by hilary johnson
If you have ever listened to the radio, a mix CD, or iTunes on shuffle, then you have witnessed the mysterious yet overwhelmingly influential art of producing music. One song may be louder than the rest; another may have more grit, yet another may sound smooth and melodic. Songs do not just magically form themselves to sound the way that best reflects their meaning.
This is production. It’s an aspect of the musical process that often gets overlooked. Even for many musicians, the true art of music production is vast and often misunderstood.
Anybody can go into Best Buy and purchase music editing software, from the cheap (Cakewalk) to the high end (Pro Tools). Some computers even come with a program already installed (GarageBand). But software alone does not a producer make, nor a decent song does it produce.
“The recording process really makes music physical,” says Mo Ricks, a local rock and hip-hop producer who has worked with many of Jacksonville’s best local musicians. “The studio is where [a song] leaves the mind and the universe and becomes physical. It helps music travel.”
The production process varies according to the type of music being produced. For hip-hop and R&B, the songwriting process starts with the producer. First, beats are written, the grooving rhythm behind the vocals that gets the song moving. The beats are then shopped around to different artists who will purchase the beat and write lyrics over it.
Rock music, however, starts with the musician and a song they have written, which are then taken into preproduction. This is when the producer studies the music’s strengths and weaknesses, arrangements, and general direction of the song. What the band might see as a hard rocker, the producer might offer the wisdom that the song is, in fact, really a ballad.
“If I were to write a song and pay another producer to record their vision of my song, he is now the fifth Beatle,” says Scott Fravala, owner and senior producer of Vision Sound Inc., a high-end recording studio and record label in Jacksonville. “[The producer] hears things you don’t hear, can’t hear.”
But it’s what happens inside the studio that breathes life into the songs that pump out of our computer speakers, clock radios and iPods.
“[Producing] allows a song to be played on any kind of system and still sound good, still get the point across,” says Ricks.
Once in the studio, sounds are selected for the various instruments. Should the drums sound roomy or warm? Should the guitar sound electric and full of reverb, or gentle and soothing? Perhaps it should sound gritty and dangerous. Even the choice of microphone makes a difference in how the artist’s voice will come across in the recording.
Beyond the choice of sounds, there are the various ways in which songs can be recorded. A vibe has to be established. Should the band record together, giving the song more of a live feel? Or should each artist record individually? Should there be one recording of each guitar part, to give the song a more elusive feel? Or should there be twenty recordings used of each part, to pump up the song and make it feel more powerful? Each one of these decisions contributes to the final outcome of the song.
Finally, once all the parts of the songs have been recorded, the producer takes all the pieces of the puzzle and puts them together. More questions are asked. Should the drums be edited for timing or left natural? How loud should the guitars be in comparison to the volume of the vocals? Which aspect of the song should be predominant?
If it were a pop song, like Kelly Clarkson, the vocals would be mixed loudest. Or for bands like Nirvana, the drums and guitars would be louder. If it’s a classic rock song, like Simon and Garfunkel, the song might have dynamics, getting louder and quieter throughout.
This all affects the way we hear the music we sing along to as we drive to work or to the beach, or during a dinner party, or in the shower.
The producer, like the glue that holds together a collage of sounds, designs the songs and makes them the music we hear. “Nothing is done until it’s done,” says Fravala. “You give me the colors and allow me to help you paint the painting.”
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