Where was the mastering guy born?

[soundsundergroun]

The ones that flunked mixing school. Just kidding

[Twerk]

I had used Nilz at The Exchange for a lot of my music, and it was always a joy to put on the test pressings for the first time. I think that alone inspired me to learn more about it.

[Bob Olhsson]

An awful lot of us started at record labels or at mastering facilities that serve the major labels.

[teknatronik]

so some of you had the intention of being mastering folk from the get go? very interesting... I would have never known about it without mixing... very cool!

[Bob Olhsson]

I found the idea of working with a cutting lathe very attractive because I'm pretty shy and thought a nerd like me could play an obscure, demanding technical role without needing better social skills. Then I got kicked out of Motown's mastering closet into the control room because I'd been a music student.

I wouldn't change a thing, my life's been a real blast! I've gotten to hang out with the greatest people in the world.

[teknatronik]

Originally Posted by Bob Olhsson

I found the idea of working with a cutting lathe very attractive because I'm pretty shy and thought a nerd like me could play an obscure, demanding technical role without needing better social skills. Then I got kicked out of Motown's mastering closet into the control room because I'd been a music student.

I wouldn't change a thing, my life's been a real blast! I've gotten to hang out with the greatest people in the world.

did you grow thinking you wanted to master music? i grew up knowing i wanted to make it, but not master.

[jayfrigo]

I knew pretty early I wanted to specialize in mastering. I certainly spent some time as a gigging and recording musician, and then recording and mixing engineer coming up, but after I finished college and had some experience in the process of making records (Bob Ludwig mastered one of my band's LPs at Masterdisk), mastering really appealed to me.

At the time it was not nearly as visible or understood by the general industry as it is today, and that was part of what intrigued me. I sought out an internship in mastering, served as an assistant, then did the "have Sonic, will travel" gig for a bit (it was still a rare and expensive thing at the time), and finally opened my own room. It was a pretty standard, if somewhat accelerated development: school, intern, assistant, editing, mastering engineer, facility owner.

[teknatronik]

Originally Posted by jayfrigo

I knew pretty early I wanted to specialize in mastering. I certainly spent some time as a gigging and recording musician, and then recording and mixing engineer coming up, but after I finished college and had some experience in the process of making records (Bob Ludwig mastered one of my band's LPs at Masterdisk), mastering really appealed to me.

At the time it was not nearly as visible or understood by the general industry as it is today, and that was part of what intrigued me. I sought out an internship in mastering, served as an assistant, then did the "have Sonic, will travel" gig for a bit (it was still a rare and expensive thing at the time), and finally opened my own room. It was a pretty standard, if somewhat accelerated development: school, intern, assistant, editing, mastering engineer, facility owner.

ok, that is very cool! thnx for sharing.

[muziekschuur]

And, with some great mastering engineers present, when became the title; "mastering engineer" come in fashion? I only knew of some guy who'd cut the masterdisk... And he's have to know somewhat about dynamics...

[Jim Williams]

Born of necessity. I got tired of paying top rates to have someone else ruin my CD's.

Now I can ruin them myself for free.

[SASMastering]

Born of necessity. I got tired of paying top rates to have someone else ruin my CD's.

Maybe there is a parallel to be drawn with leaving original audio designs alone.

I say it in jest as I have tweaked a few myself but your comment just comes across as being a bit negative and when really mastering helps many people improve their sonic integrity.

On topic I started as a musician working on my own music and others, then I worked in the UK's largest audio production company from the ground up to the head of engineering, doing tonnes of intense recording and mixing music and live gigs, broadcast engineering and mastering eventually. I just wanted to be a good sound engineer and it stemmed from that really.

[teknatronik]

I am just trying to wrap my ahead around the guy that heard the first audio bit and was like, " we need to master this."

I wonder how they figured it out or put it together that after the track was recorded it wasnt done. Maybe it didnt sound the same on tape as it did live? who was the originator/originators?

[Jerry Tubb]

Originally Posted by jayfrigo

I knew pretty early I wanted to specialize in mastering. I certainly spent some time as a gigging and recording musician, and then recording and mixing engineer coming up, but after I finished college and had some experience in the process of making records (Bob Ludwig mastered one of my band's LPs at Masterdisk), mastering really appealed to me.

At the time it was not nearly as visible or understood by the general industry as it is today, and that was part of what intrigued me. I sought out an internship in mastering, served as an assistant, then did the "have Sonic, will travel" gig for a bit (it was still a rare and expensive thing at the time), and finally opened my own room. It was a pretty standard, if somewhat accelerated development: school, intern, assistant, editing, mastering engineer, facility owner.

Like.

[t_d]

i started mastering the artists on my own label and it grew from there into a serious interest.

[Waltz Mastering]

Originally Posted by Jim Williams

Born of necessity. I got tired of paying top rates to have someone else ruin my CD's.

Now I can ruin them myself for free.

Funnier the first time around. (smiley face)

[Tarekith]

I started producing first, then just started having other producers ask me to polish their songs too, it took off from there.

Probably started earlier than that though, I used to be really into car audio, and had a lot of guys pay me to tweak their systems to sound like mine. I've always been the guy at parties adjusting the eqs on the stereo to make things sound better.

Didn't know what 'mastering' was until much later, but it seems I've always had some sort of knack for tweaking things a certain way that resonates with other people.

[Greg Reierson]

Originally Posted by teknatronik

I am just trying to wrap my ahead around the guy that heard the first audio bit and was like, " we need to master this."

It was more like having a recording and needing to make a master to so others could hear it. Intentionally changing the sound to be different than the mix is a more modern derivative.

[Squidly]

In Germany, It's an official title following stringent guidelines. The person is called a Tonemeister

Here's a quote from Wiki: The concept of a Tonmeister dates back to 1946,[1] when Arnold Schoenberg wrote a letter to the Chancellor of the University of Chicago suggesting a course to train "soundmen". Schoenberg wrote "soundmen will be trained in music, acoustics, physics, mechanics and related fields to a degree enabling them to control and improve the sonority of recordings, radio broadcasts and sound films". It was also in this year that the University in Detmold, Germany, started the first Tonmeister course

[Bob Olhsson]

Originally Posted by teknatronik

did you grow thinking you wanted to master music? i grew up knowing i wanted to make it, but not master.

I had no desire to be a performer or composer although I enjoyed playing in the violin section of my high school orchestra. A friend of my father's from Sweden was a violin maker. I seriously considered an apprenticeship with him before I saw my first lathe.

[Dylan W]

Originally Posted by teknatronik

I am just trying to wrap my ahead around the guy that heard the first audio bit and was like, " we need to master this."

I wonder how they figured it out or put it together that after the track was recorded it wasnt done. Maybe it didnt sound the same on tape as it did live? who was the originator/originators?

Correct me if this is the obvious answer.. but a mastering engineer arose out of the need to literally make a master that could be sent to the pressing plant. Operating the lathe was a specific skill. Tweaking the sonics was a later evolution, and one borne of competition and necessity (trying to get the master a little hotter, to sound a little better, etc).

[Joe_caithness]

I really liked eq and compression, like way more than was healthy, mastering is a way I can exercise this without people thinking I am odd.

[Thomas W. Bethe]

8 years classical piano in elementary, junior and senior high

3 years of high school electronics

4 years of college with a degree in Broadcasting

2 years Radio station engineer

1 Year TV sound engineer

43 years Classical recording engineer

2 years Mix engineer

5 years Live sound engineer

Intern in mastering

17 years Mastering, restoration and post production engineer.

That about sums it up.

(PLEASE NOTE: Many jobs overlapped so I am really not 90 years old...but sometimes lately I feel like it <GRIN>)

Hope this helps.

[teknatronik]

Originally Posted by Dylan W

Correct me if this is the obvious answer.. but a mastering engineer arose out of the need to literally make a master that could be sent to the pressing plant. Operating the lathe was a specific skill. Tweaking the sonics was a later evolution, and one borne of competition and necessity (trying to get the master a little hotter, to sound a little better, etc).

That is not obvious to me.


IF I were to guess I would say some of the others are saying what I thought... Either making it transferable to many systems or ready to be played for tv or radio... Maybe is was a silent movie person who said, " Hey! We need dialogue and e need it to be roughly same level?"

Some cool ideas and descriptions! thnx for the posts.

[Jim Williams]

Originally Posted by SASMastering

Maybe there is a parallel to be drawn with leaving original audio designs alone.
I say it in jest as I have tweaked a few myself but your comment just comes across as being a bit negative and when really mastering helps many people improve their sonic integrity.

It just comes from experience. I did learn a lot from Doug Sax. I did lathe work too besides all that warrentee bustin'.

It was born of necessity. With low cost digital editing, I didn't need a lathe anymore. The results that came back from top dog digital mastering guys left me disappointed. Every time I lost my air on top. I decided to figure out why.

I did and do it myself now, I'm very happy with the results. I'm not a spring chicken when it comes to mastering, now I'm a self serve chicken.

[Paul Gold]

Originally Posted by Dylan W

but a mastering engineer arose out of the need to literally make a master that could be sent to the pressing plant.

Correct. What we do now in manufacture speak is pre mastering. When you create a lacquer master it is the production part that the manufacturing moulds are made from. For optical disc manufacturing the production moulds are made from the glass master. Now that there is often no physical product even pre mastering seems like a misnomer. I guess the closest thing would be the person who creates the final files for distribution. That's not us.

Where's Laarso when you need him?

[Franco]

I got into this reaaally late, in the late 90's so "Mastering" to me means something different than it did in previous years. By the time I got into it, the task of delivering a pre-master source to a distributor was no longer that complicated.

A lot of the people I did work for in the early years of me getting into it still worked with analog recording gear, people weren't working with DAWs as much as they are now (this is back when people were using hardware samplers and modules, now everyone's got one Macbook pro and Beats By Dre headphones; Production/Recording/Mixing/Mastering all inside a laptop!)

The challenge now is to convince everyone working with DAWs, who can easily slap a limiter on the master bus that squashing the average levels while mixing isn't always the best option (the people winning in my book are those that know when to stop mixing). Another challenge is figuring out how to fix things when they bring you mixes that are already squashed and they ask "Can you print this to tape for some 'analog warmth'?"

The gig's evolved, I guess.

[senator adam]

Originally Posted by Thomas W. Bethe

8 years classical piano in elementary, junior and senior high

3 years of high school electronics

4 years of college with a degree in Broadcasting

2 years Radio station engineer

1 Year TV sound engineer

43 years Classical recording engineer

2 years Mix engineer

5 years Live sound engineer

Intern in mastering

17 years Mastering, restoration and post production engineer.

I now picture you looking like Gandolf.

[Thomas W. Bethe]

Originally Posted by senator adam

I now picture you looking like Gandolf.

Gandalf ???

Close but not quite... I do wish I had the money the actor who played him has but...I am not an actor.

[huejahfink]

Originally Posted by senator adam

I now picture you looking like Gandolf.

haha. I have a suspicion some of those periods may have ran concurrently.