Elektron-Users

Hey, has anyone here been to a school for audio production or engineering? Which one did you go to? Do you work in the audio field now?

I ask because I have taken a big plunge in my life by quitting my day job; my desire is to get a degree or something and do production or engineering or sound design, etc.

In fact, I'm going to SAE(.edu) today to check it out.

Let me know your thoughts.

Regards,
-d

Berklee College of Music in Boston is an excellent experience. I went there and would highly recommend it. I was a music synthesis major at the time and now program computers (including music software) for a living. Those things gel IMO

I went to the Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences in Tempe, Az. Honesty it was a great experience and one of the best years of my life. You can hang around campus and basically wait for kids that do not give a damn about 'school' to ditch out on their lab time which equals 12 hours in a top notch studio with a console like the SSL G+ series, rack gear like vintage la2a's and 1176's, etc.

Blah Blah.

It was fun! I learned a TON about audio as a whole, how to record and engineer a record, master tunes, etc.

I worked @ Tree Sound Studios in Atlanta Georgia shortly after for about 3 years. It was a great experience as well, but DO NOT expect to make a living off of being an audio engineer. First of all : no matter how good you think you are or how much you know, or how much a 'school' will tell you that you will be making records, you will know NOTHING about engineering when you get to work with artists. There is always someone else that has been doing it for 10 years, and in my case a kid that was 21 and had been engineering for 6 years because he droped out of highschool that worked with EVERY artist. Granted I did work with some artists like Outkast, Keith Sweat, Collective Soul, etc blah blah. All you really do for them is cut a vocal track, move a mic, help them set up a drum set.

Unless you are the house engineer you really do not do shit, and you do not make a living off of it.

As far as me now? I live in a small town about 20,000 people. I work at a killer theatre called abbeytheatre and run the sound there for their shows. They actually bring some decent artists in off tour like Patty Larkin, Zion I, Living Legends, Chuck Prophet (even though he is a big ex crackhead asshole)...

AND

I go to college for graphic design and music theory double major. So .................

If you have enough money to work and learn how to really be an engineer which means, oh, 6 years minimum outside of a school at a REAL studio? Then forget about it. I guess if you are planning on going to a school like Full Sail or Berekly which will cost you over $80,000 then you do not need to worry about money in the first place.

All in all it is a great experience. But no matter how much these sales people tell you that you will be making platnium records with Björk, it's bullshit. Even if you do happen to work with an artist that is famous or get to a landmark studio like Stankonia in Atlanta, you still are not really doing shit besides setting up mic's for the in house master engineer. If you are willing to poison the Master Engineer of a studio and kill him, then you could take his place. Otherwise wait in line for an expected 5-10 years before you really get anywhere doing that in the big fish tank of studios.

Good luck I hope my ramble makes some sort of sense.

oh yeah and they did pay me $7 an hour for the first 8 hours I worked, and you were expected to work for 16 hours every day, basically from 8am - 12am the next day (if you wanted to keep your job anyway). So you work for free for about 8 hours every day just to keep your job.

PS - This was a MAJOR studio and production house. Tree Sound Studios in atlanta. I am sure you will have better luck at a smaller place that does indeed get work but is not a major target for every audio engineer in the business.

These schools will mislead you into thinking they can get you jobs but the truth is much bleaker. My brother graduated from Expressions (like Full Sail) and I think out of his entire class maybe one person actually got a job doing audio work. For the $50-$60k it costs I think you're better off just educating yourself.

Exactly.
Going to one of those schools won't guarantee anything.

If you're starting out and your goal is to work in a studio, I'd say the easiest, most direct way is probably to learn how to use Pro Tools, and try to sell yourself as a PT operator.

Many notable producers and audio engineers are not that proficient with these *new* technologies and computers in general, and they might need someone to operate the software for them.

If you're really good at it I'm pretty sure you could make a decent living out of it.

The thing is that you can make a decent living off of being an engineer. You could work in a post house and dub sounds for commercials or movies, what have you. Working in a recording studio leaves you with NO life, as artist pay for 12 hours of time. Say room A in a studio is $1,200 for 12 hours with an engineer. That means you are there two hours every day setting up before the session, then about 2 hours afterwards. I would rather play poker for money but I still like being an engineer.

lot's of advice, haters, and praise for various audio schools on gearslutz. worth reading if you are thinking of dropping a ton of cash on one of them. personally i think there are less expensive ways to gain the knowledge and skills and finding a decent college or junior college w/a respected audio/recording program will get you just as far. then you can just learn pro tools somewhere or buy a pro-tools LE set up and master the software and you'll be right up there w/most full sail or AES grads. learn signal flow of an analog console, read Bob Katz guiide to Mastering Audio and some other well reviewed books and get a firm grasp on the concepts and then find an internship and see how recording sessions actually work. also, learn the science.. some acoustics info, phase, tape machine alignment etc etc.


http://www.gearslutz.com/board/high-end/95545-can-you-recommend-good-audio-engineering-school.html

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/so-much-gear-so-little-time/136887-going-full-sail-need-advice.html

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/moan-zone/72522-full-sail-graduates.html

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/low-end-theory/328458-i-want-future-audio-engineering-should-i-go-pro-tools.html

nljdj wrote:
The thing is that you can make a decent living off of being an engineer. You could work in a post house and dub sounds for commercials or movies, what have you. Working in a recording studio leaves you with NO life, as artist pay for 12 hours of time. Say room A in a studio is $1,200 for 12 hours with an engineer. That means you are there two hours every day setting up before the session, then about 2 hours afterwards. I would rather play poker for money but I still like being an engineer.

that's mostly true though a lot of that depends on what market you are in. many times for a tracking session, if you're tracking an album, then you setup and the studio stays that way while you track the album then you do overdubs (if you need to) then it gets mixed, usually some place else. so, the setup time is really on the first day and if someone is spending that kind of money per day on a studio it's a lockout and they are booking the studio for multiple days etc while tracking. oh also, that kind of money usually means there's an intern/assitant who helps the engineer and he is the one who is there first doing the dirty work (which is where you'll pay your dues while learning and waiting for a break).

i have to admit that being a freelance engineer is a hustle and can leave you w/no life and ruin your relationships etc. working 6 days a week for a month for 10-14 hours per day can really suck. plus, being freelance you are piecing your life together. a month session here then no work for 2 weeks then 6 weeks work then no work for a month etc etc.. so projects come and go and it can become all consuming but some people love it and manage to stay healthy and thrive on the lifestyle (i'm not one of those people). getting to the point of being a top tier engineer and picking your clients etc is like winning the lottery or making the NBA or something. you have to be talented, dedicated, driven and lucky and meet the right people and have a personality that people find amenable to getting work done. so, you really have to want to be an engineer and record lot's of bands and singers who suck and you can't stand just to get to the sometimes good bands you really enjoy.. so, really, you have to love to record.. you have to love the process in itself and take it all as a learning experience and be willing to edit a seminar of accountants so you can pay your rent

post jobs are different and really there are so many audio gigs and paths to go down that if you are really into and want the work then you can do a million different things form sound design to editing jingles to recording church bands and corporate board meetings, or doing live sound for bands etc etc.

audio post jobs tend to be more corporate in general. 9-5 monday through friday etc.

there's really a lot to say. you should read tape op. it's a great source of info on people, technical stuff, gear and all that.. mostly just great interviews about people past/present working in various levels in the audio world.

Read up on a lot of those threads. If you don't already have a college degree, go for your local community college or university and apply. Local, state universities aren't that expensive and can help take care of your costs. Many colleges have music programs that might not be as technical as SAE or the others, but still very good.

I would've considered double majoring in music, had I not already had 2 majors on my plate (Chem and Econ). Our school had a well renowned music synthesis teacher, and one of the professors was Miles Davis's pianist (I could listen to him improv for hours). Our music studio was nothing to scoff at, and there were several performing halls to control and intern at.

Anyway, a bachelor's degree in music from a university probably holds as much weight as a certification from an audio school (I base that off nothing, but just from reading these posts it seems like an associate's degree in recording doesn't help out much), and if that doesn't work out for you, you have a degree from a university that you could apply to other industries.