session lasting five hours. Early next week we will clean up some parts and mix. Then I will edit a fine demo from the mixes. The band will use the demo to get their combined foot in the door with fairs, agents and corporations. 7/15/04 Out of Kelter is a Celtic group consisting of seven members. Rick Sterner is the percussionist and a former student of mine. Rick asked me to run sound and record the band live at their Fairytale Town concert. Nathan Crosswhite and I arrived at 4PM for the 6PM concert and got set up. We ran a sound check and were able to relax for 15 minutes. Then the gates were opened and the people began streaming in. It was a lovely evening for the three hour concert. The band had a blast, the people were happy and relaxed and the recording was clean and clear. Next I will get with Rick to transfer the A-dat recordings to his Pro-Tools rig for editing and mixing. The band members played so many eclectic acoustic instruments that the air was filled with pleasant sounds all evening. 7/14/04 Nat Brown and I got together for another session and were able to record his Alto Saxophone solos on his music. We then mixed and now Nat is reviewing the mixes before replication. Nat came to the studio well prepared. He knew his music and moved quickly through the songs. Moving to quickly often leads to compromises that an artist can later regret. Remember this when moving to fast. There is never enough money to do it right the first time, But there is always enough money to do it over! Don't be in to much of a hurry. Dave Earthly came in to the studio on Sunday to finish his song titled "Don't Stop". Dave's song went through a real transformation yesterday. We worked on the arrangement and the lyrics and with some slick studio production tricks were able to wind up with a modern sounding dance tune. Dave will now begin to shop his music and also apply what he learned on this song to the next song on his list. 7/12/04 I have a guitar playing singer/songwriter friend named Larry Lizt. I have mentioned him a number of times in this log. Larry has been looking for a drummer to record his music with and he just can't seem to find one that works out. Either they are to undependable or they don't play the style that Larry wants. Larry is a rocker ala Van Halen. If you know of a good rock drummer that would like to record in the studio with Larry and get paid also, call me. 921-1515. We'd love to plug you in. Brady McKay has returned to the Pudding Stone to record some vocals for a children's music project that her mother, Jeneen Brady had written. Brady has the right vibe and sound for many singing styles, but I was mostly impressed by her lively sound in this setting. These songs were written for infants and will be sung to the child by their mothers. There is never a dull moment in the studio, each day brings brand new challenges for me. Nat Brown is currently recording tracks for his sixth CD project. No stranger to the studio, Nat has a smooth sounding voice with a shimmering vibrato. Next he will play alto sax on the songs after the vocals have been recorded. Nat chooses his music carefully and I could really get into his R&B oriented songs. Nat is blind, but when it comes to singing and playing he shows no signs of a handicap. Boss Up Entertainment is a rap
group who has their eye on the prize. The core of the group is Corell and
Michael. They write the music that is to be rapped over. They
enlisted the talent of Soup a hot young rapper to lay his lines over
their strong beats. Michael stepped into the booth and up to the plate to record a verse
and a chorus to the song. They plan on shop their songs in LA later this month.
Here it is the last day of June. I just found out that a new student named Nathan Crosswhite, will be joining us for the Recording Connection Audio Engineering Program that is taught here at Pudding Stone. Nathan is a fine musician/songwriter and singer. Here performs locally in many places. Check back often for the further adventures of "Nathan Crosswhite, Student Audio Engineer". John Wilkerson returned to the studio yesterday and we re-recorded his vocal track on "Iron Sharpens Iron". We worked on John's phrasing. Once that was completed we needed to re-track Beverly River's background vocal track to match John's new phrasing. I tweaked the mix and made some CD copies for John. This is a powerful song with a powerful message. It also has a good arrangement and clean instrumental and vocal parts. I feel John has an excellent chance to break out with this song. Now on to the next song. Ron Theriot has picked up the mastered versions of his two songs. Ron is now ready to shop both the songs and himself as an artist. Michael La Rue has completed the Recording Connection Audio Engineering Program. Michael came to the studio and as his final recording, he recorded his band "Element Unknown". Michael has taken a job at Guitar Center in Modesto where he lives. James Hackett has only to take his final written exam and final recording project and he too will have completed the program. Good luck to both of these students as they graduate into the world of music recording. Beverly Rivers has been busy singing back ground vocals for some other recording artists and now she has embarked on her own second CD project. The first song is called "House Praise". I played the song yesterday on the Mary Jane Popp radio show. Mary Jane was impressed with the strong vocals and heavy dance groove. Beverly played all of the parts on her synth one part at a time and it really grooves. More on Beverly later. Luvtaxi has returned to Pudding Stone several times in the last couple of months to continue working on their CD project. Frank Lizarraga reminds me of the story of the "Hare and the Tortoise". Frank keeps plodding forward on this project and it is really beginning to take shape. We have now recorded all of the parts and need only to mix and master to finish. This project has been three years in the making. Frank has had to deal with some member changes and paying a little as he goes. Good work Frank your tenacity will pay off! Linda Rigel is a songwriter that first came to Pudding Stone to have me transfer some sound tracks that she recorded some ten years ago. She then showed me one of her original songs and I am now in the process of producing it for her. I was very impressed with her sound tracks in which she played all of the parts on her Protius synth. She confided that it took her several hundred hours to create the music as she had no way of syncing the music to the film. I have been in that place before and it becomes very time intensive. Ron Theriot has been writing and recording his music for many years. Ron came to me to help him produce two country ballads. I brought in Jimmy Malone on piano and Bob Pearce on pedal steel as well as Beverly Rivers on back ground vocals. The songs are almost finished and Ron wants to have me record some of his rap music next. This man is very eclectic to say the least. Morning After is a rock group that has members who are still in high school. That does not slow the group down in any way. They attacked the music with the fever that I often see in younger bands. They were thrilled to be hearing themselves clearly for the first time. They came into the studio after having played a concert at their high school that same day. Playing five original songs, the group now has a fine demo CD and a five song CD to sell to their fans. Rupert Duncan is the leader and lead singer for the band that bares his name. The Rupert Duncan Band recorded a demo tape in record time two weeks ago. Rupert sings classic country. We were able to record six songs in just over three hours. Our Budget Demo Package worked out well for the band. The demo will become an important part of the groups promo package. May 2004 Chayla Furlong is a high school senior that wanted to record an original song for her class project. She showed up at the studio with some friends to help her. With Karin in vocals and Ryan on acoustic guitar we began recording. I programmed some drums to have a solid timing reference, then Chayla played the acoustic piano while Karin sang a lead vocal track. Next Ryan recorded an acoustic guitar track. Chayla recorded a bridge vocal track and finally Ryan sang some back up vocal tracks. I mixed the music and Chayla was relieved to have her class project in hand. John Wilkerson is a singer songwriter who has been on a writing binge of late. John came to me wanting to record his 2nd CD project. We hit it off well in the studio and our first session was almost five hours long. In that time we arranged his song titled "Iron sharpens Iron". We created some secondary guitar lines that filled out the rhythm and wrote a solo bridge. Then we worked on smoothing out the lyrics. John's songs are catchy and this will be a fine project to be associated with. Did I mention that we had a lot of fun during the session? No? Well we did! Paul Fury came back to Pudding Stone again. Because of the success of the last recording session, Paul has returned to record more vocals. Paul said that he wants to take advantage of the quality of his voice. This is twice in as many weeks. Adam Castanon and Mike LaRue have completed the Recording Connection Audio Engineering course. Adam and Mike need only to do their final recording sessions and they will be ready to pursue their careers in the recording business. The other students are doing well also. Gilda Taffet is the wife of guitar player Doug Pauly. Gilda is a fine guitar player herself with several CD's to her credit. She is also a graphic artist and she works for a company that is doing a commercial for the NEC company. She came to the studio with voice over talent Allen to record a script that will be used in conjunction with a video. We recorded the script and now Gilda will go over it with her boss to see if it is useable as is. Then she'll be back to edit and complete the project. Alexis Taylan is just eight years old. Alexis and her parents came into the studio to record a Mothers Day CD for her Mother and Grandmother. This little girl had an incredible voice. She sang through five songs with out any overdubs. I was impressed with the purity of tone that she had. It is rare to hear such a clear voice. Hopefully her voice will retain that clarity of tone as she matures. Jessica Teddington has been trying to get back into the studio for the last six months. Her busy schedule has prevented her from doing so. But all of that changed this week and we got together and began laying vocal tracks on her original songs. Jessica informed me that she was accepted at Berkley school of music in Boston. We need to get together two CD's as her demo's for the music courses that she wants to take. I have to say that she was in fine vocal form. We play on getting together on Thursdays for the next couple of weeks to finish up. Paul Fury returned to Pudding Stone after about a year. Paul wanted to record another CD project and we got right to it. Paul had his music all pre-produced and needed only to record his vocals. We recorded for six hours and Paul felt that his vocal quality was right where it needed to be. Paul is taking some time to review the mixes and then we'll deal with the duplication. April 2004 Brennen Cull is a jazz singer that did a recording a couple of years ago at Pudding Stone. Brennen returned to record a demo to take with him to LA to seek his fortune. It has been two years since I have heard him sing. He sounded very good to me. Smooth and confident. His backup band was Markus Burger on the acoustic piano. Jerry Pineda on upright bass and Wendell Yoponce on the drums. I really like doing these kind of recordings because it's like playing live. The band works out a quick head arrangement and we go for it. The groove was deep and wide tonight and we all felt like what we captured was just what was needed. Nuff said! Tomorrow I'll mix the music and cut together a nice five minute demo for Brennen. 4/22/04 I love my job! Trio Capitol is a band of Mexican musicians that play Mexican standards. They all play acoustic guitar and each sings. When they are singing in three part harmony, they remind me of the "Sons of the Pioneers". Alex, Henry and Rafael are maintaining history in this lost art form. They are much in demand and perform weekly. In the studio we began by having them sing and play so I could figure the best placement of the microphones. My intent was to capture guitars and vocals at the same time with a good blend of both. I found the sweet spot for each player and began recording direct to hard disk. In one and one half hours we recorded twelve songs. I did some editing and gave them a CD to make sure that everything sounded right. I will need to get with the duplicator today as they need these CD's for next Sunday. Trio Capitol is in fine form. 4/19/04 Pete Droubay & Bob McComb came in together on two separate occasions to record hour long training versions CD's to introduce their videos entitled "Top Dogs, running with the big dogs" a training guide to better and more effective business practice's. These guys were hot in the recording booth's. After trying unsuccessfully to record from a script. They employed a method whereby Pete would lay the groundwork of a particular subject from a script and Bob would elaborate based upon his 30 years in the business of commercial real estate. It was the tag team approach and it really worked. I am working on the edits now and plan to finish this week as they have a dead line of May 1st. to kick off this project. 4/14/04 (It was completed and picked up on the 22 of April. Still leaving enough time for the May 1st deadline.) Peter Droubay is a motivational
speaker that I have worked with before. Pete is now involved with two new
business and needs to record a new CD to get interest in his new products. Sales is
Pete's forte. His concepts on just how to be an effective salesman are truly
inspirational. While listening to Pete I got all jazzed and began thinking about how
his concepts will work for me. We will be recording and editing for several
days. Next we will be selecting some bumper music for the heads and tails of each
section. Then it's off to the replication house for 1000 copies. WHAM BAM
it's the sales man 4/8/04
Brady McKay and Chuck Bond booked two days (the 30th and 31st) to complete the mixing of their album. We were able to do some touch up recording and get the entire album mixed in about ten hours. Now they are off to LA to get the project mastered. This is only the second time in my recording career that I have not used any reverb on a project. The music is so rich in fundamental tones that it can stand alone without any effects or EQ. It has presence that would be compromised by effects. We all agreed that we had a good time and the album was worth the effort. Richard Krivcher was the producer of a session unlike any I have recorded before. The session was poetry recited by four poets including Gary Gray, Paul O Williams, Jerry Kilbride and Ebba Story. While the poets were reciting their Japanese styled poetry, Gerard Yun played an ancient Japanese instrument called a Shakuhatchi. It was a flute like instrument made out of bamboo. The style of the poetry was completely new to me. But I found it to be both interesting and relaxing. We recorded live for five hours on a Sunday morning and into the afternoon. There is never a dull moment in the studio with new projects coming from all directions. Brady McKay and Chuck Bond booked the 17th & 18th to record their album titled, "Pieces of us." Jerry Krahn flew in from Nashville to play arch top acoustic guitar. Richard Simon from Los Angels flew in also with his upright bass. Brady sings and Chuck plays cornet. We were able to record 14 songs in two nine hour sessions over the course of the two days. The musicians played beautifully and Brady sang through some difficult arrangements. It was inspiring to work with these players as they worked through the arrangements and read the charts. There is no substitute for knowing your axe. The studio is where the "Tire hits the road", when it comes to playing. 3/19/04 Robert Chatman came to the studio to record a demo. He had a song that needed to be done quickly to meet a contest deadline. I called Butch Minor who drove from Nevada City (on very short notice) to play drums. We figured out an arrangement for Robert's R/B-Gospel song titled "A time and a season". I played bass while Butch played drums and Robert played piano and sang a scratch track. I recorded an acoustic guitar, then an electric guitar. Next Beverly Rivers recorded a synth B-3 track. All that was left to do was to re-record Roberts vocals and mix. Then he was off to the post office to send a CD copy of his song to Texas. It was fast and fun. Robert had a good time and was happy with the final product. 3/16/04 Butch Minor and I got together on Wednesday morning and recorded the drum tracks for Beth Duncan's demo. All went well with the recording and after having re-mixed the songs I was able to cut together a nice demo for Beth. Now she's in the field (so to speak) shopping herself for gig opportunities. She will be performing with her band at the Stock Market on March 28th at 5pm. It's a good idea to make a reservation, as the venue is popular and the seats go quickly. Zipporah returned to re-lay some rap tracks on two of her songs. She is looking to get things wrapped up and into the hands of some record producers. She told me, "I need a record deal because I have a son to raise and music to be heard". We recorded her new vocal tracks and had her mother Paula come in and sing on the chorus', I edited together her song "New kind groove, as well as mixed and edited another song of Zipporah's titled "Two individuals". Zipporah is now out shopping her CD. Beth Duncan came in to the studio to record some vocals in order to make up a new demo. We were able to knock out enough songs that I can edit her a nice five minute professional demo. Beth is a lot of fun to work with in the studio because she is a pro and we speak the same language. Butch Minor will be laying some drum tracks on her demo later this week. Michael Severin called me to request that I mix some of the music that he and his wife Sherry Bowen recorded about eight years ago. I had finished an albums worth of music (12 songs) but they had recorded another sixteen songs. Sherry died about eight months after having completed the album and Michael wanted to get the rest of the music on CD. I was happy to accommodate Michael and now the work is finished. I had not spoken with Michael since Sherry's funeral service in 1997. Our Break Free Artists Forum was a complete success. Lasting most of Saturday, the guests were treated to a variety of speakers that shared some valuable information with them. Each had an opportunity to get in to the booth and record a demo. They were graded and will get a personal evaluation soon. Artists came from as far away as Los Angeles Manteca and San Jose. The next forum is scheduled for April 17th. Each artist enjoyed the forum and left with a new found sense of "With a little help, Yes I can do it!" Vivian Lee has scheduled studio time to begin laying rhythm tracks for her third album. This is March 1st and we will begin tonight. It will be nice to record Vivian and her band once again. Beth Duncan has also made plans to do some more work with her recordings. It seems that Beth needs a good demo to get her foot into the door at some local clubs. I suggested that we re-record her vocal tracks as she is singing much better than when we recorded her live performance. Beth agreed. We will begin this week. Larry Litz has returned to Pudding Stone to begin working on a new group of songs. Larry is a screaming rock guitar player and singer that is no stranger to the studio. We went over some previously recorded tracks that Larry wishes to add some other instruments. He has been working with a new drummer ands will return in short order to begin recording again. February 2004 Sida Saunders is the newest student to sign on for the Recording Connection Audio Engineering class. She will enter the program in time to see Adam Castanon record and mix a band for his final project. One student moves on as another begins. Life goes on and the big wheel keeps on turning. Fat Tuesday led us into Ash Wednesday. Another Mardi Gras has come and gone. As always there was plenty of good Mardi Gras music and food. This is one of the best party's that occur in Sacramento. The crowds were enjoying them selves as usual. The propane heaters were a nice addition to get a quick warm-up when needed. But I saw many people dancing in shirt sleeves. Adam Castanon (my graduating Audio Engineering student) dropped by on Saturday to assist me for several hours. Other than tearing the seat out of my pants (which left me feeling a draft), things went smoothly this weekend. My wife brought me new pants and the show didn't miss a beat. I ran into a few old musician friends that I haven't seen in ten years. Life is good! :) Open house at Pudding Stone Recording. That's right Saturday February 28 will mark the first of a number of career oriented open house forums sponsored by Pudding Stone Recording and Break Free Artists com. Beginning at 10 am until 4pm. Featuring professional guest speakers, demonstrations, and a photographer plus some free recording time to help evaluate talented artists. There will also a Q & A period. This forum will focus on the importance of having an effective professional promo package. There will be also be a hosted lunch. This forum is open to the public for a very small charge. Make plans now to attend this forum and the subsequent forums that will follow. The next forum on April 17th, 2004 will be focusing on building a career in the music business by being prepared when your chance appears. For more information contact Beverly Rivers at 370-3461. The Sacramento Mardi Gras will be getting underway this weekend for three days and nights. (Feb. 20, 21 and 22). For the last three years I have been in charge of the sound at the largest venue known as the Freeway Gardens. This year my site will be the only venue and I am looking forward to large crowds. As always, I will be assisted by my Audio Engineering Students. They will help me with the change-over's as new bands are brought on stage every two hours. This Mardi Gras event is always a lot of fun and the music is hot and danceable. Come on down to Old Sacramento this weekend for the best in Cajon music and food. Noah Salazar returned for a second session and we began working on yet another song. Noah Salazar called me to book time to have me help him write and arrange his song. I began by having him sing the song while I found the key and chords to harmonize the melody. We then recorded a scratch track of vocal and guitar with a dummy drum track as our timing reference. Armed with a CD to practice with, Noah set off to get his vocals right and will return to the studio in a week to record the final version. I always like to do this kind of work. It's always rewarding. Michael Strasser came to the studio with the idea of having me mix his album project. He brought his complete computer loaded with Cakewalk's Sonar software.. Once we listened to his raw tracks I suggested that I show him how to use his software more effectively. The result will be better sounding tracks that are in time. We worked for several hours and when we stopped Michael exclaimed that he had learned a lot. Sometimes the time in the studio leads people in different directions than they had planned. My job is to assist in getting the music to be and sound as good as it can. Intel's Chris Lewis commissioned Pudding Stone to record another voice over. It is for Intel's on line explanation of the V-Tune. A software product that aids code writers to find and eliminate bugs. This version highlights the "Thread Checker", program. Once again I hooked up with Rob Farrell (the voice if Intel), and we were able to knock out this VO in record time. It is now on the Intel site and ready to be viewed and heard. The B St. Theater contracted me to compose music for the next Children's Theater of California play entitled "Still Life With Iris". There was a deadline of one week, so I had to move fast on this one. I called Bonnie Otto who is a renown piano player in the area and we got together on Friday morning at 9am. We worked on writing original music for the first act. I then edited and prepared a CD to give to the director Jerry Montoya. Jerry and I met the next day on Saturday afternoon and he approved the music. Bonnie and I will reconvene on Monday morning to write and record act two. This kind of work is fun to do because cues are between 6 and 60 seconds long. We composed the music in the style of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. This worked out well as Bonnie has been studying Mozart. January 2004 "Happy New Year" :) March 20, 2003 ---- Modern times have brought us to war with Iraq. My hope is that this war will come to a speedy climax with a minimum of loss of life on both sides. All I can do is pray for all involved and continue to work with the music that comes to Pudding Stone. Men make war, while music sooths the savage beast in all of us. Peace on earth. Bruce Bolin
I was looking over some older Studio News columns, and found this old report to be of interest. Studio News August 2000 The big news is that rap artist Eminem (M & M) was in town on June 21st. While here, he came to Pudding Stone to do some digital editing for his show tonight at Arco Arena. He was a pro in the studio. Other rappers to come through lately include Zagg, Gangster Dre, Mr. Doctor, Lord Chaos and GAP. (Goin’ Platinum). Jeff Johnson is a new rapper on the scene that should get some major attention. Dr. Steven Kidd and the Davis Jazz Choir (20singers) returned for a second year to record a CD. This group has mega energy and did well in the studio. Soul Purpose returned to cut some tracks for a local radio show. Then two of the singers in the group Amos & Eddie, sang on a commercial spot for Fetch-O-Mastic, a new search engine on the Internet. Local piano player Bonnie Otto contributed piano tracks for this project and for Angela Delivered, who cut an audition CD. Sister Swing recorded some tracks for the Auburn Black & White Ball next month. We have recorded some kickin’ local rock bands including Time Maker, Head trip, Modus, and Larry Litz. Larry is a rock guitar player second to none. Move over Van Halen! Jamaican solo artist Shilo recorded some more tracks for his latest project. Bronc Wise cut tracks for his latest square dance calling record. Local Beer Dawg, Bob Pierce had us resurrect some old masters dating back to the 70’s. Bob is to be married to Laura by his lead guitar player and minister Steve Wall. Good luck to them. Lastly we recorded live for four nights at the world famous Torch Club. Produced by Bad Boy drummer Steve Boutte’, this CD project features Joe Lev on bass and blues guitarist’s Aaron King, Jimmy Pailer and Lou Fratis. Until the next time Bye’. |
Click to hear
I have finished mixing the CD project with Cory Norris. The finished
songs sound good and have Cory's signature sound of singing and playing his
12 string. During the post production process, I recorded several electric
guitar solo's and added some string parts to the music as I was directed to
do by Cory. Due to budget constraints, I pre mastered the music at the
studio and now it's off to duplication. Cory will be performing in the
local area and selling his new CD. On another note, Peter
Mundy returned on Saturday and we continued his seventeen song
production. We reviewed the music and decided that many of the songs are
ready to be mixed. I plan to get on it this week. I have
also been working with Jimmy Malone on a soundtrack for another
client that is to be delivered this week. Busy, busy, busy.
2-9-09
I hadn’t tried before in both LA and then
Miami. It’s just that I could never find a person or p
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Frank,
Celia and Jamie of Luvtaxi were back in the studio last Monday
evening to record some vocals for the two projects that they are working on.
We also imported some Basque language samples for a song that that Frank has
been putting together in the world music category. Once again Luvtaxi has
been nominated for a SAMMIE in the Latin/World/Raggae category.
Go on line and show your support with a vote for them. I am doing the same.
Here's a link to help you to vote.
Last Saturday my mission was to record Joe and Susan Finkleman
reciting their poetry while being accompanied by Francesca Reitano
playing a variety of flutes and singing background vocal parts. The other
member of the group was Mark Halverson who played percussion. These
two musicians helped to create a variety of different moods as a background
for the poetry. It was a very interesting several hours in which time we
recorded the seventeen poems. Basically it was a live performance in
the studio. Once we were set up, we moved quickly through the material
as the group has been working together for some time. I mixed the project
the next day and Joe and Susan are planning to pick it up the finished
masters tonight. I love the diversity that is presented to me in the studio.
It always keeps the work interesting. 
Felipe Lariz
came by yesterday and we made our final preparations to have his year long
project duplicated. We arranged for the CD duplication and got together with
my favorite graphic artist and roughed out ideas for the outer cover,
the inside and the tray card of the CD. Then we finalized the graphics for
the CD itself. It is an important step getting all of these items correct
and then proof reading them several times to be sure that all the bases have
been covered. Once the project goes to the printer your stuck with the
results. Misspelled words or
wrong information can only be corrected by paying to have the project
re-printed. Remember when it comes to the way your CD looks and sells as
it sits in a rack with thousands of other CD's, 
Rob Bierman is
an airman stationed at Travis Air Force Base. Rob is due to be
shipped out to Iraq next month and he wanted to record several songs for his
wife and three month old baby. Rob emailed me to ask if I could donate the
studio time to make the recording. Considering his situation I agreed.
Last Saturday Rob, his wife Rachel and new baby came to the studio. Once Rob
was in the booth we got underway in earnest. I had my two audio
students assisting with the recording process. In an hour and a half Rob had
his three songs on CD and was thanking us for the opportunity. I asked Rob
if any other studios had answered his request, his reply was "not even
one studio had answered the call or replied via email". Oh well! I felt that it was a
just cause deserving of my time, talents and studio. 4-1-08
Doran Smout is a musician/music lover
who played in a band back in the early 60's. One night while playing with
the Bob McCaul Band in a popular night club in Salt Lake City, he recorded the performance. Now
some 40 years later he is resurrecting those old tapes to give to the ten
surviving children of the lead singer Bob McCaul. Doran came to me to make
a tape transfer and to try and clean up the sound. I EQ'd the tapes as I
transferred them into Pro Tools and made them as listenable as possible.
Then I burned them onto CD's for Doran to give the children. An extra
benefit of this project is that both the mother and father of the lead
singer Bob McCaul, played in the band at the time and the children will be
able to hear their grandmother sing and their grandfather play saxophone.
3-25-08 
Tanjia Harris
has joined the Recording Connection Audio Engineering
class and is in her fourth week. Tanjia is a singer the has recorded
in many studios in the Bay Area and has been recording her song writing
ideas on her Boss digital recorder. She is eager to learn the tricks of the
trade and has benefited from the information she has learned so far in
the few short weeks that she has been involved in the program.
3-24-08
David Carmiol
has just completed the second week of the Recording Connection
Audio Engineering course. When I asked him if he was learning anything
his reply was "oh ya" . David is already on the computer recording
with Pro Tools. He has made plans to buy a Digidesign ProTools LE 002
unit from Mark Tyler who has two of them. So as it turns out one
student finishes the course and another begins the next week.
Geneva Garrett came in to record several readings that she had me edit
into a song that she had recorded previously. On Monday I will go to her
house and record her playing her grand piano. I will use my mobile recording
unit to capture her performance. Barry Weiner from The
Bluez Catz came by today to pick up his mastered CD's so he can have
them duplicated before his CD release party on February 22, at the
Po' Boys club located on Oak Ave. in Folsom. The band will play from
9 to 11:30PM. 2-16-08
Greg
Coffin and I met at the studio at
9am Wednesday morning the 23rd. to begin the task of adding effects,
sweetening, mixing and assembling the music for the demo. We worked straight
through till 5pm. We took a break for dinner then began again at 6:30.
We finished at 11:30pm. It was a long but productive day. We were
blurry eyed and tired but we finished what we had set out to do. Greg
was very organized and I felt that we made a good team. All in a days work
at Pudding Stone. 
Dave McAsey asked me to travel to his
house with my mobile recording rig to capture him in his most comfortable
Sister Swing preformed at the local Art Second
Saturday. They preformed outside on the street in front of Jim Ferries
20th Street Art shop located on 20th street between I & J Streets. The
Sisters played their two sets in spite of the impending rain storm that was
forecast. These kinds of gigs are for the community to get a chance to
mingle and hear some music while taking in the local art exhibits. This
happens every 2nd Saturday.
Jim Mizerik
called to inquire about having me master his four song demo. Jim has an
interesting song writing style. He's very easy to listen to as his musical
style lies some where between rock and folksy-bluesy-bayou-country. This
song is called "I belong to a broken heart". Jim has written over one
hundred songs and he continues to write on a regular basis. Jim admits that
he is not to good when it comes to recording but he needs to get his ideas
recorded before he forgets them. I can relate about forgetting your
song ideas. Jim is pictured here with his freshly mastered demo.
For the second time Nat has enlisted the help of Cynthia Douglas,
a long time Sacramento singing veteran, on back ground
vocals. When Cynthia is in the booth, things move quickly. She has a
good ear for harmony's and she sings with a good sense of timing and pitch.
Cynthia has her own quintet that she regularly performs with on the
local area. 3-2-07
Rob Farrell
is the mastering engineering that I have worked with for
many years. Together Rob and I balance and refine the CD project to
bring out the best sound that we can in the music. Mastering is the last
chance to give the project some additional sheen. My concept is that two
heads are better than one. There is a lot of special equipment
involved and I prefer to go to a mastering lab to do that kind of work.
I feel that the extra expense is well worth the cost. Rob is pictured
here performing with one of the bands he plays with. The Scott Rodell Band 
