AES Student Blog

 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.

More Information

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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:

Thank you to Merging, the company that brought the incredible DAW Pyramix into the industry, and one of our sponsors for the student recording competition!

Merging Technologies is the world’s foremost manufacturer of high-resolution digital audio recording systems.  The list of customers reads like a who’s who in the recording industry and recordings made with Merging Technologies’ systems regularly receive the recording industry’s prestigious Grammy® Award. 

The company was founded in 1990 in Chexbres, Switzerland by Claude Cellier; an electronics graduate of the Institute of Technology in Lausanne  Prior to this, Claude worked for the famous Swiss audio maker Nagra Kudelski for 10 years. Within a short time of its founding, Merging quickly established a reputation for their expertise in digital signal processing and associated hardware, and with their Pyramix Virtual Studio, was one of the first companies to produce a DSD recording system. 

In 2007, Claude Cellier was presented with the Audio Engineering Society Fellowship Award  for outstanding contributions to the development of high-performance, high-resolution audio workstations.  Merging Technologies currently has over 20 employees with offices in Switzerland and the UK.

Like many other audio technology companies, Genelec’s roots are deeply seeded in the world of Broadcast & Music recording technology. Our current offering is the most complete in the market place: from the very compact 8010 to the massive 1236A with technologies like Directivity Control Waveguide™, pioneered by Genelec and the Smart Active Monitor technologies featuring AutoCalibration etc. Still to date, after 10 years in the market something Genelec is alone of. Genelec stays at the forefront of speaker technology and is proud to serve many of the worlds finest audio facilities.

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