Producer, Songwriter, Keyboard

Q: Can you share one music production tip?

A: Always track with less microphones than you need. More often than not an engineer will throw up as many microphones as they have tracks, this leads to you focusing more on sound and phase then the music.

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

A: I walk the line between acoustic instruments and synth work. I really like where pop music has gone the last year or so with minor key downtempo electronic music.

Q: What's your strongest skill?

A: Working fast. I hate wasting time in the studio and with that I know Pro Tools like the back of my hand and can turn around fast results. This comes from working in post production where every minute you're in the studio is big bucks and you have to be fast but turn in top rated work.

Q: What do you bring to a song?

A: Experience is on my side. I have been playing piano for almost 30 years, worked on over 100 albums and toured the world with different bands. This has all led me to know what an artist wants and to translate their direction to actual songs.

Q: What's your typical work process?

A: For producing I have the artist send me tracks they are into at the moment and their favorite artists of all time. I then start to sketch out tracks based on those and send back and forth until we get the perfect song.

Q: Tell us about your studio setup.

A: I have plenty of vintage gear but these days 90% of my time is done in the box. My typical single track is either a U87 or SM7B (depending on the source), into an API preamp, fed through my Universal Audio converter and recorded in Pro Tools. For plugins I have tons of VST instruments and Sound Toys seems to make its way onto every recording.

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

A: I like the organic recording approach of the 1960s and tend to gravitate towards producers that follow that. Ethan Johns has been my go-to for the last decade.

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

A: I started out as a piano player in college at Berklee but soon got into recording once I moved to NYC. Recently most of my work has been behind the computer either producing or scoring for film.