Recording, Mixing, Producing

Q: What questions do you ask prospective clients?

A: 1. What are you looking to achieve by hiring me? 2.

Q: What advice do you have for a customer looking to hire a provider like you?

A: Please provide a concise description of what you need and try to have realistic expectations for the finished product. It would be my pleasure to answer any questions that a client may have, I prefer to have them ask questions up front as well as answer a bunch of my own questions in order to get the best idea of the client and the project we will be working on together.

Q: If you were on a desert island and could take just 5 pieces of gear, what would they be?

A: I hope they have AC plugs on this island! LOL I would bring my Macbook Pro, Maschine Studio, UAD Apollo 8, Zoom H4N, Phonon Headphones This way I could make music and record sounds of all the wildlife on the island!

Q: What was your career path? How long have you been doing this?

A: I started DJing at the age of 15 at school dances and parties. After turning 18 (legal age in Montreal) I began DJing in clubs around the city. The following year I attended a professional program on Music Recording and Mixing which lasted 12 months. Following that I have produced and released tracks for numerous people as well as producing music for commercials and corporate events. I also worked in the audio recording and post-production of corporate events.

Q: How would you describe your style?

A: I am laid back and easy to work with. That being said, I am very punctual with deadlines and stay in contact with my clients regularly to update them on the progress I have been making.

Q: Which artist would you like to work with and why?

A: My dream would have ben to work with Prince as I adore his music as well as his business ethic. He was one smart cookie! Otherwise I would love to work with DJ Quik who is one of the greatest producers out there.

Q: Can you share one music production tip?

A: Less is always more. We as humans have a tendency of always wanting to add more parts to try and improve a song when in reality when we start to strip things down we start to focus on the elements that truly make the song great; few as they may be at times.

Q: What type of music do you usually work on?

A: House music, Dance, Hip-Hop and I have recently began work on a Hard Rock project as well as recording and mixing a Heavy Metal band. I have also created and mixed music and voice-overs for a series of commercials that appeared on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) television station for a Montreal Spoken Word event known as Coco Cafe.

Q: What's your strongest skill?

A: I am a people person. Although my audio related skills are most important to my career I believe it is my ability to deal with many different personalities is my true strength. In this business we deal with creative people and they can sometimes be very passionate about their art. I pride myself in my ability to identify the client's needs and personality type and work with them on their level to achieve the desired product.

Q: Describe the most common type of work you do for your clients.

A: I put the finishing touches on other people's music. By adding details and achieving sonic clarity and punch I get my clients songs sounding in line with what is on the market today in their respective genres.

Q: What do you bring to a song?

A: My ears. Often times the person who wrote the song is far too attached to their material and have a hard time seeing the forest through the trees. My ears are coming from an objective 3rd party point of view which allows me to use what the client already has and put it in to the context of the respective genre or "sound" that they are trying to achieve.

Q: What's your typical work process?

A: I finish a lot of electronic and Hip Hop music for clients who have beats or ideas with strong potential. I will generally get replace some of their sounds and fix arrangement issues in order to achieve a quality sound prior to mix down. At times I will also suggest that we add certain elements or discard them based on the overall quality that we want to achieve. In the mixdown process I use stock and 3rd party plugins to EQ, control dynamics. I also add reverb, delay and other effects to give the mix that special something and have it stand out from the crowd.

Q: Tell us about your studio setup.

A: I use a UAD Apollo 8 QUAD as my audio interface in an acoustically treated room. My main tools for producing music are Native Instruments Komplete & Maschine (Studio and JAM), Cubase, Ableton Live, Logic Pro and a wide vartiety of Software synths including the Arturia V collection. I monitor using a pair of Event 2020, JBL LSR4326P & LSR2325P.

Q: What other musicians or music production professionals inspire you?

A: I Love music and therefore inspired by many different artists, producers and engineers. In the Dance world I am a big fan of David Morales as a producer and DJ due to the consistent quality of his output. Otherwise at the moment I am loving Kendrick Lamar, Telefone, Thundercat, Kamasi Washington, Anderson Park, the list goes on and on!