Hey Hey!
This month's meeting was set up by our V.P., Michael Kolar so here he is with an introduction... Thanks Mike! -KJH
I’ve been into music making & recording studios for over 10 years. I pride myself on not just working in my little bubble but getting out to other studios, big & small, to see what people are doing to make/record music. That has been the most rewarding part of serving as Vice President of EARS. When my SoundScape Studios was hosting a Digidesign/Waves demo, I had the pleasure to put a face to a very familiar name, Don Griffin.
Since my High School days I’ve always read Mix Magazine & Illinios Entertainers’ studio guides to see who was doing what where. Over the last 10 years, a lot of names have come and gone from the guides and we know how tough Chicago can be for people in the music biz, so it seems easy to keep track of people who manage to keep artists coming back for their services. Don Griffin is one of those people whose name inevitably comes up when talking about good Chicago music, especially the blues. Don has been working on some particularly cool stuff in the last year. The new album Can You Dig It! by Chicagoland’s Blue Plate Special, recorded by Don at VMR Studios has earned the 2006 Blues Band Of The Year Award from Midnight Special Blues Radio. Recorded and engineered by Don Griffin and produced by Griffin and Ron Parizek, the album has so far produced seven number-one songs on blues radio worldwide. He also works with Oscar Colemen, Johnny Winter, Sonny Burgess (one of the original Sun Records musicians) and most recently, he mastered Tommy Allsup’s (Buddy Holly’s guitarist’s) new album. Don is also an accomplished musician, signed to Columbia Records in 1978 to record his first release at the Record Planet in Sausalito, where he lived for two months while making the album and was Real Blues Magazine’s Blues/Rock Guitar Player for 1999/2000/2001.
Don will show us around, play tracks, and answer questions about his work. He has to have one of the most intimidating DAWs I’ve ever seen, incorporating a ProTools HD3 Rig, a Mackie D8B, and a slew of great outboard gear, all synced up with an Apogee Big Ben and their multitrack DAC’s and fed into three sets of monitors, including old school URIE 813 A’s, Adam S3-a, and some large WestLakes. Also, to round out the evening, Matt Cellitti from Native Instruments will show off the new Kore System, which let’s the user run any one program into the next to create some mind-blowing sounds, with real time control over the software via the Kore interface. We will also listen to the Guitar Rig 2 softsynth guitar simulator w/ footswitch controller. Attendees will also be able to take advantage of special pricing on all N.I. Products. Food and drink will be provided as usual. There's parking out back and plenty more on the street. The studio phone is 708-267-2198 if you have trouble finding it.
-Michael Kolar, EARS V.P.
Recap/Appreciation File
The only thing more impressive than John Ovnik's Deaf Dog Music on the night we held our January meeting, had to be the weather. There was a temperature drop of something like 45 degrees in what seemed like minutes. Along with that, of course, were crazy winds and snow that made my drive home horrendous. Still, for those who braved the cold, wind, and snow, it was worth it all. Talk about a serious console! John's Focusrite is a serious beast. We're talking three-phase power brought into the facility just to power the board and a separate air conditioning unit with ducts going straight in and out of the console itself, a single rotary fader on the master monitor level that cost more than some home DAW systems feeding amazing sounding huge ATC monitors. Not only was everything John played for us wonderfully created, but it was a thing to behold how great it sounded in there. In looking at his outboard rack, which frankly wasn't that extensive due to the lack of need given such a console, I was confused by a couple of pieces of gear that looked familiar and yet strange. Turns out it's because each was a case of him owning the original prototypes with slightly different knobs and cosmetics. On the other side of the glass was a Yamaha grand piano that apparently has the honor of Chick Corea naming it the best piano he's ever played. (I'm not talking about the model of piano, but THIS piano.) The whole place had a very cool, very comfortable vibe that was obviously instrumental in making this a place where John could really get some work done. John pulled out the stops and treated us to some great food, really great food, and drink and it was very sad to see some of it go to waste as we only had about half the attendees we were anticipating. In any case. John was a wonderful host and it was just a great night for all who made it out. Thanks so much, John. You've got a wonderful place and we hope to do it again sometime when more can see what you've put so much into.
Also, a good number of our members turned out for a very nice time at the Chicago NARAS chapter's Grammy Party at the Hard Rock Cafe. Plentiful hors d'oeuvres (especially in the VIP section), an open bar, great people, just a great night. Thanks so much to the lovely Sarah Mudler for once again extending an invitation to EARS members. - KJH
Upcoming Meetings
The next couple of months are lining up to be very special meetings. One will be a last chance to see a time-honored Chicago facility, the other a very special celebration of some Chicago folks who've contributed greatly to our craft. You'll want to keep the usual last Tuesdays open. We're working hard to make it worth your while. - KJH
AES
Our friends at AES have another interesting meeting happening this coming March 6th. It will be a tour of the audio systems at Willow Creek Community Church, an absolutely huge facility with multiple large rooms including a 7,200 seat main auditorium that they pack out every week for three services. Check out the AES Chicago Section website for more details.
This past month, the meeting featured Mike Stoica of Sytek(Neotek) and I have to say it was really nice to hear some insights from a very serious designer of some nice consoles. It was a small (due again to the weather) crowd and fairly informal, leaving lots of room for questions and a very friendly, casual discussion. We hope to involve Mike in something we're planning for later this year. - KJH
Suggestions Welcome!
There are endless good reasons to band together here as EARS. It can be whatever we want it to be. If you have any ideas for the EARdrum, our website, or future meetings, please email me. We still have a lot of great meeting plans lining up for next year, some website plans, and a lot of good fresh energy (maybe not so much as a year ago, but...) and hopes for a more vibrant, participatory EARS, so of course we're very interested in your input on everything EARS. Please. :) - KJH
Archives
Our Archives are again up to date. Check out the website for that and more EARS info. Also, I'd like to complete our files with the pre-2001 EARdrums. By my calculations we're missing the first 16 years! I know Timothy Powell has a year or so on his Metro-Mobile website but that still leaves a lot missing. If you happen to have your old paper copies or files you could get to me, I would love to get them online for posterity. Let me know. - KJH
A note about our Website
I've noticed that it doesn't automatically update in some web browsers. If you're looking for something and it looks like old info, try reloading the page. I'll see what I can do about it, but I think it would take a full redo to get it in a format that did this automatically for us.
Dues!
Thanks to all who support EARS through paying their dues. Just as a reminder, they're due yearly by the October meeting and this is a prerequisite for voting and joining us for the Holiday Party and BBQ in August (and occasionally things like the Grammy Party). Dues checks for $25.00 (or cash, but no credit cards) can be made out to EARS and given to any of our officers or sent to the following address:
Engineering and Recording Society of Chicago, C/O Eric Roth, Treasurer, PO Box 98, Highland Park, IL 60035-0098 - KJH
A (few) (more) word(s) from the Prez...
or “Does anyone really know the difference between the Oscar for Best Sound Editing and Best Sound Mixing? Do the makers of The Bourne Ultimatum even know?”
Well, this is where each month I apologize for getting the EARdrum out so late. How glad I am that you all know clearly that the meetings are by default on the last Tuesday of the month. It can sometimes be quite a challenge to get all the ducks in a row. This month we were working hard on an idea that would have been great (and still will, when we come back to it in a couple of months) but just wasn't working out. Luckily another great idea dropped in our laps. I'm very thankful for Michael Kolar's assistance with this.
I'll keep the personal notes short this time. I'm still really enjoying monitoring through my Apogee converters instead of Digi's and continue to work on this album project that I'm just so excited about. I can't wait to get to that point where I have something to play at a meeting. Things have been busy both at the day gig doing primarily live event support and on the side. Taking a little break to go to a friend's very fun annual Oscar party left me thinking about how the masses perceive this thing we devote our lives to, sound. I think just about anyone has a concept of the difference between film editing, directing, and even art direction and such. But who outside of our business (and sometimes even within!) can really even give a clear explanation of the difference between an engineer and a producer, let alone the blurry lines these days between things like editing and mixing. Even as the war rages between Blue Ray (who'd like to thank the academy, Mr. and Mrs. Ray, and God) and HD-DVD (who'd like to appear on camera as if they're happy for Blue Ray, though they secretly know they've always been better) people turn more and more to listening to music with complete disregard to audio quality. Well, I guess there is one good sign: R.I.P. the CD 1982-2007. Maybe with that scapegoat out of the way we'll see another attempt at a higher quality audio delivery medium. I've heard vinyl sales are up. I bet we can do better.
At your service,
Kerry J Haps
