Kevin Tye had never made a professional product with his music. With the help of Studio Pros, he’s now taken his passion to the next level.
Kevin Tye has quite a bit of musical experience–he played in local bands for almost a quarter century. Eventually he moved on to writing his own material, taking advantage of the fact that he could set up a home studio very easily with today’s computer recording options. These days, he writes and records songs in his spare time when he’s not a this full-time job as a teacher. “I do it as a passion,” he says. “I just like to create things.” But until recently, he had never attempted to make a fully professional recording of his music.
Tye writes in multiple styles and genres, but as of late he has been focusing his creative efforts mainly on writing country songs. He saw an ad for Studio Pros in a magazine. “I decided I would give it a try,” he remembers, “to see what one of my songs would sound like through a professional studio.”
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“I was a bit unsure exactly how it was all gonna play out,” he admits. But Tye’s confidence grew with each step of the recording process with Studio Pros; it started with a song sketch and built from there, while he gave his input on each of the tracks as he heard them. He was particularly interested in hearing the musical direction his songs would take by letting Studio Pros’ session musicians make their own decisions. “I wanted to see what the choices would be for people who are doing this thing day in and day out,” he explains. Then, giving more of his own feedback as the process went on, Tye struck a balance that he felt optimized his songs. “In the end I think it was a good mix of musical choices. For example, the singer did some slightly different things in the vocal than I had done, which I ended up liking quite a bit. So it was kind of that process where I was just feeling it out at first, then giving more input at the very end stages.”
Jeff Heiniger knew the importance of a professional production–so he turned to Studio Pros when he didn’t want to settle for anything less.
Jeff Heiniger has known what goes into a professional production for a long time. In 1987, he won a national songwriting competition in the UK that was put together by Rolling Stones bassist Bill Wyman. The prize: a chance to record in the Stones’ state-of-the-art mobile recording studio with top producers Mick McKenna and Terry Taylor. “It was brilliant to work with actual professionals,” Heiniger remembers. “They turned our demo into something that was fantastic.”
Heiniger first started taking music lessons after getting a piano when he was 13. He also started listening to all sorts of pop music, from Electric Light Orchestra to Depeche Mode, ABBA to The Beatles. Since winning the competition he has put together a Pro Tools-equipped home studio, but soon realized that without a professional producer behind the board he wasn’t going to achieve the same sort of radio-ready product he got with is winning song. “The problem is that I’m not an engineer, so I didn’t have anybody to record my stuff,” he explains. “What I found was really good about Studio Pros was that the production was sort of taken out of my hands in a way.”
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When he found the Studio Pros website, Heiniger was actually looking for session vocalists on the web. “I couldn’t find anyone locally who was any good,” he says. “It’s quite laborious, taking your music to a recording studio and finding an engineer who will record a session singer who you may not like. It seemed quite a lengthy process, and one that may not yield results at the end of the day.” He found himself intrigued by the Studio Pros website. “The site itself looked very professional. Professionalism and price were important.”
With Studio Pros, Heiniger was able to focus on writing a song on piano, then letting our team of world-class studio musicians build the rest from the ground up. Along the way, he would provide input and feedback to make sure everything came together how he wanted it. In order to make it easier, Heiniger would provide reference tracks with other music that matched the vibe he was going for with each song.
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Technology can be a great tool. It can help you come up with your next masterpiece, and it can give you the means of recording your latest creation. And I don’t know about you, but it sure does make me feel warm and fuzzy inside when I buy a shiny new piece of gear for my home studio.
That is, until I plug it in. You see, technology is something of a double-edged sword. Even though buying new gear is really fun, it also means you have to invest a ton of time into learning how to use it well. That’s why the fuzzy feeling starts fading as soon as my new piece of gear is out of the box. I’m faced with the daunting task of the dreaded musical equipment learning curve, something I may have time to get the hang of, but rarely have the time to master.
And there’s the real kicker–even when you get used to using new gear, it still takes a lot of time, experience, trial and error to be able to use it to its maximum potential the way a top professional would. While it would certainly be nice to get to that point eventually, I don’t want to sacrifice the quality of the recording I’m doing now to work towards the goal of great recordings later.
It’s because of this that technology, while seemingly freeing initially, can really put unnecessary limits on your song’s production and ruin your creative process! Talk about a catch-22… Every minute you spend figuring out how to maximize your gear’s potential is taken away from time you could have spent composing, creating, and expanding your artistic horizons.
There is, of course, the obvious solution to this dilemma: put your music in the hands of a professional who already knows what they’re doing with today’s best technology. But that sure sounds easier said than done–it’s not like you can just hand your stuff over to a Grammy-nominated engineer who will mix and master it to radio broadcast standards without forking over your life savings, right?
Happily, I can tell you that you really can do that–and for a lot less money than you’d expect. Studio Pros gets your music into the able hands of Grammy-nominated engineers for a very affordable price, and you get results quickly. In fact, it costs less than most high-end audio gear, so you’re saving money and time for a product you probably wouldn’t get on your own in the first place.
Think about your musical goals. If you want to have a great sounding album of your own, you should do what the top artists do: they don’t buy another keyboard or a new software title. In fact, some of the most successful artists in the world may have never touched professional music gear in their entire lives! They simply hire the best session players, engineers and producers they can find. You can do that too, with the help of Studio Pros. Call today to get started on the album you’ve always dreamed of recording.
A successful song usually has great lyrics that stick to a central theme or idea. “Layla” by Derek and the Dominos has a theme of an unrequited love, while “Fix You” by Coldplay is full of sympathy and comforting words. Great lyrics tell a story or create a mood, sucking the listener in with every successive word.
But writing great lyrics can be easier said than done. If you don’t try to contain your thoughts to a particular theme, you run the risk of going off on tangents and losing the focus on the song. Losing focus means you might lose the attention of the listener… And you never want to do that!
Tell a story
Storytelling is a common device among songs. Direct storytelling can make it easy to keep yourself within the confines of your song’s theme. Take the song “Hurricane” by Bob Dylan. It’s about the alleged wrongful trial and conviction of a man in the ’60s, and the lyrics follow a straightforward narrative style. As the song progresses, you hear more of the true story as Dylan sees it; other songs make up fictional stories and tell them directly through their lyrics.
But storytelling doesn’t have to be quite as cut and dry. In the song “American Pie” by Don McLean, the lyrics don’t spell out a story per say, but they have a story-like quality to them (and they’re all related to the central theme of the deaths of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper). In other songs, the lyrics tell the story of a turning point or defining moment of a person’s life.
Whether or not you actually narrate a story or simply recall the tale of a moment in your life, your lyrics should take the listener on a journey from start to finish, leaving them feeling like they learned or experienced something from the song.
A music bridge is a new section of a song that differs from the verses and choruses. A great bridge can really take your song to the next level, but sometimes we’re so focused on the verses and the choruses that we forget how powerful an amazing bridge can be.
A memorable song bridge can break up the monotony of simply switching back and forth between verses and choruses. It can be a great place to bring the dynamic level up or down in the song. It can fit nicely along with the feel of the verses and choruses, or it can throw the listener into unexpected new territory. There’s no one way to write a bridge, but here are some opportunities that you might want to capitalize on when it comes to writing the third section of your next song.
Introduce a new chord progression
A bridge allows you to bring a new chord progression into your song that hasn’t been heard before. Since the verses and choruses should generally stay consistent with each other, a bridge allows you the freedom to introduce something new. You might draw inspiration from (or use chords from) other sections of the song, or you could go the daring route and try something completely different. The sky’s the limit! A good example is ”Pretty Woman” by Roy Orbison
Change keys
Sometimes artists will modulate to a different key for their bridge. This can really make the section stand out from the rest of the song, and it keeps the listener interested in hearing more of the song. After you change keys, you have the option of getting back to the original key when the bridge ends, or simply staying in the new key for the rest of the song. An example of a key-changing bridge is “Summer of 69” by Bryan Adams.
So many talented songwriters and composers love melodies and harmonies so much that they layer as many into their song as they possibly can. They want the best music productions for their songs, but think that adding more and more instruments and parts will make their production sound great.
Unfortunately, it won’t!
Less is more
Have you ever noticed that some of the biggest hits of all time only have three or four instruments on them? Lots of classic Beatles songs just have a couple simple guitar parts, bass, drums and vocals. Nirvana and Green Day have had monumental hit songs, and neither group is more than a power trio. Even “Billie Jean,” one of Michael Jackson’s biggest hits, is a simple production with few instruments.
If you have too many parts, melodies and counter-melodies, it can prevent your song from being catchy and memorable. If you try singing two melodies that are played together in a song, it’s pretty much impossible… And if you can’t do it, neither can your potential fans.
Don’t let too many parts get in the way of your song’s catchy melody
You should try to limit yourself to one main instrument that will be featured in your production–or at most a lead vocal with a unique melody along with one instrument playing a simple melody that compliments it. If you do more than this, it could distract from the part of the song that you most want people to listen to. Just think back to my post on how minimalist music production can make for maximum hit song potential.
If you’re not sure what parts of your song are essential and what parts are expendable, Studio Pros can help. Call today for a free music project consultation, and one of our producers will give you professional feedback for your songs!
Have you ever wondered what makes a song instantly recognizable?
Take a listen to the first five seconds of this song:
How is it that it’s possible to know what song it is just from listening to the first five seconds?
One instrument (acoustic guitar). Two chords. It can’t be any simpler than that, yet it’s unique and easy to remember. How many times have you been to a live concert where the artist starts playing their hit song, and within the first couple of seconds the crowd goes crazy? Why? Because they know what song it is immediately.
What’s the best way to produce your songs? In order to answer that question, you’ll need to answer another first: what are your musical goals?
What would you do with your song if it was already produced just like you wanted it to be? Would you try to get placements in movies? Would you want it played on popular TV shows? How about a commercial spot? Or would you rather pitch it to another artist? Maybe you’re just looking to record a single to send to all of your friends, or you want to have a song to post on the Internet and rack up some plays on Myspace and fans on Facebook. Defining the end goal will help you determine the best way to produce your song, because you’ll know more about the specific needs for the song’s final product.
Your song can be produced in many ways
There are multiple options on the table when it comes to producing your song. You could hire a band and rent a day in a commercial recording studio. You could send your tune to a “one man band” producer, a sort of jack of all trades that can arrange and perform most of the tracks himself. You could produce it with musicians via the Internet (just like Studio Pros). In the end, you’re the only one who can decide on the best way to record your song.
Even if you’re relatively new to the musician world, you’ve probably heard the term “press kit” thrown around quite a few times by now. A press kit is a package of materials that you might send to record labels, media outlets, venues, etc. that contains all of the pertinent information about your band. But what does that mean exactly? What is and isn’t relevant information?
You’ll want your press kit to follow some basic standards if industry people are going to look at it. Here are a few tips and essentials on putting together the ultimate press kit.
Band Photo
The first thing in your press kit should be a hi-resolution photo of the band (or yourself if you’re a solo artist.) This can be black and white or full color. There aren’t a whole lot of rules when it comes to taking a great band photo (although you might want to stay away from some common clichés such as railroad tracks and brick walls). But you should definitely make sure of at least two things: everyone’s face should be easily seen in the picture, and the band’s “image” should be on display. If you play dark metal music, it might not suit your image to be wearing bright colors and lying in a field of flowers. If you’re an upbeat pop band, it might not fit to be wearing all black and looking dreary. Let your band’s character shine through!
With a little Studio Pros magic, Robert Norris is making music fun again.
Robert Norris had all but given up on music by his early thirties. ”Music just wasn’t fun anymore,” he remembers. “I basically ran out of steam and decided to get on with my life.”
Norris had been a musician since he was a kid, when he took drum lessons and started his first garage band in junior high. As time went on, he began learning music theory, became a lead singer, and even got to sample the rock star lifestyle in the beach town of Marshfield, Massachusetts. “The summer we graduated, 1975, the drinking age was 18,” he says. “We were playing in bars that we were barely old enough to be in. Lots of fun, great experience, and a taste of the life.”
After a brief stint at UMass Amherst as a vocal music education major, Norris sang in several bands around the Boston area and began writing original music. After a band breakup, he took to the studio to record a cassette tape of original songs called Nobody’s Dream Come True. But despite getting some local airplay and seeing some interest in his songs, Norris felt like he had hit a wall; music was set aside and life went on.
But as most musicians can attest to, the music bug doesn’t easily go away; years later, Norris wanted to start singing again. But having been removed from the scene and all his old musician contacts for so long, he needed to hire session players for his recordings. “I contacted a studio locally,” he says. “Having no other viable options, I scheduled a four-hour session to start my first song. He charged me from the minute I walked in till the minute I left with no allowance for the three breaks the musicians took. And to make matters worse, I didn’t really like what we had recorded.”
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Kevin Tye had never made a professional product with his music. With the help of Studio Pros, he’s now taken his passion to the next level.
