More Doom and Gloom for Music
I recently reached out to my local Music Entertainment-Recording-Media-Arts Education Mega School/University. They’ve been in business for several decades, you probably know who I’m speaking of. They’ve been very successful with their programs. I’ve known several instructors that worked and taught there. I’ve participated in their free recording session platform.
The first time I recorded in one of those student recording engineer sessions was in the 80s. This goes back to multi-track analog tape machines. I remember playing drums on a “Jazz” session, the student engineer spoke to me through my headphone mix, “What’s that scraping sound? I explained I was playing with brushes. There was another incident where the student engineer ask, “What’s that hissing sound? I replied that I was playing my ride cymbal with sizzle rivets in it. Another time, I was playing a non-swing rumba tune. They ask me if I knew I had my snares off, on the drum.
On the other hand, I’ve had a few free sessions where I was very happy with the production.
My recent discovery and following of (ai) Chat GPT and other platforms brings me to this discovery. Things are changing rapidly in music, art, media and technology.
In my recent phone conversation with the head of recording artist relations at my local “Media-Arts-Entertainment” University, I mentioned interest in booking a free recoding session. He told me the program had evaporated to very few sessions. They weren’t booking any. What had been several 100 per month were now, only a few.
If they needed real live musicians for the session, they could recruit someone from within the school.
What this confirms is home studio or computer recording gear has become the affordable technology. The “University Degree” as a recording engineer is dead.
All education institutions need to be capable of change. With the invention of Pro Tools and Logic, I’ve always thought it was crazy to spend your money on a “University Degree” in recording.
Covid motivated thousands of live performance and recording musicians to learn the technology of home recording. I’ve watched videos and presentations from popular drummers that record tracks for clients from their home studio.
In 2023, (Youtube drummers performing with tracks has become the new “look at me” I’m fantastic, marketing resume) (Sign up for (whatever) if you enjoy this video, click the like button)
My local high profile “University” with it’s academic deletion from their catalog will be the first of many for education providers, in all fields. If I were a high position administrative Dean in Arts-Music-Entertainment, I would be looking at “new” ways to survive the decrease of tuition. The cash cow revenue oasis has dried up.
Hey, “What’s that hissing sound?
sign of the times, I guess. Sorry to hear.