Euphonic Studio ™

Even though the weather is turning colder, things are turning hotter than a $2 dollar pistol in an all-night gunfight! (Pardon me, just had to use a simile today.)

Nitris work continues as Rick Schweibert laid down 3 tracks on Super Bowl Sunday. I am going to be re-doing all the second guitar parts for now as their hunt for a pair of blistering guitarists is proceeding well. They have taken over 30 calls so far and are planning to start auditions this Sunday.

Lisa Tracy will be here Friday the 17th to record another song. I still have not found exactly what I’m looking for to put on the additional tracks from her last recording session. We will try to get that straightened out.

I haven’t heard from Ben Shinrock for a few days; we are going to arrange a date to lay down live drums for his song Everything In Between which is a terrific alternative rock song.

In new business, Mary Smith (friend of my former colleague Doralyn Bigelow who moved to other parts) is organizing a run at finishing her CD project and after sorting out some entanglements with her publisher she will get underway here with her project. One thing she needs to do to finish her project is have her M-Audio controller keyboard (pre-Oxygen) hooked back up and get Forte re-installed on her computer. She plans to offer her songs for sale with scores. Mary writes and performs sacred music with an interesting twist; she has written narrations to tie her songs together. She has started this project in 2 different studios; it will finish in Euphonic Studio.

Steve Pawlenty surprised me yesterday by sending me a batch of tracks he sang for the song “My Redeemer Lives”. It’s a great song, and Steve did 4 backing vocal tracks with himself as lead singer. It’s a great arrangement, and I’ll be mixing that for him as time permits. Hopefully soon. I brought all the tracks into a project, anyway, so we’re almost there!

I’ve done a bit of work on Kaitlin Thune’s music video and hope to have that done and up shortly.

I decided to take down the two advocacy posts that I had up. I assume that the issues I was posting about will affect everyone greatly, but it’s out of my hands so I’m letting it go. Welcome to the 21st century.

Things are nearing the hectic stage in Euphonic recording studio. Photo credit goes to arseni at http://arseni.deviantart.com/

Euphonic Studio is getting REAL busy again. It seems like it’s time to try that cloning experiment again to see if two of me can handle this.

Ben Shinrock’s project is back on the table and I am starting tracking on Carousels, one of Ben’s songs that has a lot of potential. Besides bass & drums, I have tracked a Hammond part and plan to add a violin track which will share fills with another guitar, possibly a nylon string.

Nitris has had some personnel changes and we are dealing with that as we finished tracking the bass and vocals last night. My friend from Mt. Vernon Rick Schwiebert (Large Midgets, Copper Moon) will be adding guitar tracks to the project over the next 2 weeks.

Lisa Tracy got snowed out last Friday 20th and may be coming over this Friday if it fits her schedule. Her next song will include an overdubbed guitar solo, which is something we haven’t yet done but I am looking forward to hearing it. She is truly an artist and I love her work.

My granddaughter Kate helped me shoot a video which will show how easy and laid back it is to record a “karaoke” type song here if you bring in your own backing tracks. She chose to sing an Adele song which tests the bottom of her range, but that’s great because it will give me an opportunity to demonstrate Melodyne. This is an ongoing secondary project for the studio advertising/promotion effort. Since it’s my project it takes the back seat to my customer’s projects.

I need to also mention that Steve Pawlenty and I are working up a standards CD via email. Steve and I used to be bandmates in the Firehouse Band (see samples on their page link to the right) and so far we have one song mostly done… I am working on a page for Steve and also the Twilight Blues Band and will have these done soon. Or perhaps my clone can finish them for me…?

I noticed that we’ve been getting a lot of hits searching for information about Ben Shinrock’s recording project.  I’m sorry that I haven’t updated the site earlier, but I’m excited to tell you that we are back at it with some changes.  Also it’s exciting to see the public interest!

Ben Shinrock, singer/songwriter recording project is back on track! He will finish 3 songs by himself and then do one with his new band late in February.

Ben’s song “Everything In Between” will now be finished off with real drums rather than programmed ones.  The drummer for Ben’s new band will be playing the part.  Work continues on “Carousels” and the third song we started in the original sessions has been scrapped and will be replaced with a song yet to be chosen.

Sometimes towards the end of February we will be recording Ben’s new band for one song.  The band has yet to be named and the song has yet to be chosen, but judging by his earlier material it’s going to be exciting.

Also, on a personal note, Ben is now engaged.  Congratulations to Ben & Crystal!

We just passed the one year anniversary of Lisa Tracy’s work at Euphonic Studio.  She and her husband Mike came in for a studio tour in December 2010 and decided that this place had the right vibes for them to record.

We like to think of the Tracys as part of our family.  They have been coming over for recording sessions roughly every 2 weeks.  Mike figures that at this rate they have another year’s worth of material.

We are extremely gratified to have someone of Lisa’s artistic caliber recording here.  Her work has been one of the forces driving me to upgrade the recording systems and ancillary equipment; I want to capture her beautiful voice, guitar style, and songs in the best way possible.

Thanks to Lisa and Mike and here’s looking to another year of recording!

Euphonic Studio is happy to announce that the band Nitris from Cedar Falls, IA has chosen us to record their first CD.  It will consist of 9 original songs written by band members plus one bonus track. The name of the CD is Arise, and you can check more information on the project by clicking the Nitris link to the right.

Recording is scheduled to begin on December 11th.  More information, photos, progress reports, and possibly video footage of some of the sessions will be posted as it comes in.

We are extremely pleased that the band chose Euphonic after extensive shopping.  I like to encourage and support bands that are doing their own material and Nitris will benefit from recent upgrades to our AD/DA converters (RME UFX, a powerhouse!) and the integration of an analog mixer for summing.

Welcome to our new friends and clients, Nitris!

Update:  Nitris has begun recording their project here (Dec 11,  18, and 20th) and the songs are dynamite!  There is a ton of raw power in the rock songs and even the ballad evokes powerful images with the haunting melody and thematic material.  We are making good progress on it and hope to have some mixes soon.

Busy Times at Euphonic

From August into October has gotten to be pretty frantic around here (in a good way, of course). The recording studio part of Euphonic Studio business is keeping our foot on the accelerator trying to keep up.

In late August I recorded a 3 song demo for Rachael T. which you can hear at her own link in the Euphonic Studio Artists list to the right. Rachael T. is a young woman from the area with a load of energy and talent. We were very happy to have her visit us and I hope to talk her into doing a video to accompany the music she recorded.

Just previous to Rachael T. I recorded 5 songs from “High School Musical”, namely the duets between the two leads. Kaitlin Thune and Seamus Taylor headed up an amazing cast for the show, which MVHS put on for their Spring Musical last May.

Alex Doser, Music Director for MVHS "Little Shop of Horrors" and amazing pianist

After Rachael T. I again was visited for two sessions with the singing cast of the MVHS Fall Musical “Little Shop of Horrors”. The casting, again, was outstanding. In attendance at the session were Student Director Annabeth Lucas and Music Director Alex Doser.

There were two huge surprises for me at the session. First off, Alex is a musician’s musician, making my Mason and Hamlin grand sing and directing the session at the same time. WTG, Alex! Secondly, the casting choice for Seymour, Connett Krogan, was a former guitar student of mine who is very active in Mount Vernon football. The character voice he came up with was this mousey, Brooklyn-esque whine that was perfect for the part but so different than Connett that it was mind-boggling. All in all it was a pleasant way to spend a couple of intense afternoons. The music, BTW, is a bit on the edgy side.

As all of these things plus a number of family hassles unraveled, I have been working on a project for Ben Shinrock on an ongoing basis. I will get it done soon, though, because I had to cancel lessons for the month of October (ouch!) to go to International Falls, MN and look after my 86 year old mother. As it turned out, the situation was much more fluid than I was led to believe and it was able to be handled by another family member.

Ben is an interesting songwriter who has recorded 3 songs here. One of them is near completion, one may actually be done, and the other is somewhere about halfway done. I will see what he wants to put up on the site. I upgraded all of my recording software and hardware in the middle of Ben’s project and for some reason one of his songs is giving Sonar 8.5 Producer fits. I WILL get to the bottom of it, though, because that’s my job.

Bill and Lori Niemi, co-owners of Euphonic Studio LLC

Having a second website might seem redundant to some, and we already have been using Euphonic.us for nearly a decade.  But since the Euphonic.us website is somewhat static as far as content on music business sites go, I decided to start this one up as a more interactive experience for our visitors.  This site will be much more oriented to the recording part of our business.  You will find a lot of audio and video content created at Euphonic Studio and elsewhere to show how our capabilities have evolved over the years.

We are coming up on the 30th anniversary of Euphonic Studio’s first full length album! My how time flies. I have decided to put up recordings of former bands for a tribute to my former bandmates and a treat for their families. (I hope you enjoy them, too… some of the bands were actually quite polished). I have had such a terrific time re-connected with old friends over the years.  Some of you are still MIA… meaning I haven’t tracked you down yet.  I hope I don’t have to call out Dawg da Bounty Hunter! If you are one of my students or hobbyist friends I hope that hearing this old stuff might pique your curiosity and maybe even move you to get started on that project you always had in mind.  Do  you have an aunt you’ve always promised a recording?  Well, now you can actually afford to do it! More on the this and many topics.

PLEASE CLICK THE EUPHONIC STUDIO SCHEDULER FOR THE LATEST INFORMATION ON OUR SCHEDULE.  IF IT DOESN’T MATCH YOUR SCHEDULE THEN LET’S FIGURE OUT WHO’S WRONG (USUALLY ME) AND FIX IT!

Phone 319.895.8002 for information about recording and scheduling.

email: bill@euphonic.us