* How can I get started in the Audio Recording business?

1) Internships - For many years, this was the traditional method of learning the business. Sort of like becoming an electrician, or plumber or bricklayer. You start out as an apprentice and work your way up. If you're lucky enough to get into one of the bigger commercial studios, you'll be working for little or no money and it may take a while before you get to move a fader. Interns usually start out pushing brooms, making coffee, doing clerical work or any number of menial jobs. One potential way past all that is to wave some money in the face of the studio owner. Money talks. Bullshit walks if you get my drift.

2) Take college classes and get a certification or degree - Having a formal education always looks good on a resume. Some of the better recording schools offer job placement assistance. Click on the links below for more info on recording schools here in the US. 

http://www.colum.edu/undergraduate/IM/

http://www.recordingconnection.com/

http://www.career-connection-inc.com/

http://www.audioinstitute.com/

http://www.cras.org/

http://www.fullsail.com/

http://www.iprschool.com/

http://www.madisonmedia.com/

http://www.recordingworkshop.com/

3) Build your own studio - Requires working capital, technical know-how, marketing savvy and a lot of faith. If you got all that then go for it! Nothing like being master of the universe :-)

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I have, on occasion, seen help wanted ads in Mix magazine for recording engineers. Mix is one of the leading industry periodicals for professional recording engineers. Of course, a studio that goes through the expense of placing an ad in Mix is usually looking for experienced people.

Now, time for a reality check:

1) The following "write-up" comes from an internet colleague who works professionally in the recording industry. This message was originally posted on one of Cakewalk's on-line user chat forums that we both frequent. The author goes by the name "Yep". The subject was about professional schooling and whether you actually needed a degree to get a job in this industry. I thought you'd find it interesting (I did). Reprinted here with permission from the author.

"My roommate, who is a full-blown recording artist who has played in some pretty well-known bands and toured all over and played to crowds of better than 100,000 currently makes a significant chunk of his income playing and recording bumper audio for video games and TV and such-- those little drum fills or guitar pick slides or 2-second metal riffs that they use in scene transitions and the like. He also gets some sizable checks selling songs to TV shows and stuff like that.

I posted this on another thread a while ago about this topic:
Three years ago or so, I had a conversation over a few beers with a biggish-league studio owner and a couple of well-known audio engineers about breaking into the record-making business. I was (and remain) the low man on the totem pole here, having been a low-paid assistant on some high-budget sessions and a low-paid engineer on some low-budget sessions. This was after a conference.

The studio owner said something to the effect of, "You know who I would pay good money for? A licensed electrician with a music degree. The kids I get out of recording school are worse interns than the guys who are just playing in a band and want to learn about this stuff. The last thing I need is some kid who had to go to school to learn how to use a compressor who thinks he's too good to sweep floors and make coffee."
If what you really want is to get into the world of record-making, then I think the best route to go is to just start doing it for anyone who will let you. Offer to record local bands, community theater, high-school orchestras, college concerts, town meetings, cable-access-station productions, stuff like that. You may not make much money, but it will cost less than going to school, and I think it will likely put you ahead of the game, because you will actually have an opportunity to develop a reputation and professional connections. People will start to ask you to record them, not because of a sheepskin, but because they've heard your work or because you've been recommended, and you can start to charge something in the neighborhood of a living wage once you can keep busy enough. It can at least help offset the cost of a fairly expensive hobby.

In the world of professional record-making, here are some of the players involved and how the career-path goes:

If you don't already have a significant album credit and you apply for work at a large studio, the best you can usually hope for, regardless of your skill or credentials, is a job as "studio assistant." This is slightly more glorified than "intern," which is more likely to be the only job the studio will offer to anyone who doesn't already have studio experience or a really good connection. Studio assistants may make anywhere from minimum wage to 10 or 12 dollars an hour, depending on the market and the size of the studio and the competition for the job. Either of these positions is usually highly competitive and connections usually count for more than credentials do, although persistence and/or bribes of various sorts can be very effective.

Interns usually work for free (they may get lunch). Interns make coffee, pick up lunch orders, file papers, clean up, and are occasionally afforded the opportunity to train to touch the gear, usually under supervision after-hours, as they are basically assistants-in-training. They very rarely hang out with or even meet rock stars or producers.

Studio Assistants live in a somewhat more glamorous world although they are rarely paid enough to live on in whatever market they are working in. They set up mic stands, perform equipment maintenance like cleaning and aligning tape heads and labeling patch bays, soldering mic cables, do basic setup of drum kits and other instruments, and so on. They spend a fair amount of time in the machine room, if there is one. They are an extra set of hands for the engineer and are usually a somewhat trusted and closely-involved member of the record-making team, although they typically have very little creative input. Perhaps unfortunately, they also often procure illegal and semi-legal "favors" for the band or producer, and frequently use their skills in this area to supplement their meager income. I'm just calling it as I've seen it, don't shoot the messenger here.

The heart of the recording process is the audio engineer. This is the guy or gal who sits behind the console, decides mic type and locations, preamps used, brand of tape, recording medium, and all that nitty-gritty and the one who actually makes the recording and who is responsible for the sound quality. The first primary audio engineer in any studio is usually the studio owner, only because most recording studios are originally started by the recording engineer. In bigger studios, the it is not uncommon for the original founder to be more businessman than engineer, or for the founder to be a full-blown producer or a marquis-name engineer who charges big bucks and whose services are reserved for special clients (think Steve Albini at Electrical Audio). In these big-name studios and in many smaller studios, there are often multiple studios and multiple rooms that may be hired out with or without engineering services included, and the engineer working the session is usually a freelance or semi-freelance contractor or employee.

These engineers might make anywhere from $30-100 per hour in big studios, which sounds pretty good until you figure that there are no benefits, and that they are hard-pressed to work a stable 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year since they have to rustle up work and negotiate the price and often are expected to work far from home, or to work a contract rate, which may specify a certain weekly pay that sounds like a good salary except that it means working sometimes 6 days a week for as long as the band/producer wants to be there (often to the wee hours of the AM) for the equivalent pay of a normal 9-5 schedule. Certain engineers are even expected to provide much of the recording equipment (mics, preamps, processors, monitors, etc) at their own expense, much like a carpenter or a plumber.

Very good, very well-known and expensive engineers typically have a sort of agent or business manager whose job it is to keep them busy, and that person's salary is paid out of the engineer's own pocket. Other engineers have to perform this role themselves, and for every hour they get paid for, they may have spent another hour (or the equivalent of an hour's pay) drumming up the work or printing business cards or promotional materials or meeting prospective clients and the like.

Being an engineer can be a very rewarding, very fulfilling, very creative and fairly glamorous line of work. It can also be very frustrating and very tough on the psyche to be in the midst of the creative process, often surrounded by rich, famous, and spoiled people who expect you to make them stay that way while you struggle with all the stuff any 9-to-5 guy does while simultaneously catering to the whims of people who often have far less understanding of what they're doing than you do.

This is why most engineers hope to become producers.

The role of producer is a vague one, oftentimes. The producer is virtually always hired by the record label (sometimes IS the record label, if it's a producer-funded record). When the label is footing the bill, the producer is usually paid an advance against future royalties, just like the band. Big-time producers can make more money than the rock stars they are producing. In some cases, the producer may even have more control over the finished record than the actual recording artist does. The producer's job is to make a hit record. The producer may pick the studio, the engineer, the songs on the album, the singles, the guitar amps used, the singing coach for the vocalist, the brand of drum heads, whatever. The producer might even decide to rewrite some songs, or to have them re-written by an outside songwriter, and may decide to have some of the parts re-recorded by "ghost" musicians. The producer may have the power to not only completely dismantle and rebuild the artist's material this way, the producer might even be able to bill the cost of doing it against the artist's future royalties.

Some producers are very hands-on audio engineers who record and mix the record themselves. Some are businessmen, wheeler-dealers who have never touched a mixing console but who know how to match the right engineer and the right studio to the right band and who know how to keep a project on time and under budget and how to pick the right therapist when the singer wants to quit and so on. Some are coaches, mentors, basically just old hands of the music biz who may have been rock stars themselves at one point, and who know how to navigate the process, with a smattering of this and a smattering of that. Some are gifted musicians themselves who become partners and collaborators in the creative process and who may write and even perform a lot of the material themselves. Some are armchair psychologists who make it their job to keep the band and the engineer and the musicians creative and cooperative and who serve as referees in the decision-making. Some are sort of ringleaders, people with a strong personality who plan and schedule and delegate and bring disparate elements together and keep everyone focused on the goal.

The producer's job is to make a hit record. If the producer is hired by the record label, then it is because the producer is trusted and regarded as a known quantity that has what it takes to make sure this thing actually gets finished and fulfills the promise that the label saw in the demos or the showcase or whatever. If the producer is the one financing the record, then obviously the producer has a significant stake in making sure it's going to be an entertaining and saleable product. If the producer has actually sold his services to the band themselves and is being paid by the artist to produce a record, then again, clearly, the role of the producer is to make sure that a good record is produced."

3) Mixerman - this link takes you to a website devoted to some mysterious individual who goes by the name "Mixerman". Mixerman appears to be a recording engineer who works in the big leagues and took the time to document an actual high-profile recording project that he was involved in some years ago. These on-line diaries were later turned into a formal website business along with a book that you can purchase. Funny stuff!

4) My 2 cents (which is about what I make after taxes) - If after having read through all this, you're still intent on pursing your dreams, then by all means go for it. There are a lot of "sour grapes" out there and it's easy to become jaded by this industry. After you've been pooped on enough, you begin to wonder "is this really worth it?". At some point, you have to be able to pay bills and put food on the table. You know, the basic necessities of life. It's unlikely that you will be able to support yourself, even with a degree in hand, unless you are extremely flexible and have a fair amount of business acumen. I can tell you that it's all a matter of perspective. The ones that seem to rise to the top are the ones that keep a positive "can do" attitude (even in the face of adversity), are easy to get along with, work quickly and efficiently, have a good sense of humor, are honest and trustworthy, and most importantly, know their stuff!

Best of luck to you!

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