AES Student Blog

1) Tell us a little about yourself. Where are you from and what do you study?

I'm originally from Kennesaw (suburb of Atlanta), but I've lived in Nashville for 7 years now and it's my home. I recently graduated from Belmont University with a self oriented focus on score composition and film audio, and formally I graduated with a B.S. degree in Audio Engineering Technology with a minor in Music Business.

2) What initiated your passion for audio? When did it start?

I've grown up playing and composing on piano since I was 4 years old, though I never really learned to read music past a basic level. My piano teacher, after my stubborness wouldn't cease, fostered ear training and I learned to play fully by ear by the age of 8 or so. From there I learned to play other instruments - guitars, bass, drums, a little trumpet and viola, and I developed an ear for how instruments sound and fit together. Recorded bands throughout high school with a super simple Zoom 16 multitrack and maybe 3 mics. From that point on my perfectionist mind was always fascinated with sound and making things sound better and better. I realized in 2014 that I wasn't meant to record bands all my life (though I still will on the side), but I realized with my passion for audio and composition - and after having an incredible emotional reaction to seeing Interstellar in IMAX - that I had to fight to become a film score composer. Since then, I have trained myself to score films and have been lucky enough to work on over 2 dozen short films and bigger ones are in the works right now! Scoring really is the one things I feel that I can do in this world to impact people and to help creators share their story or to enhance a vision. This is everything to me, it is purpose.

3) Tell us about production of your submission? What is the story behind it? What inspired it? How long did you work on it? Was it your first entry?

This was my second entry! Last year I won a Bronze for a project under a similar situation, so I was really exciting and relieved to know I not only placed this time as well, but I did better than last year which feels great! So for this project I was hired to both create an original score and fully mix/master and do all the postproduction audio. The film was a successful graduate thesis project for Emerson College M.F.A. student Logan Freeman. I began the project in January of 2017 and completed both the score and the final mix in April of 2017. Upon deciding to submit, I created a 2.1 version and performed a remix to enhance and tighten things. The film, "Fated to Repeat," covers the struggle of an Alabama grunge rock band attempting to recover after losing one of their members in a tragic accident. My submission took place towards the middle of the 20min film and followed Mia, the band's now lead singer, who has gone outside the music venue to find the father of their deceased lead singer, Evan. The clip begins with Evan's father abruptly driving away when he sees Mia, which triggers Mia into a dream state where she recalls her past experiences with Evan and the band.

4) What/who made you join AES?

I went to a local Nashville AES when I was a freshman or sophomore I believe, and I joined our Belmont chapter then. I became the Treasurer for my junior year and then the Chair for my senior year.

5) Tell us about your favourite experiences at the 143st AES convention in NY!

Two of my fellow Belmont friends who are in the Audio masters program were able to present their research at AES and it was exciting to see that! I loved the seminars on film audio - they will keep me coming back every year for sure. Honestly I also just enjoyed New York as it was my first time being there, and getting to spend it with friends, celebrating the Recording Compeition results was incredible. Also getting to be in the room with SO many incredible engineers and creators is priceless and gives me a boost of energy that I hope will last me until next time!

To listen to Kerrick's project click here:

1) Tell us a little about yourself. Where are you from and what do you study?

My name is Julián David Rincón Ruiz. I studied at the University of San Buenaventura in Bogotá, Colombia.

2) What initiated your passion for audio? When did it start?

My passion for audio was born from the need to save the sounds that I generated with my electric guitar, as a result of this, I started reading about audio and I realized the great amount of interesting things that the audio world offered, it was about 13 years ago.

3) Tell us about production of your submission? What is the story behind it? What inspired it? How long did you work on it? Was it your first entry?

I always try to record musical genres that are not very common. I do this, because I think that each genre has interesting things to contribute and challenges to solve when I record. Some time ago I wanted to record something that had instruments like: charango, violins and flutes. Initially I contacted a friend of mine who makes music for movies but unfortunately he had to move out of town, so I decided to search the internet for some musical groups of genres that had some of these instruments, searching, I found "Tierra Fertil" a group of Andean music and I decided to contact them to record a session in block. We were approximately 2 months adjusting schedules and dates and I was listening to many songs of that genre to study their sonority and thus be able to choose the indicated microphones so that the recording would sound as organic as possible; the day of the recording, we spent about 8 hours in the studio and recorded 4 songs in block. I decided to choose the song "Sol del Sur" because it was the song that most conveyed emotions. I think that although the recording process is very important. Finally in my opinion when we create music we generate emotions.

4) What/who made you join AES?

Last year, by suggestion of a university professor, I decided to join the AES to participate in the student competition of the 141st convention that was to be held in Los Angeles. I signed up with my degree project partner and I participated with the project "Design and construction of a control system for audio editors with integrated communication management" with which we got the gold award. Considering the great support and incentives from the AES, this year I decided to participate in the section of traditional recording in studio.

5) Tell us about your favourite experiences at the 143st AES convention in NY!

The 143rd convention was incredible because I had the opportunity to meet incredible people and excellent engineers, besides being able to see the latest in audio technology and to visit amazing studios in NY.

To listen to Julián's project click here:

1) Tell us a little about yourself. Where are you from and what do you study?

I grew up in Istanbul and came to the USA four years ago to pursue my studies. I am a last-year undergraduate student in New York University, double majoring in Music Technology and Computer Science. I am very interested in technology and its applications, especially artificial intelligence. Although music on the other hand is the spirit and soul. Therefor I'm trying to find a healthy balance between the two.

2) What initiated your passion for audio? When did it start?

My passion for audio came from my passion towards music. At the age of 10 I started to develop my musical taste, until then I would listen to whatever was given. Initially I was very interested in rap, rock and punk, didn't really listened to the electronic music of the time. Not much later I wanted get more involved in music and picked up my first instrument, which was my father's classical guitar. I met most of my closest friends through my interest to make and listen to music. We would spend hours just listening and talking about records. My interest in electronic music began when I discovered the legendary Ghent based group Soulwax. What they did blew my mind because I had no idea how such songs were possible to perform. This curiosity led me to discover other great artists, and sparked my interest in the technology behind all of this.

3) Tell us about production of your submission? What is the story behind it? What inspired it? How long did you work on it? Was it your first entry?

About two years ago I took a graduate course titled Music for the Web, which introduced the basic concepts behind how audio works on the web. We were supposed to do a final project for this class and I chose to do a very simple application where a user can play and manipulate loops. This was a very primal version of my submission to the AES competition. After spending some thought on the project I realized that with additional features, this can actually turn into a product that others would want to use. The main inspiration behind this project is concerned with how we consume music today. I feel like everything is planned or recorded beforehand, let it be shows or music we listen to. I've been making music for many years now and I rarely record what I play, it's mostly about jamming in the moment. I realized that these jams not always get recorded and not a lot of people get to hear them. What I try to accomplish with this project is to encourage people to take a step away from composing and simply play what they feel at the moment with all its impurity and spontaneity. The project took about a year and a half to get to its current state, with a lot of mistakes made along the way. Even though I work day and night to evolve this project to what I had dreamt of, if it wasn't for other responsibilities I have such as school I'm sure it would not have taken more than a few months to get to this stage. This was my first ever AES convention and my first entry to the competition, I'm glad it became a memorable first experience.

4) What/who made you join AES? 

The associate director of the music technology program, who is also an AES fellow, our lovely Agnieszka Roginska emailed me about the competition encouraging me to apply with my project which I have previously demonstrated in school. I felt like I had to join since it was in New York and I had a well made product under my hands, it was a good opportunity at the right time.

5) Tell us about your favourite experiences at the 143st AES convention in NY! 

My favorite experience was having the chance of showcasing my project to a variety of professionals in the industry from all around the world and hearing their opinions on it. Most of the feedback I received was positive and it certainly motivated me to go further with this project. 

 1) Tell us a little about yourself. Where are you from and what do you study?

I am from Portsmouth NH, and I went to school at Emerson College studying Audio Post Production/Sound Design for Visual Media Arts. At school I worked on audio post-production for student films with the occasional foray into production recording. Additionally I explored music editing for a dance organization on campus and podcast editing for EdTech Times in Boston, so I really tried to explore all sorts of audio while at school - except for music production. There was very little at my school offered for music production, which I think is a shame, but Emerson is not a music school so I guess it makes sense. Regardless of this, in my time at Emerson I was able to focus my time on post-production and learn from some really knowledgeable professors and I am grateful for all of the experiences I had there.

2) What initiated your passion for audio? When did it start? 

My passion for audio began in High School when I started playing with synthesizers and experimenting with effects units. At this point I had really just dipped my toes into recording. It was all so daunting and I kind of just jumped into it and taught myself subtractive synthesis on a Roland SH-201 keyboard that my dad had given me. I was always interested in music during school and I was unquestionably a band geek but I didn’t want to pursue performance as a career so audio felt like a natural alternative. It wasn’t until I arrived at Emerson that I became interested in sound for film, but I really enjoyed it and that is how I came to be where I am now.

3) Tell us about production of your submission? What is the story behind it? What inspired it? How long did you work on it? Was it your first entry?

My AES submission was a product of my final semester in which I had already taken every audio related class at Emerson. Unfortunately there was no real capstone project in my program, so I decided to create my own audio capstone. I always loved the show Avatar: The Last Airbender, and it seemed like the style of sound design would be both challenging but also achievable and so that was my pick for a sound replacement. Deciding to do an entire episode was biting off far more than I could chew at the time, but I just had to chip away and learn as I went. I spent roughly 400 hours on it in total and it really was the only thing I worked on all semester. It was my first AES submission and so I was quite proud to have been a finalist.

4) What/who made you join AES?

I had joined AES the year previous when I had heard my friends discussing going to AES 139. At the time I had never even heard of AES, but we all decided to go and check it out. It was honestly overwhelming at the time because there was so much to see, and I did not get nearly as much out of it as I did this time at AES 143. I was glad to be back again with a better sense of the convention!

5) Tell us about your favourite experiences at the 143st AES convention in NY!

My favorite experiences at AES 143 were the all of the conversations had between other people just like myself who are trying to get into this industry. I met so many amazing people who are doing amazing things, and I made a lot of friends that I know I will stay in touch with. In addition, meeting so many experienced minds within the industry and having the opportunity to have some of them critique my work was really an honor.

1) Tell us a little about yourself. Where are you from and what do you study?

Our colleagues at Audio Engineering Society British Section are organising a great conference and they are inviting all current AES Student and Recent Graduate Members. 

Once again, AES UK section are hosting UP Your Output! - the AES UK student conference, running March 17th/18th 2018 at Leeds Beckett University. This year's conference includes a great range of keynotes, loads of practical workshops and trade exhibits/tech demos from a range of top companies. They also have a student poster competition where students can present their project work in the format of an academic poster.

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1) Tell us a little about yourself. Where are you from and what do you study?

I grew up just outside of Chicago but moved to Nashville about 4 years ago to attend Middle Tennessee State University. I finished my undergraduate audio production degree there in 2015, and now I’m working on finishing my masters in recording arts and technologies here at MTSU. I plan to graduate with my masters in the Spring of 2018. 

2) What initiated your passion for audio? When did it start? 

Like most people, my musical journey started out by being a musician. I took piano lessons as a kid, I played clarinet and trumpet in my school band, and I was a guitar player for a variety of rock bands throughout high school and college. I was lucky to attend a grammy winning high school that had music theory classes and a small MIDI based computer lab. This was my first introduction to music technology and the power that it had. Eventually I invested some money into a basic recording setup of my own so that I could record and produce my own songs. It wasn’t long before I became totally obsessed with audio. I used every chance I could to learn more about how to make better sounding music. This new found passion is what brought me to Nashville to attend MTSU and where I now produce local bands and songwriters. 

3) Tell us about production of your submission? What is the story behind it? What inspired it? How long did you work on it? Was it your first entry?

The song I submitted for the competition was written by a friend of mine Natalie Madigan who is also a student at MTSU. I originally demoed a few of her songs as part of a class project during the later part of 2016. I was really impressed by her work so we decided to do a song together in our free time outside of class. The song was written to raise awareness about sexual assault and therefore had a lot of emotional depth to it. I wanted to maintain that feeling with the production of this song so we used a lot of dark tones, big reverbs, and ethereal sound effects. The production started out as just a piano and vocal recording. After the piano and vocal was recorded, I took the tracks home and programmed some strings and a bass line for the song. Next we recorded the drums. Then after adding and chopping up some additional sound effects and synth parts, we recorded the various background vocals parts heard in the track. The entire process from demo to a finished mix was probably about 4-5 months since we had to find time to work on it between our busy schedules and school work. This was my 3rd time entering the competition. Last year I won bronze, and this year I won gold.

4) What/who made you join AES?

My school is who really got me to join AES. When I first came to MTSU and was researching various organizations that were involved with audio, AES was one of the first names to pop up. I wanted to be involved in everything any anything audio that I could so it seemed like a no brainer to join the AES.

5) Tell us about your favourite experiences at the 143st AES convention in NY!

I think my favorite experiences at the the 143rd AES convention would have to be both winning gold in the student recording competition, and going to the student party at Jungle Studios. I had set a goal a while back to win gold at the AES student recording competition so the moment my name was announced as the winner was a moment of pure elation. It was also really cool to see and spend time in Jungle Studios knowing that some very successful artists had stood and created some hit songs in that very same room. As always, the AES convention is always a great opportunity to see and reconnect with old friends.

To listen to Kyle's project click here: