AES Student Blog

Mastering The Mix is dedicated to helping music producers get the best possible results. We do this by making game changing tools for forward thinking producers.

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Interfacio provides a unique, global and specialist recruitment service within the Audio, Music, Broadcast and Film technology sectors. We identify and introduce suitably qualified and experienced commercial, technical and management personnel to our clients. Our specialized recruitment, search and selection service addresses the difficulties of recruiting for roles which need a very specific skill set and technical background. We have many years of working within the Professional-Audio industry and so we know and understand the space and have an established network of connections. We are committed to working closely and honestly with both candidates and clients, and as such, candidate fit and the long term success of our placements are our ultimate goals.

Originally a singer and pianist, Hazel Burns received a Bachelor’s Degree of Music in classical voice from the University of Victoria. Turning her focus towards the field of audio engineering, she went on to complete a Master’s Degree in Sound Recording at McGill University. During her studies she additionally trained as an Audio Associate at the Banff Centre with a focus on classical producing. The work she did at the Banff Centre lead to her being a recipient of the 2011 MusiCounts Fred Sherratt Award for Outstanding Achievement in Music and Recording Arts and Sciences. Ms. Burns later returned to the Banff Centre as staff in the roles of both Production Coordinator and Senior Recording Engineer.  

Other past positions include working as the staff Recording Engineer at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto and as a Post Sound Engineer and Music Editor at CTV on Discovery Channel Canada’s documentary series: Mighty Ships, Mighty Planes, Nerve Centre, and Alien Mysteries. She received a Canadian Screen Award nomination for Best Sound in a Documentary Series for the latter. She has additionally been active as both a freelance producer and engineer with many album credits to her name.

Currently Hazel Burns is a full-time professor in Music Production at the Universidad San Francisco de Quito in Ecuador, which is part of the Berklee International Network. When she’s not teaching, she keeps busy working on different recording and producing projects. She’s also an active member of AES, having started the first AES chapter in Ecuador.

Crane Song is the the company of designer and engineer Dave Hill who crafts hardware and software with an exceptional attention to detail.

Dave Hill's intimate knowledge of analog electronics, as well as decades of experience as a recording engineer have spawned a large range of very useful and musical products that deliver top-of-the-line quality throughout.

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Kirk McNally is a sound engineer who specializes in popular and classical music recording, as well as new music performances using electronics. He has worked with national and international recording artists in studios in Toronto and Vancouver, including REM, Bryan Adams and the National Youth Orchestra of Canada.

Kirk is the assistant professor of Music Technology for the School of Music at the University of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. He is the program administrator for the school’s undergraduate combined major program in music and computer science and the graduate program in Music Technology. His research and creative work has been supported by the Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst (DAAD), the Canada Council for the Arts, the University of Victoria’s Learning and Teaching Centre, the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC).  

His research explores the diverse ways recording engineers and producers communicate with musicians, both verbally and through their use of technology to manipulate sound, to better understand how they create the music we know and love in our everyday lives. In 2018 he was awarded a SSHRC Insight Development Grant for his project, “Creating Capacity for Research into Sound Recording and Music Production.” 

Having built a discography boasting names such as Wiz Khalifa, Donnie McClurkin, The Roots, Open Mike Eagle, Billy Woods, Milo and many more, Paul "Willie Green" Womack has established himself as one of the top record men in independent urban music. Residing in Brooklyn NY, Womack is a graduate of Berklee College of Music's MP&E program and is a freelance producer, engineer and songwriter. 

Piper Payne is a mastering engineer in Oakland, CA, where she works on albums for independent artists and major labels. Piper is the Owner and Chief Mastering Engineer of Neato Mastering and she is a Co-Founder and the Chief Product Officer for Second Line Vinyl, a new Oakland-based vinyl record pressing plant. She recently finished her term as President of the SF Chapter of the Recording Academy and serves on the P&E Wing Steering Committee and the Advisory Council. She is also the Co-Founder and Co-Chair of the Audio Engineering Society’s Diversity & Inclusion Committee and she is on the committee of the AES SF Chapter as well as an active member of Women's Audio Mission. Piper is an audio professor and guest lectures often about mastering and recording. Piper began her career with a BFA in Audio from The University of Michigan, continuing her graduate education in Audio at the University of Stavanger in Norway. She has apprenticed under some of the best-known Mastering and audio mentors in the world, including Bob Katz in Orlando and Michael Romanowski in San Francisco. Piper moved to San Francisco after working at the Banff Centre in Alberta, Canada as the Senior Audio Associate in a work-study program that had her climbing glaciers for film sound design and recording jazz orchestras in the same day! Her focus is mastering and she lives for quality and equality in audio.

Piper has a diverse background in musical styles. As a drummer, she knows that the best outcome of every project is that it has to feel good. As an engineer, Piper is focused on technical quality and correctness. But, at the end of the day, mastering is about format conversion and quality control so the project gets just what it needs.

Piper has mastered a wide variety of music including nationally renowned artists Third Eye Blind, Madame Gandhi, Geographer, Elettrodomestico (Jane Wiedlin/Go-Go’s), Shamir, Between You & Me, David Messier, and Fritz Montana, as well as Bay Area favorites Kat Robichaud, ANML, Sioux City Kid, The She’s, Emily Afton, Abbot Kinney, Travis Hayes, Kendra McKinley, Van Goat, and Diana Gameros.

Bill Crabtree is a Professor of Recording Industry and the Director of the Masters of Fine Arts program in Recording Arts and Technologies at Middle Tennessee State University. He works as freelance musician, recording engineer, and technical writer. He has engineered a wide scope of studio productions in Boston and Nashville. As a technical writer he recently completed the latest Operator’s Manual for the API Legacy Plus console. He teaches courses in multi-track recording and studio production in MTSU’s B.S. in Recording Industry and M.F.A in Recording Arts and Technologies.