Echo 61

Christine Rosen of The New Atlantis Raises Questions About Our Desires for Mobility...

2011-10-04T06:31:00.003-05:00

The New Meaning of Mobility

Christine Rosen

What is “mobility” and what is it for? The word has commonly been used to describe upward movement on the socioeconomic scale, the sort of classic American success story of which fiction and real life have given us countless examples. This figurative meaning is related to the more literal sense of mobility as freedom for movement across physical space — which itself has an iconic role in the American tale, from the explorers through the pioneers and the Beats. Americans understood the two meanings of mobility as of a piece: moving out and moving up, both a means of striking out for new prospects. It was liberation, pursued in the spirit of self-reliance, exploration, and reinvention.

Today, when we speak of being “mobile,” we refer to the myriad technologies that allow us to remain in constant contact with each other regardless of where we are. This kind of mobility isn’t like that of immigrants struggling to break out of poverty, or of the pioneers heading west. That kind was engaged with places: escaping the confines of the old place, searching for opportunities in the new. For today’s mobile citizens, place matters very little; it is an obstacle that technology painlessly overcomes, with our ever-present smartphones telling us always where we are, what’s around us, and, thanks to GPS, how to get where we are going.

The cutting edge of mobility is “location awareness”: smartphone content that automatically responds and reacts to your physical location. For instance, websites like Yelp allow you to see nearby restaurants and businesses. And Twitter, Facebook, and other social networking sites allow you to “geotag” your updates, so that friends and followers will know precisely where you are. Panasonic makes a camera with a built-in GPS that can automatically geotag every photograph you take, allowing picture-sharing sites to show where the photo was taken.

Although we rarely pause to consider whether this kind of mobility is good, we are beginning to see what it means for those who hope to profit from our use of it. AT&T recently unveiled ShopAlerts, a “geo-fencing” service: as the New York Times Media Decoder blog reported, “marketers can create a geo-fence around an event, like a concert, a retail location or a geographic area,” and when a person with a smartphone steps into the geofenced area, he is bombarded with offers of products to buy. This is but one example of how mobility has begun to deepen the commercialization of public space, moving it from mere ads and billboards to a point where every individual sojourn into public space becomes an opportunity for targeted commercial exploitation. In this sense, the digitization of public space seems to be following the path that the Internet took two decades ago, moving rapidly away from its initial status as a freewheeling, unencumbered realm and turning it into something that more closely resembles a shopping mall.

Consider an interview Eric Schmidt gave to the Wall Street Journal in August 2010 when he was still CEO of Google, in which he stated rather matter-of-factly, “We know roughly who you are, roughly what you care about, roughly who your friends are.” This is true for millions of users of GPS-enabled smartphones — and, as users of Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Android discovered this spring, data on their locations and movements are stored and transmitted back to the parent companies, meaning that they know too where you are, and where you were.

Why do Google and Apple want to know where you are and where you’ve been? So that one day in the near future, when you are walking home from work, Google can remind you to get milk and urge you to stop into a nearby store to buy it. Schmidt foresees, in the Journal author’s paraphrasing, that “a generation of powerful handheld devices is just around the corner that will be adept at surprising you with information that you didn’t know you wanted to know.” Schmidt calls this “serendipity,” and promises that it “can be calculated now. We can actually produce it electronically.”

How desirable, really, is this “electronic serendipity”? It is no small historical irony that the technology that is meant to liberate us from place also allows such ubiquitous location tracking: You can go anywhere, but you can also be found anywhere. The possibility encapsulated in the old form of mobility — the freedom to escape one’s past, the chance to start anew — is undermined by the technologies of the new mobility, which make it increasingly difficult for us, even from moment to moment in far-off places, to be free from society, from each other, and from ourselves.

Curiously, although we are ever more inextricably linked together in this way, human ties are not necessarily strengthening as a result. As many sociologists have documented, we frequently find ourselves “alone together,” whether we are immersed in our individual cell-phone conversations in public or updating our Facebook pages at home while our family members engage in their own electronic entertainments. We are now available for communication with practically anyone at any time, yet large numbers of Americans report feelings of loneliness, fewer families sit down together to share meals, and the number of Americans living alone is the highest it has ever been. We have more hours of leisure time than any previous generation, and yet we spend most of them watching television. And while we are “connected” to large numbers of people via social networking, studies show we have fewer close friends than did previous generations.

As Sherry Turkle puts it in her new book, which takes Alone Together as its title, “we expect more from technology and less from each other.” Perhaps we are justified in sensing something paradoxical at work in the progress of our technologies of mobility: their promise — to connect us to people and places — is belied by the reality that our connections to people and places seem only to be weakening.
Mobile But Tethered

To be rooted is perhaps the most important and least recognized need of the human soul,” Simone Weil argued in the mid-twentieth century. Even our virtual playgrounds pay homage to the deeply felt need for place: MySpace was, until recently, called “a place for friends”; Second Life mimics real-life places with its homes, offices, and restaurants. What is different about mobile playgrounds is that mobile devices force real life and virtual life (and real places and virtual places) to try to coexist in a way they never have before.

We want to see this as a good, enabling thing — I can fire off that e-mail to the office and then get back to relaxing on my vacation! — but it is instructive to go to a playground today: even on a weekend, you will see parents engrossed in their iPhones and BlackBerrys while their children make increasingly loud bids for their attention. The November 2, 2009 cover of The New Yorker sadly and beautifully satirized this trend: it shows an illustration of children out trick-or-treating, basked in the glow of houselights, while their parents bask in the glow of the smartphones in which they are rapt. Even our leisure time, it seems, has been colonized by our need to stay connected — and it is a constant struggle to set limits on our engagement with the virtual world so that we can attend to the real one in front of us.

And when we decide to leave home entirely, we find it difficult to leave the demands of work behind. Consider the cruise ship industry: every year, more than three million people board a Carnival Cruise ship to take a vacation. They spend a great deal of time eating — and gambling — and then eating some more. The perpetual buffets that have long been a staple of the cruise ship lifestyle cater to one kind of hunger; Carnival now caters to another — one that seems counterintuitive in vacationers eager to get away from it all: staying connected. With their twenty-four-hour Internet cafés, onboard WiFi, and an advertising campaign that features bikini-clad patrons lounging on deck chairs with laptop computers, Carnival Cruise Lines has enthusiastically responded to the demands of patrons who seek an ideal of maritime escape but still want to check their e-mail several times a day.

This, too, is the strange new world of leisure: never disconnected, and never really free from the demands of daily life. Notwithstanding all the talk of mobility, we find ourselves tethered in novel ways — not to a hometown, or to a particular social background, but to our devices themselves and the feeling of connection they provide, which we seemingly cannot sit still without.

This kind of ubiquitous connection transforms our sense of place. First, it brings the Outside in: it eliminates the boundary between work life and home life, and in the process disrupts many of the rituals of private life. Family members constantly checking in and out of virtual worlds exist in a state that has been dubbed “continuous partial attention,” which is hardly conducive to healthy family life. Neither is this erosion between work and home life at all like the days when the two were merged, with children tending to the family farm and family members producing goods out of home-based workshops, for this new shift does not bring with it the binding up of family members together in some shared activity or practice. Quite the opposite: what family members do around each other at home has less and less to do with each other.

Our new mobility also brings the Inside out by transforming public space. Every public space is now potentially a scene for the private if we can reach out to those we know via technology. The oft-told tales of being forced to listen to someone else’s cell-phone conversation are but one example. More broadly, our new mobility brings the Inside out in the sense that we bring our personal connections with us wherever we go. We can talk to our neighbor when we’re on the other side of the world, and update our Facebook page while climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro. This connectivity comes with a cost: the joy of being away from familiar places and discovering new ones unencumbered, the freedom of disconnection.

A related consequence of our increasing mobility is the homogenization of experience. We take our devices with us wherever we go, staying connected to our social networks and tapping into the same sources of news and entertainment that we would access at home. Even when visiting remote or exotic locales, we now need never go without the social chit-chat, political commentary, celebrity gossip, sports scores, and jokes that fill our everyday conversations. In the twentieth century, industrialization and mass culture, for all their blessings, greatly eroded local flavor and the particular character of places. Now, the 24/7 hum of electronic communication is having a similar effect, making our experience of every place like every other.

Mobility also continues to erode social institutions. As one writer for the Carnegie Council put it in summarizing the findings of a German research project, “Increased mobility goes hand in hand with increased economic uncertainty, especially among young professionals,” which has led to delays in marriage and childrearing. “Not only are young people less economically able to start a family, but they also change locations more often than ever with the fluidity of labor markets. Spouses or couples are less likely to find appropriate work in the same place.” What was at first the freedom that mobility newly granted us to move about is increasingly becoming an economic necessity.

Seen in this light, mobility is less appealing. When mobility becomes transience, ennui often follows. In Keith Gessen’s 2008 novel All the Sad Young Literary Men, one character remarks, “If you walked around America and looked properly, what you saw was a group of wandering disaggregated people, torn apart and carrying with them, in their hands, like supplicants, the pieces of flesh they’d won from others in their time.” They are probably also carrying their iPhones, thinking them a relief.
Losing Our Place

Perhaps it is time to reconsider “location awareness.” Nearly forty million Americans change residences each year; our daily commutes to work are getting longer and longer. A genuine awareness of location or place might lead us to rethink mobility, to recognize that much of the ritual and happenstance of daily life — from the family meal to a passing conversation with a stranger on the bus — is necessarily tied to place. We outsource location awareness to mobile technology and exercise too little of it ourselves.

In a recent symposium about the Internet, architect Galia Solomonoff noted the way “our sense of orientation, space, and place has changed” because of the connectedness and mobility made possible by our new technologies. But she cautions: “The Internet at this point privileges what we can see and read over many other aspects of knowledge and sensation, such as how much something weighs, how it feels, how stable it is.” And she wonders whether we are better able to navigate places now than we were before the advent of location awareness technology: “Do we have longer, better sojourns in faraway places or constant placelessness? How have image, space, place, and content been altered to give us a sense of here and now?”

These are good questions to grapple with as we think about the future of mobility and membership in particular communities. Serendipity is not, contra Google’s former CEO, something we can engineer; it is the ability to find something valuable when we are not even seeking it. Mobile technologies promise us access to just such a world whose vast riches we can explore, but in practice, Internet serendipity has come to resemble targeted advertising rather than exciting unexplored horizons.

The more fundamental question is whether, in inhabiting these virtual worlds, we lose sight of the importance of the real one — and our deeply felt human need for place, for community, and for the unpredictable pleasures of face-to-face interaction. Just as architects and urban planners can design buildings and city centers that encourage rather than discourage community, so technological designers and individual users can construct boundaries that make use of our tools without undermining the good life we originally devised them to better.

Christine Rosen is a senior editor of The New Atlantis. She is the coeditor, with Naomi Schaefer Riley, of Acculturated: 23 Savvy Writers Find Hidden Virtue in Reality TV, Chick Lit, Video Games, and Other Pillars of Pop Culture (Templeton, 2011).

The New Atlantis » Why Bother with Marshall McLuhan?

2011-09-06T06:26:00.000-05:00

The New Atlantis » Why Bother with Marshall McLuhan?

Sir Ken Robinson...on transforming education

2011-01-14T23:53:00.002-06:00

JM featured in article on audio education in GC Pro's Audio Solutions...

2010-12-30T09:11:00.003-06:00

It was thirty years ago today...

2010-12-08T21:42:00.001-06:00

From the Op-Ed pages of the NY Times, December 8, 2010:

JOHN and I are in our Dakota kitchen in the middle of the night. Three cats — Sasha, Micha and Charo — are looking up at John, who is making tea for us two.

Sasha is all white, Micha is all black. They are both gorgeous, classy Persian cats. Charo, on the other hand, is a mutt. John used to have a special love for Charo. “You’ve got a funny face, Charo!” he would say, and pat her.

“Yoko, Yoko, you’re supposed to first put the tea bags in, and then the hot water.” John took the role of the tea maker, for being English. So I gave up doing it.

It was nice to be up in the middle of the night, when there was no sound in the house, and sip the tea John would make. One night, however, John said: “I was talking to Aunt Mimi this afternoon and she says you are supposed to put the hot water in first. Then the tea bag. I could swear she taught me to put the tea bag in first, but ...”

“So all this time, we were doing it wrong?”

“Yeah ...”

We both cracked up. That was in 1980. Neither of us knew that it was to be the last year of our life together.

This would have been the 70th birthday year for John if only he was here. But people are not questioning if he is here or not. They just love him and are keeping him alive with their love. I’ve received notes from people in all corners of the world letting me know that they were celebrating this year to thank John for having given us so much in his 40 short years on earth.

The most important gift we received from him was not words, but deeds. He believed in Truth, and had dared to speak up. We all knew that he upset certain powerful people with it. But that was John. He couldn’t have been any other way. If he were here now, I think he would still be shouting the truth. Without the truth, there would be no way to achieve world peace.

On this day, the day he was assassinated, what I remember is the night we both cracked up drinking tea.

They say teenagers laugh at the drop of a hat. Nowadays I see many teenagers sad and angry with each other. John and I were hardly teenagers. But my memory of us is that we were a couple who laughed.

Yoko Ono is an artist.

TFMAA at 129th AES in San Francisco...

2010-11-09T07:36:00.004-06:00

The 129th AES Convention in San Francisco was once again held at the Moscone Center.

TFMAA was asked to serve on the panel at the Education Forum. This year's topic was Creating the Out-of-Class Experience. Our presentation was titled PRODUCTION IN ACTION: An Innovative Approach to Collaboration with the Industry. Alex Case, AES Education Committee Chair, moderated the 90 minute session.

Other educators and professionals on the panel included Agniezka Roginska, Paul Geluso, and John Storyk representing New York University, and Nathan Breitling, Ryan Kleeman representing Art Institute of California.

Hundreds of exhibitors filled the large hall. Boutique manufacturers of everything from high-end analog front end mic pres and eqs to medium and large format consoles to loudspeakers were on display. We noticed a remarkable resemblance in many of these new products to designs of the past.

TFMAA also had a table at the Education Fair. More schools than ever were present talking with prospective students of audio programs. Sam Pasquesi, Tom Siuchninski, Dakota Serviss, Adam Hajnos, and Kyle Olson all made the trip to represent the Recording Arts Department and institution.

Sennheiser/Neumann Event at TFMAA

2010-11-04T10:18:00.008-05:00

Tribeca Flashpoint now listed as a Education Partner and Resource at SoundWorks Collection....

2010-10-18T09:57:00.007-05:00

The SoundWorks Collection is a new site and organization linking students and educators to industry professionals and "behind the scenes" source material to be used in the classroom and consumed by anyone interested in knowing about the world of audio post-production for the film and game industries. Below is an example of their latest piece produced by Michael Coleman highlighting the audio post process on the new film The Social Network led by Supervising Sound Editor Ren Klyce. Check it out:

The SoundWorks Collection home site can be found here.

New Gear at TBFP...

2010-09-10T13:51:00.005-05:00

Focal CMS50s as nearfields in both Post Control rooms.

Each of the Post rooms now have two channels of John Hardy M1 and two channels of Chandler LTD-2. Post 1 has two additional channels of Helios 69 and Post 2 has two additional channels of Chandler LTD-1.

Universal Audio 2-610S for Music Control.

Fender Twin 1965 Re-Issue.

Ampeg SVT7 Pro Bass Head and SVT410 Cabinet.

A pair of Neumann TLM67s.

New Surround Post Suite Coming Online at TBFP...

2010-09-10T13:42:00.002-05:00

Like Post Control 2, this suite is equipped with the D-Command control surface. Barefoot MM27's are among the last items yet to be installed.

Catie Curtis Recording Arts Workshop...

2010-07-09T23:33:00.004-05:00

Chicago Blackhawks Ticker-Tape Parade...

2010-06-11T11:43:00.010-05:00

Official Tribeca Flashpoint press release...

2010-04-19T23:32:00.005-05:00

TRIBECA ENTERPRISES AND FLASHPOINT ACADEMY ANNOUNCE STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP SET TO OPERATE UNDER NEW BANNER: TRIBECA FLASHPOINT MEDIA ARTS ACADEMY
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

TRIBECA ENTERPRISES AND FLASHPOINT ACADEMY ANNOUNCE STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP SET TO OPERATE UNDER NEW BANNER: TRIBECA FLASHPOINT MEDIA ARTS ACADEMY

Tribeca Becomes Fifty-Percent Partner in Chicago-Based Digital Media Arts & Sciences Academy, Expanding the Digital Media Education Model

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Academy Expands Tribeca’s Presence in Education, Innovation and Digital Media

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New York, NY [April 13, 2010]– Tribeca Enterprises and Flashpoint Academy today announced that Tribeca Educational Ventures LLC, a Tribeca Enterprises subsidiary, will partner with Chicago-based Flashpoint Academy of Media Arts & Sciences. The two-year Digital Media Arts College is set to be re-named Tribeca Flashpoint Media Arts Academy and will provide students with an enhanced hands-on education in film and broadcast, game and interactive media development, recording arts and visual effects and animation.

Founded in 2007, Flashpoint was created as an alternative to traditional media arts education. The school focuses on immersive learning using the tools, methods, latest technology and trends used in today’s converging digital entertainment industries. Currently, 450 students learn to produce films, video games, music videos, animation and broadcast projects inside Flashpoint’s 75,000 square foot state-of-the-art facility and two large-scale production stages in Chicago. Flashpoint’s first class graduated in the spring of 2009, with students going on to careers and internships with media, gaming and production companies, including Reveille, FOX Searchlight, Tap Me! Games and Robomodo Games, Draft FCB, Young & Rubicam, Chicago Recording Company and IATSE Local 2.

Tribeca has become a 50% partner in Flashpoint and will enhance the college’s curriculum and programs by offering students access to industry-recognized talent and visiting lecturers, increasing real world work experience through student participation in Tribeca Enterprises initiatives and Tribeca Film Festival projects; and by providing access to Tribeca partners, sponsors and industry contacts that strengthen student job prospects upon graduation.

“Flashpoint stood out as an extraordinary opportunity to complement and expand our educational and digital media ecosystem,” said Craig Hatkoff, Co-founder of Tribeca Enterprises. “Tribeca Flashpoint’s platform is scalable; the emphasis on hands-on learning using the latest technologies will prepare the first generation of digital natives for the transition from the classroom into the marketplace. We believe innovation and creativity are teachable skills that will be necessary for success amidst the ongoing disruption of traditional business models.”

“Education has always been a part of the fabric of Tribeca,” said Jane Rosenthal, co-founder of Tribeca Enterprises. “The media industry is rapidly evolving and the skills required for success are as well. We are excited about Tribeca Flashpoint’s ability to provide students with a digital media education, training, opportunities and hands-on experience they need to become the future of our industry.”

“Flashpoint Academy has always used a forward-thinking, collaborative approach to digital media education,” said Flashpoint CEO Howard A. Tullman. “As these crucial media industries continue to merge – with games demanding increased narrative structures – and films requiring more and more animation, visual effects as well as powerful music, we think convergence is the key to the future. Working hand in hand with Tribeca, we are confident that the school will continue to be a leader in education and provide our students with even more opportunities to break into all of these industries.”

“Tribeca’s investment in Flashpoint is part of our continued commitment to our industry,” said Tribeca Enterprises co-founder Robert De Niro. “We have always sought to nurture young aspiring talent and I am proud that this new venture will continue to do just that.”

Tribeca Enterprises is the umbrella organization for the Tribeca Film Festival, Tribeca Cinemas, the Doha Tribeca Film Festival, a new national distribution initiative, Tribeca Film and the first-ever Tribeca Film Festival Virtual. Through its investment in Flashpoint, Tribeca will further extend its digital media portfolio and presence beyond New York City. Tribeca Flashpoint has the opportunity to strengthen the media arts education landscape and create new opportunities for digital media students by focusing on hands-on experience and job-placement.

Tribeca Flashpoint students will receive a comprehensive digital media arts education based on a collaborative, real-world model and graduate from Tribeca Flashpoint equipped with the skills and work product to enter the digital work force.

Enrollment for the fall 2010 semester at the Tribeca Flashpoint Media Arts Academy is currently open. For additional information, please visit www.tribecaflashpoint.com. Tribeca Flashpoint Media Arts Academy is located at 28 North Clark Street, Chicago, IL.

About Tribeca Enterprises
Tribeca Enterprises is a diversified global media company based in New York City. Established in 2003 by Robert De Niro, Jane Rosenthal and Craig Hatkoff, the company currently operates a network of branded entertainment businesses including the Tribeca Film Festival, Tribeca Film Festival International, Tribeca Cinemas, and the newly announced distribution initiative, Tribeca Film. The Company's mission is to provide artists with unique platforms to expand the audience for their works and to broaden the access point for consumers to experience independent film and media. Jonathan Tisch, through Walnut Hill Media, is a minority investor in Tribeca Enterprises and is a member of the Board of Directors.

Tribeca Flashpoint Media Arts Academy new logo...

2010-04-15T07:03:00.002-05:00

De Niro's Tribeca partners with Flashpoint...

2010-04-13T21:17:00.005-05:00

Written by Mark Caro - Chicago Tribune - April 13, 2010

Tribeca is the name of a Lower Manhattan neighborhood, film festival, institute and production company, and now it has a strong Chicago association as well.

That's because the company founded by actor Robert De Niro, his producing partner Jane Rosenthal and her investor husband Craig Hatkoff has taken a 50 percent interest in the Loop-based two-year digital media vocational school Flashpoint: The Academy of Media Arts and Sciences. The school now will be known as the Tribeca Flashpoint Media Arts Academy as it opens a virtual pipeline between the 75,000-square-foot Clark Street facility and Tribeca's New York headquarters.

"It really means amazing opportunities for our students," Flashpoint president/CEO Howard Tullman said, noting that his school was "looking for a strategic partner as much as an investor."

"It's state of the art," Rosenthal said of Flashpoint. "It's really an amazing place. It just happened to be the right fit for what we were looking for."

Tribeca has been in expansion mode of late, overseeing not only the Tribeca Film Festival (launched in 2002 and running Apr. 21-May 2 this year) but also a virtual version of the festival, a cinema, a production facility and an institute involved in community outreach and education. Rosenthal said her company has worked with middle-school and high-school students before, but Flashpoint represents the first such partnership with an institution for more advanced students.

Built out in a high-rise kitty corner to Daley Plaza, Flashpoint welcomed its first students in September 2007 and has seen its enrollment grow from 110 students to the current 450, Flashpoint Dean Paula Froehle said.

"What Howard has pulled together in a very short period of time, it's almost hard to believe," Hatkoff said.

The school takes a contrasting approach to the film program at nearby Columbia College, which offers a traditional four-year liberal arts degree. Flashpoint is a two-year immersive program designed to prepare students, college age or older, for work in the digital media world.

Local-based filmmaker Harold Ramis has close ties to Columbia College, and also appears in Flashpoint's promotional materials. He said he still values a four-year liberal arts education, but he's also impressed with Flashpoint.

"It's a really cool facility," Ramis said. Calling Tribeca an institution that "does things right," he added, "I can't imagine this is a moneymaking enterprise for them, but as a pipeline for talent and well-trained students, it's probably a good thing."

To Rosenthal and Hatkoff, the partnership is less about bringing Flashpoint students into the Tribeca fold than boosting an industry in a state of wild flux.

"I've been in the industry for over 25 years, and I've never seen the industry change more," Rosenthal said. "The jobs and the skills (needed) are changing dramatically, and you need to stay forward thinking. The students that do come out of this program will help us keep our industry healthy."

Hatkoff cited a question posed by a Gates Foundation report: "How do we prepare students for jobs that don't yet exist?" Flashpoint, Hatkoff said, is poised to do just that.

Tullman said he envisions Tribeca Flashpoint students getting involved in various aspects of the film festival, such as working with filmmakers and helping them develop marketing materials and trailers. (Flashpoint students already have done such work on projects such as "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo," distributed by Chicago's Music Box Films.)

Rosenthal said the specifics of the interplay have yet to be determined. "It's too soon to say what students at Tribeca Flashpoint will be doing at Tribeca," she said. "If students have the opportunity to work at Tribeca and if we have the opportunity to work with students, that will be fantastic."

Third Coast International Audio Festival...

2010-04-12T19:34:00.005-05:00

The Third Coast International Audio Festival (TCF) was founded in 2000 as a part of Chicago Public Radio, WBEZ–FM. After eight great years, the festival became its own non-profit arts organization in the summer of 2009. Since its inception, the TCF has celebrated and supported producers and other artists making compelling, relevant, and innovative audio documentary work of all styles; and has worked to bring this fresh and vital work to audiences throughout the world.

To learn more click here.

Harry Everett Smith...

2010-03-25T07:09:00.019-05:00

HARRY SMITH (1923-1991)

Harry Smith was an artist whose activities and interests put him at the center of the mid twentieth-century American avant-garde. Although best known as a filmmaker and musicologist, he frequently described himself as a painter, and his varied projects called on his skills as an anthropologist, linguist, and translator. He had a lifelong interest in the occult and esoteric fields of knowledge, leading him to speak of his art in alchemical and cosmological terms.

Harry Smith was born May 29, 1923, in Portland, Oregon, and his early childhood was spent in the Pacific Northwest. Smith's father, Robert James Smith, was a watchman for the local salmon canning company. His mother, Mary Louise, taught school on the Lummi Indian reservation. Robert Smith's grandfather had been a prominent Freemason who was a Union General in the Civil War. Harry's parents were Theosophists, who exposed him to a variety of pantheistic ideas, which persisted in his fascination with unorthodox spirituality and comparative religion and philosophy. By the age of 15, Harry had spent time recording many songs and rituals of the Lummi and Samish peoples and was compiling a dictionary of several Puget Sound dialects. He later became proficient in Kiowa sign-language and Kwakiutl. In addition to developing complicated systems for transcription, he also amassed an important collection of sacred religious objects, one of a number of museological endeavors that occupied Smith throughout his life.

Smith studied anthropology at the University of Washington for five semesters between 1943 and 1944. After a weekend visit to Berkeley, during which he attended a Woody Guthrie concert, met members of San Francisco's bohemian community of artists and intellectuals, and experimented with marijuana for the first time, Smith decided that the type of intellectual stimulation he was seeking was unavailable in his student life.

It was in San Francisco that Smith began to build a reputation as one of the leading American experimental filmmakers. He showed frequently in the "Art in Cinema" screenings organized by Frank Stauffacher at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Smith not only became close with other avant-garde filmmakers in the Bay Area, such as Jordan Belson and Hy Hirsh, but traveled frequently to Los Angeles to see the films of Oskar Fischinger, Kenneth Anger, and other Southern Californians experimentalists. Smith developed his own methods of animation, using both stop motion collage techniques and, more uniquely, hand-painting directly on film. Often a single film required years of painstakingly precise labor. While a few other filmmakers had employed similar frame-by-frame processes, few matched the complexity of composition, movement, and integration in Smith's work. Smith's films have been interpreted as investigations of conscious and unconscious mental processes, while his fusion of color and sound are acknowledged as precursors of sixties psychedelia. At times, Smith spoke of his films in terms of synaethesia, the search for correspondences between color and sound and sound and movement.

Smith's films cannot be easily separated from his paintings, and in both he was influenced by the abstract work of Kandinsky, Marc, and others who formed the foundation of the collection of the Museum of Non-Objective Painting (later the Guggenheim Museum) in New York. Smith developed a relationship with Hilla Rebay, the museum's director, and she arranged for Smith to come to New York and to receive a Solomon Guggenheim grant in 1950. He moved to New York permanently in the early fifties. In need of money, he offered to sell his extraordinary record collection of American vernacular music to Folkways Records. Instead, Moses Asch, the label's president, challenged Smith to cull his collection into an anthology.

In 1952 Folkways issued Smith's multi-volume Anthology of American Folk Music. The Anthology was comprised entirely of recordings issued between 1927 (the year electronic recording made accurate reproduction possible) and 1932, the period between the realization by the major record companies of distinct regional markets and the Depression's stifling of folk music sales. Released in three volumes of two discs each, the 84 tracks of the anthology are recognized as having been a seminal inspiration for the folk music revival of the 1950s and 1960 (the 1997 reissue by the Smithsonian was embraced with critical acclaim and two Grammy awards). Traditional American music was only one of Smith's musical interests. From the late 1940s, he was a passionate jazz enthusiast, going so far as to create paintings that are note-by-note transcriptions of particular tunes. He spent much of the fifties in the company of jazz pioneers like Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, and Thelonious Monk. Smith's involvement with recording continued into the sixties and seventies as he produced and recorded the first album by the Fugs in 1965. His long term friendships with many of the Beat writers led to the release of Allen Ginsberg's First Blues in 1976 as well as unreleased recordings of Gregory Corso's poetry and Peter Orlovsky's songs. Smith spent part of this era living with groups of Native Americans, and this resulted in his recording the peyote songs of the Kiowa Indians (Kiowa Peyote Meeting, Folkways, 1973).

Smith's broad range of interests resulted in a number of collections. He donated the largest known paper airplane collection in the world to the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum. He was a collector of Seminole textiles and Ukrainian Easter Eggs. He also considered himself the world's leading authority on string figures, having mastered hundreds of forms from around the world.

Smith spent his last years 1988-1991) as "shaman in residence" at Naropa Institute, where he offered a series of lectures, worked on sound projects, and continued collecting and researching. In 1991 he received a Chairman's Merit Award at the Grammy Awards ceremony for his contribution to American Folk Music. Upon receiving the award, he proclaimed, "I'm glad to say my dreams came true. I saw America changed by music."

Harry Everett Smith died at the Chelsea Hotel on November 27, 1991.

Gregory Corso...

2010-03-17T07:24:00.005-05:00

"They, that unnamed "they," they've knocked me down but I got up. I always get up - and I swear when I went down quite often I took the fall; nothing moves a mountain but itself. They, I've long ago named them me." — Gregory Corso

Just Kids...

2010-03-15T20:08:00.007-05:00

63 years of age and still creating, Patti Smith continues on...

In reading her recent tender and bittersweet memoir Just Kids, which chronicles her time in NYC in the 1970's, and in particular, her profound relationship with Robert Mapplethorpe, I was struck not by the excesses of drugs and booze and dangerous lifestyles the artists, musicians, writers, and actors of the time were living, but by how little she partook. Make no mistake, she was at the heart of it, at first a homeless bohemian, eventually moving into the historic artist co-op Hotel Chelsea, then on to various loft spaces, all the while sharing some of the most remarkable moments of New York's 20th century counterculture with the likes of Allen Ginsberg, Jimi Hendrix, Harry Smith, Sandy Daley, Janis Joplin, Gregory Corso, William Burroughs, Andy Warhol, Bobby Neuwirth, Todd Rundgren, Tony Ingrassia, Jim Carroll, Sandy Peralman, Sam Shepard, etc. The intersections went on and on, as did the overdoses, mishaps, alcoholism, and dangerous promiscuity, but she rarely indulged herself.

Like the immediacy of a Polaroid picture, Patti Smith captured the moment. I can't help but think her unique discipline to craft a filterless phrase, being of and with a community, the eyes and ears of a movement, was not somehow divine. Her spirit and spirituality has never waned. She saw it. She lived it. She made sure she could retell it. Most of them are gone, yet Patti continues on helping us understand, and for that I thank her.

More Cavashawn pics...

2010-03-02T09:58:00.007-06:00

Flashpoint hosts Gammy U and Chicago's Cavashawn...

2010-02-25T21:22:00.009-06:00

The March 2010 issue of AP Magazine called Cavashawn Chicago's "Hometown Hero." Via Flashpoint's association with Grammy U, Cavashawn came into our studios for a terrific day-long workshop with both first and second year Recording Arts students. This is another wonderful example of FPA's connection to industry professionals and regular opportunities for our students to engineer bona-fide real-world recording sessions.

Legendary microphone preamplifier designer John Hardy lectures as AES Student Chapter guest...

2010-02-07T07:27:00.004-06:00

el relojero: The Clockmaker's Revelation...

2010-01-27T22:50:00.005-06:00

Directed by Paula Froehle, el relojero is another beautiful example of meaningful and immersive learning via collaboration at Flashpoint Academy. Perry Harovas and his crew of visual effects students worked day and night to bring this surrealistic narrative alive with color and motion while my team of sound designers, Kieran Dennis and Dan Newman, explored and experimented with the ideas of "hearing" time passing within the imagination of a simple clockmaker. Miguel Kertsman's score, recorded in real-time to picture through complex networking in multiple studios, delicately provides an emotional context of the protagonist.

Enjoy!

el relojero: The Clockmaker's Revelation from Flashpoint Academy on Vimeo.

Hollywood Foley Artist Vincent Guisetti returns to Flashpoint for two workshops...

2009-12-17T09:41:00.007-06:00

Perennial AES scholar, author, and sound engineer, Alex Case lectures on the subject of digital delay as Student Chapter guest at Flashpoint...

2009-11-22T21:11:00.009-06:00

psychodots, Not a Pretty Face

2009-11-14T07:47:00.001-06:00

Our third PRODUCTION-IN-ACTION was a music video. Directed by Film Department Chair, Peter Hawley, the video is a fun chronicle of the band's inability to "stay current." What began in the Flashpoint recording studios as a two-day tracking and overdubbing session that the students set-up and ran, ended on our soundstage for another three days with film students getting a healthy dose of working side-by-side with industry professionals.

Enjoy!

psychodots from Flashpoint Academy on Vimeo.

Michael Santucci lectures to Recording Arts students at kick-off event hosted by Flashpoint Academy and AES Student Chapter...

2009-10-28T21:28:00.006-05:00

Michael Santucci, President and owner of Sensaphonics, Inc. lectured to all first-year students of the Recording Arts Department at Flashpoint Academy this past Thursday October 22. The event not only served as an excellent supplement to the foundational courses RA students are currently taking in the department, but also acted as a kick-off for the guest lecture series hosted by the newly formed Audio Engineering Society Student Chapter at the school. Michael lectured on hearing conservation, in-ear monitors, and the need for an overall awareness of living in an culture that more and more includes "personal listening devices" played back at dangerously loud sound pressure levels. During the demonstration portion of his lecture, Michael took ear canal impressions of Academic Dean Paula Froehle, which will become custom-molded ear plugs. Kudos to all the officers of the AES Student Chapter for hosting a great first event.

127th AES in NYC...

2009-10-13T16:13:00.005-05:00

The Intruder

2009-08-23T18:15:00.002-05:00

The Intruder was our second PRODUCTION-IN-ACTION and a considerably larger undertaking than The Collector in terms of numbers of students. It premiered in Toronto at the Worldwide Shorts Film Festival and has since gone on to play festivals in Palm Springs, Evanston, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, and Barcelona.

We were able to incorporate the entire sound design process into the Flashpoint curriculum from the very beginning - assigning students to record the many layers of Foley effects, work on cut effects, and design some of the other-worldly sounds that play such a major role in the film. In fact, virtually every sound element in the track, save for the sparse dialogue, was recreated in post-production. Incorporating Miguel Kertsman's haunting score provided yet another wonderful example of collaboration because so many of the visual effects needed support - and from a sonic perspective, that had to be done by one of the teams but not both. In the end, I really think there is a seamless integration and the result is quite powerful.

Enjoy!

The Intruder from Flashpoint Academy on Vimeo.

MDR - Foreign Tongue - Live at Flashpoint Academy

2009-07-17T16:31:00.002-05:00

The Collector

2009-07-10T06:56:00.004-05:00

Our first PRODUCTION-IN-ACTION project. It was shot during the summer of 2007 with post-production occurring later that fall. The Collector had its world premiere as a 35mm print at the Chicago Outdoor Film Festival in 2008 and has since gone on to play film festivals nationwide. The soundtrack for this film is one of the most subtle sound designs I have ever done, but it's among my favorites. Director Paula Froehle really allowed me a lot of latitude for soundscape and texture in the ambience tracks, which I believe provides an incredibly complex, albeit distant, foundation for the narrative. There's also plenty of aural space to support Pete Biagi's gorgeous drifting cinematography. And Miguel Kertsman's gentle score has a dreamy, melancholic feel that seems to float right along side the memories of the protagonist. All in all, quite lovely.

Enjoy!

The Collector from Flashpoint Academy on Vimeo.

JM quoted in latest Vintage King press release...

2009-07-06T11:15:00.010-05:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
July 7, 2009
Barefoot Sound MicroMain 27
Available Exclusively in the United States through Vintage King Audio

PRODUCT SPECIFICATIONS
Description
3-way active monitor with integral subs
Controls Input level attenuator, Twt/Mid/Sub amplifier mutes, crossover voicing select
Input Impedance 50k Ohm
Frequency Response 38 Hz – 20 kHz (+/- 1.5 dB)
Bass Response -3 dB @ 33 Hz
Q = 0.707
Slope: 12 dB/octave

Cabinet: 32 liters total internal volume, Sealed sub enclosure, Individual sealed midbass
enclosures, Machined aluminum front baffle plate
Crossover Frequencies 110/2500 Hz
Tweeter 1” soft dome, Rear waveguide chamber

Power: 60W
Dual Midbasses 5” poly cones, Sealed rear waveguide enclosures
Power: 250W
Dual Subwoofers 10” aluminum cones, 1” peak-to-peak linear excursion
Power: 500W
AC Power Input Nominal 115 VAC or 230 VAC selectable
Power Consumption Idle: 30W, Maximum: 675W

Weight Speaker: 71 lbs each (32 kg)
Shipping: 79 lbs each (36 kg)
Dimensions HxWxD 20.5 x 9.5 x 15.25 inches (521 x 241 x 387 mm)
Price $3,747.50 USD (MSRP: $4,650.00 USD)

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING...
“The most important factor for us as an educational institution and working facility was to have a multi-channel speaker system that could serve both the music and cinematic industries. I’ve been very happy with the MM27’s translation to virtually any environment – in the car, at home, on the patio, lo-fi, hi-fi, through in-ears or headphones and in small and large theatrical settings. I’ve never mixed on loudspeakers that result in the same impression, no matter the playback system or acoustic space. In a word: astonishing.”

John Murray, Flashpoint: The Academy of Media Arts & Sciences, Chicago
In addition to serving as Chair of the Recording Arts Department at Flashpoint, Murray has worked in film sound editorial for 25 years, designing and mixing award-winning soundtracks for features, documentaries, shorts and commercials. For more information on Flashpoint Academy, visit www.flashpointacademy.com

For additional information, images or to schedule a product demo for review,
please contact Meghan Pochebit, Meghan@OffCentralPR.com

Flashpoint Academy graduates first class...

2009-06-15T19:40:00.001-05:00

Congratulations to all the students, staff, and faculty for this momentous accomplishment. The inaugural class - forever trailblazers - will go on to do great things and I'm especially honored to call them my colleagues.

The Recording Arts Class of 2009:

Gabe Anello
David Ballard
Ryan Burtis
Nick Charlan
Ryan Connelly
Kieran Dennis
Serafin Flores
Joe Herald
Jeremy Hoen
Chris Loeber
Eric Maat
Dan Macias
Alec Meredith
Chris Messer
Daniel Newman
Dan O'Leary
Dan Patchin
Tim Pearson
Joe Petrovich
Josh Popescu
Kevin Weber
Brian Shields

Happy 50th Antoine!

2009-05-06T22:22:00.005-05:00

50 years ago this week François Truffaut's Les quatre cents coups [400 Blows] premiered at Cannes and signaled the French New Wave. Happy Birthday!

theMDR - Day 3 - Day of Show...

2009-04-29T19:37:00.013-05:00

theMDR - Day 2 - More Pics...

2009-04-29T07:49:00.015-05:00

theMDR Concert Poster...

2009-04-28T20:18:00.003-05:00

Created by Rachel Landry.

theMDR - Day 2 - Lights, Sound Reinforcement, Mobile Truck...

2009-04-24T00:47:00.023-05:00

theMDR - Day 1 - Staging and Rigging...

2009-04-21T22:01:00.004-05:00

theMDR - Open Window

2009-03-25T18:24:00.004-05:00

theMDR >> TH3 MO5T DAN63ROU5 RAC3 to play live concert for Flashpoint Academy's spring PRODUCTION-IN-ACTION...

2009-03-12T19:57:00.029-05:00

Flashpoint Academy's PRODUCTION-IN-ACTION. Unique, large-scale, and totally immersive. This will be the fourth PIA since we opened our doors in September of 2007 and it's shaping up to be as exciting as anything we've done to date. A live concert with theMDR on our newest soundstage, Studio B in the CBS production center at Dearborn and Washington, is at the heart of an idea that ingeniously brings all four disciplines together for a thoroughly collaborative learning experience second to none. Industry professionals leading key crew positions. First-rate concert sound, staging, and lighting. Multi-camera high-definition shoot. Game development and design with visual effects and graphics from the show. Students engaging in the process. This is PRODUCTION-IN-ACTION.

Matt Walker and JT McCluskey.

Sonically emotive, visually scintillating >> theMDR.

The show will be captured via an HD multi-camera "iso" shoot and high resolution digital audio; raw video elements and multi-channel audio will be brought into an interactive game environment where the player acts as technical director in a "live" broadcast line cut; VFX students will create images for projection inside the venue and graphics for the game; Film students will shoot and cut; Recording Arts students will record, edit, and mix, and Game students will construct a race against time and accuracy Flash-based game resembling a live broadcast - all under the direction of industry pros and the artist.

PRODUCTION-IN-ACTION at Flashpoint, the Academy of Media Arts and Sciences.

Recording Arts students visit Gravity Studios for capstone Mixing and Mastering class with Doug McBride...

2009-03-06T05:32:00.006-06:00

Flashpoint Recording Arts students track analog to Studer 2" - Nathan Tenenbaum of The Next Big Sound...

2009-02-27T13:57:00.008-06:00

Flashpoint Recording Arts student Nick Charlan takes on first FPA Studios job for singer Erin O'Shea and piano accompaniment...

2009-02-22T07:58:00.004-06:00

Bernie Mack at Wall 2 Wall teaching analog in second Flashpoint Academy Recording Arts Focused Studies class...

2009-02-22T07:52:00.006-06:00

Flashpoint Recording Arts Associate Chair, Bernie Mack, leads first offsite Focused Studies class at Wall 2 Wall Recording...

2009-02-12T14:00:00.005-06:00

Recording Arts students take a field trip to visit and talk with Millennium Park and Harris Theatre acoustical designers and technicians...

2009-01-31T15:41:00.012-06:00

The Miracle wins a CINE Golden Eagle...

2008-12-30T09:50:00.007-06:00

Congratulations to Jeff Smith and The Miracle crew once again for another award!
In total - 47 festival appearances, 20 awards, and 8 nominations.

This film was one of the most challenging and rewarding sound design projects I've done. Because it covers several decades of time and many different locations, I found it very difficult to find an overall tone - something that's important for me early on in the development of a soundtrack. As I worked my way through the series of vignettes that make up the film, I realized I had stopped fighting the desire to have sonic continuity and just gave into the story. What emerged, to my pleasant surprise, was a soundtrack that surged and recessed right along side the two main characters and actually supported the conflict between them, making the eventual resolution that much more powerful. In hindsight, it was the obvious choice to make, and that's what's so interesting to me about the creative and collaborative process.

From CINE:

CINE has a remarkable track record for rewarding excellence, particularly among new and emerging filmmakers. Many prominent members of the film and television industry have received the CINE Golden Eagle Award, and for some — such as Ken Burns and Steven Spielberg — it was their first major award. Ron Howard was a teenager, Robert Zemeckis a college student, and Mike Nichols a young comic when each won his Golden Eagle, and hundreds of other distinguished filmmakers, producers and journalists have since followed in their footsteps, some in CINE’s early years (Mel Brooks, 1963) and others in the present day (Martin Scorsese, 2006). For members of the film and television industry, the CINE Golden Eagle Award is an acknowledgment of excellence and validation by their peers.

Good luck!

Ralphi Rosario spends day at Flashpoint in Remix Workshop...

2008-11-24T18:08:00.004-06:00

AES Day 2...

2008-10-07T16:33:00.006-05:00

AES Day 1...

2008-10-04T03:41:00.010-05:00

Alice Peacock at Flashpoint....

2008-09-30T22:33:00.007-05:00

Alice Peacock, Chicago singer/songwriter, was gracious enough to spend an afternoon with Rec Arts students in the studio talking about her personal creative process of writing and recording.

Flashpoint Rec Arts Faculty Miguel Kertsman...

2008-09-24T20:56:00.015-05:00

International recording artist/composer and Flashpoint Recording Arts Department faculty Miguel Kertsman will be performing live this Saturday, Sept 27 as part of PianoForte's prestigious Salon Series - Piano Plus. More information can be found here.

Richard Wright 1943-2008...

2008-09-15T22:43:00.011-05:00

The quiet, unassuming keyboard player extraordinaire of The Pink Floyd Sound has died. More to come... Meanwhile enjoy RW's exquisite contribution to perhaps the best of TPFS, Echoes [this site in part named after], 1971, live at Pompeii.

Second brodcast of Introductions with WFMT...

2008-09-07T06:52:00.011-05:00

L to R: Lisa Brownstone, Introductions host, Julie Belsky, 16, mezzo-soprano, Linda Zhao, 15, piano, David Polk, Introductions producer

Jesse McQuarters, WFMT engineer, George Luif, Flashpoint engineer

Dan Patchin, Rec Arts student, Andy Rosenstein, Flashpoint in-house producer, Ian Roelle, Rec Arts student

New Mic-Pre's in Music Control at Flashpoint...

2008-09-06T10:05:00.010-05:00

A Designs - PACIFICA

Shadow Hills - 500 Series Mono Gama [Golden Age Microphone Amp]

Recording Arts Guest Speaker Series No. 2...

2008-08-21T07:16:00.010-05:00

Tuesday, August 19
Curt Marolt
Senior Sound Designer/Composer at Publications International LTD.

Eric Arunas
Live performance Recording Engineer of classical music for WFMT.

Wednesday, August 20
Rich Carle
Lead Sound Designer and Director of the Audio Studio at Midway Games.

The Collector goes 35mm...

2008-08-15T07:03:00.003-05:00

Last week, among some 1000+ Chicago film enthusiasts, I sat and watched [heard] the first-ever Flashpoint Academy produced film The Collector in Grant Park on a gargantuan screen with a killer sound system. The film, directed by FP Academic Dean Paula Froehle, was not only accepted as a short to be screened at the Chicago Outdoor Film Festival, but is living and breathing proof our PRODUCTION-IN-ACTION component has real-world impact. Though the festival could not accommodate our multi-channel surround mix, the stereo playback system at the venue was first-rate and, of course, it was terrific to see it projected as a 35mm print.

One of my students...

2008-07-11T22:19:00.003-05:00

...asked me to do an interview about why I settled on sound design and teaching as my career path. I thought it might be helpful for incoming Flashpoint students if I re-printed the transcription.

The interview was conducted by Dan Newman, one of the inaugural Rec Arts students, now awaiting his second year at FP.

------------------

April 2008

Dan Newman: You seemed to have established yourself well in the field of sound design, can you talk about how you got started in the industry?

John Murray: I suppose it all started with a love for sound, and a thirst to capture it, harness it, manipulate it, and to tell a story with it.

My first recording device was a cheap portable Panasonic cassette recorder / player. I carried it with me everywhere. I was about nine years old. Once I discovered that I could start and stop recordings with the “PAUSE” button, and in effect, string together snippets of audio, there was no stopping me. Although I didn’t recognize it as such at the time, it was a way that I could “edit.” Much like a film editor tells a story by “editing” together discontinuous moving image sequences, I was editing little pieces of unrelated audio that once compiled together told a story that was formerly only present in my imagination.

That primitive methodology evolved through middle school until I became dissatisfied with the lack of precision. After all, the PAUSE button was mechanical, housed inside a really cheap device. I wanted the ability to make “cuts” that were absolutely, and precisely, in time with the music I was using. So around the time I started high school, I began meticulously taking apart cassette casings, carefully pulling the tape off the reels, cutting it with scissors at exact moments, rearranging the pieces and using scotch tape to mend the seams back together.

By the time I got to college and was allowed to use “professional grade” open reel tape recorders, splicing blocks, grease pencils, razor blades, and real bona fide splicing tape, I was completely hooked.

DN: Why sound design? Have you any interest in music recording or location audio?

JM: Though I thoroughly enjoy the process of recording music with bands, and I’ve done a fair amount of it, I guess I’ve always known that “audio production,” including the freedom and control of multi-track layering, editing, and manipulation, was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. I just love the idea of being able to use bits of seemingly random pieces of recorded audio to create an entirely new emotional response.

And, for the first ten years of my career, I was fortunate enough to work at facilities that had both music recording studios and sound for picture rooms. So, if I ever had the urge to do that I could.

Location audio wasn’t something I understood until I started doing audio post for TV commercials. I did location audio a few times early on and it just never agreed with me. I never got comfortable with waiting around on set for hours while grip and electric and the DP set up shots.

Field recording to gather sound effects and ambiences, on the other hand, is something that interests me very much though I never seem to have enough time to do it.

DN: Can you talk a little about the medium that you worked on before Pro Tools became the industry standard? What was the industry standard before the digital age came about?

JM: Well, obviously it was in the analog domain. I started out using the Ampex AG-440 line of transitor-based recorders. Fantastic machines. 1” 8-track, 1/2" 4-track, and 1/4” 2-track. Built like tanks. Then I moved up to Otari multi-track recorders, before finally working regularly with a variety of 2” 24-track machines. You have to understand that although these machines were workhorses – I mean you could really pound on them - you had to perform daily maintenance, constantly making adjustments to the internal electronics that governed record and playback levels and bias across the frequency spectrum. It was a funny mixture of feeling comfortable that the machines would NEVER fail you, so we worked them pretty hard, but you also wanted to take care of them. I suppose it’s akin to antique car collectors getting fussy about “leaning” on a front quarter-panel. In the end, they were mechanical devices, and we were the operators, so an extraordinary amount of care went into making sure they were functioning properly. It was just part of the gig. Any engineer from that era will muse fondly about the countless hours listening to the voice identifying frequencies on MRL [Magnetic Reference Laboratory] alignment tapes used to calibrate the machines.

There was also the fact that there wasn’t any “undo.” When you punched into record on a specific spot on tape it was forever, no going back. Whatever was there previously was now erased. It seemed completely natural at the time, but part of being a good engineer was understanding the limitations of the devices you were working with, which included only a certain amount of tracks. What we would call “file management” or “track layout” today was at a premium back then. You only had so many, so you had to pack it in wherever you could.

DN: What is your process in doing the actual work of sound design for film? Is it conceptually driven or practical, or both?

JM: It starts out conceptually and then moves into practical. There is always this moment at the beginning of a project where I panic a little, not knowing how things are going to turn out. Or if I’m going to be able to sonically capture the essence of a story, but that always seems to fade the farther I move along in the process.

I typically begin with dialogue, cleaning up production audio to make it as smooth as possible throughout the film. It often takes quite a while to get the noise floor to be seamless from shot to shot and scene to scene. In doing this, I become very familiar with the characters and the little nuances in performance, which helps me hone in on the story on several different levels—not just the obvious narrative arc, but also any symbolic or metaphorical stuff that I can latch onto.

I then turn my attention to backgrounds or ambiences. Again, taking great care to represent an interior or exterior shot as accurately as possible. Often, I have to “build” an ambience. For exteriors, this means creating things that are not only appropriate in the foreground, but also distant, out-of-frame stuff, like dogs barking, car passes, hydraulics of buses, lawn mowers, kids playing, construction, airplanes, you name it—anything to bring alive the neighborhood. Mind you, all of these sound elements usually end up on the edge of perception, but they really give a soundtrack realism.

Foley is next. If I’m doing it myself it’s fairly laborious. Footsteps, floor creaks, seat rustles, and cloth movements make a huge difference, but there are always props that need to get re-recorded as well. Keys, phones, dishes, glasses are all examples; it’s really anything that a character may handle, touch, or move.

Of course, I’ve described a typical slice-of-life film. If the story is a thriller or action or sci-fi or horror, everything changes. In those cases, music and / or sound design elements created with virtual instrument modules, i.e., synths and waveform modulation stuff, play a much bigger role and I usually need to get to that earlier in the development of the track.

DN: How do you get motivated to do the work? What are your aspirations? Who inspires you most?

JM: It’s not “who” that inspires me, it’s “what.” It’s always the story. If the story is good, interesting, and meaningful, I’m in for the long haul. And I guess that’s where my motivation comes from.

DN: In your personal experience, how has your creative work reflected or influenced your life?

JM: That’s not exactly an easy question to answer because I think it goes both ways, back and forth. My personal life certainly influences my creativity, but it’s also the other way around.

What I can say is that when I’m deep into a project there is no difference between them. In other words, immersing myself in a sound design project is my life for a short amount of time. It’s all I think about. I go to sleep anxious to get back to it the next day, and I wake up thinking about how yesterday’s work is already different in my mind. There are definitely instances of clarity that come to me as I walk away from the studio each day or night. Perspective and momentary distant from a project is vital to me. I need time to digest and ponder the development of each day’s work. I suppose if you charted it, there might be a pattern. But if there is, I’m not sure what it looks like.

DN: Is there anything about the industry that you know now that you wished you had known 10 years ago?

JM: Not so much 10 years ago, but I wish I knew 25 years ago how important it would be to protect my hearing. I used to go to a lot of live music shows, most of them were entirely too loud, and I also spent quite a bit of time under headphones listening to audio at high SPL’s. I just didn’t think about it then, I was young and thought I was invincible. The parts of the ear that allow us to hear are some of the few vital human organs and processes that do not repair if damaged. Ever.

DN: What advice can you offer someone interested in the sound design field?

JM: Don’t worry about the software and hardware. By the time you master any given product it’s long obsolete. Spend your time grasping concepts. Sound, image, time, and space are good places to start. Develop perception, attention to detail, and aesthetics. Work on communication skills and understand collaboration and never keep somebody waiting. If you can create a sound in your mind and then know exactly how to achieve that sound using available technology or good old-fashioned knowhow, and do it quickly, you’ll be just fine.

I don’t mean to sound like an advertisement for Flashpoint Academy, but we hammer away at these issues for a reason. They are the most important tools you can have.

DN: Do you enjoy teaching the craft better than working in the field?

JM: Fortunately, I get to do both. But yes, I enjoy teaching immensely. I think one of the greatest gifts we can give is to pass along knowledge and experience to the next generation. And to finally find an institution where immersive and experiential learning can take place—something I believe in very strongly for technology-based education—is a terrific situation for me.

New Pics of Flashpoint...

2008-06-17T23:11:00.005-05:00

Photographer: Nick Novelli.

Flashpoint Recording Arts Guest Speaker Series...

2008-05-17T10:01:00.030-05:00

Monday, May 12
Jeff Kliment
Newest Rec Arts faculty, coming onboard June 1. Former faculty at San Francisco Art Institute, former lead sound designer and project manager at LucasArts, and former music recording / Foley / ADR engineer at Russian Hill Recording.

Tuesday, May 13
Jun Mhoon
CEO of I Am Music Online, Jun is a digital aggregator / content supplier for iTunes, Amazon, Real Network, Napster, eMusic, Google, etc.

Wednesday, May 14
Cory Coken
Sound Designer / Mixer at Avenue Edit. Has designed hundreds and hundreds of national, regional, and local commercials, films and documentaries.

Thursday, May 15
Tom Zimmerman
Location Sound Recordist and Digital Imaging Technician. 30 years working with many major film companies and productions houses including Sony Pictures, BBC, National Geographic, David Gruber Prods, Ron Ascher Prods, etc.

Danny Leake
Mastering Engineer, owner of Urban Gurilla Engineers. Kanye West, Janet Jackson, Sting, Hank Williams Jr., Candlebox, Willie Nelson, Stevie Wonder, etc.

Friday, May 16
Doug McBride
Music Recording Engineer, owner of Gravity Studios. Working round the clock right through the heart of Chicago’s Indie scene, Gravity has hosted Veruca Salt, Smashing Pumpkins, Fall Out Boy, Dashboard Confessional, Juliana Theory, Bob Mould, RATM, Red Red Meat, Sinead O’Connor, etc.

Psychodots come to Flashpoint...

2008-04-30T07:12:00.012-05:00

Rob Fetters, Chris Arduser, and Bob Nyswonger, also known as they Psychodots came into town this week for four days as part of our spring PRODUCTION-IN-ACTION. Part I took place Monday and Tuesday in the Flashpoint music recording studios as the band re-recorded Not a Pretty Face with Bernie Mack engineering. During the afternoon session, RA students took the controls, punching through vocal parts for verses and choruses.

Part II takes place today and tomorrow on a soundstage where FP Film students will be involved in the shooting of a video for the song with Peter Hawley directing and Amy Rising producing.

Game and Animation students, who helped with our set-up on Monday, are also creating a game to go along with the video.

All in all, it's another terrific immersive-learning experience for FP students.

The Miracle wins People's Choice in Europe...

2008-04-23T23:28:00.013-05:00

The Miracle takes home the People's Choice Award at the European Spiritual Film Festival marking the fifth award in the last two weeks, and eight awards overall. Congratulations to Director Jeff Smith and the rest of the cast and crew who made designing the soundtrack for this film such a delight.

The scorecard, so far...

FILM FESTIVALS

WORLD PREMIERE: RHODE ISLAND INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, AUGUST 2007

INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, SOUTH AFRICA, OCTOBER 2008
REELHEART INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, TORONTO, JUNE 2008
SUPERFEST, BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA, JUNE 2008
TUPELO FILM FESTIVAL, MAY 2008
RENO FILM FESTIVAL, MAY 2008
BIG ISLAND FILM FESTIVAL, HAWAII, MAY 2008
WEST CHESTER FILM FESTIVAL, PENNSYLVANIA, APRIL 2008
SYRACUSE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, APRIL 2008
FIRST TAKE FILM FESTIVAL, GEORGIA, APRIL 2008
EUROPEAN SPIRITUAL FILM FESTIVAL, FRANCE, MARCH-APRIL 2008
EAST LANSING FILM FESTIVAL, MARCH 2008
TREASURE COAST FILM FESTIVAL, FLORIDA, FEBRUARY 2008
MUSKEGON FILM FESTIVAL, FEBRUARY 2008
PICTURE THIS FILM FESTIVAL, CALGARY, FEBRUARY 2008
GOLDEN LION FILM FESTIVAL, SWAZILAND, AFRICA, NOVEMBER 2007
ABILITIES ARTS FESTIVAL, TORONTO, NOVEMBER 2007
NEW HAMPSHIRE FILM FESTIVAL, OCTOBER 2007

AWARDS

PEOPLE'S CHOICE AWARD, EUROPEAN SPRITUAL FILM FESTIVAL, 2008
BEST FAMILY FILM, RENO FILM FESTIVAL 2008
BEST COMEDY, FIRST TAKE FILM FESTIVAL 2008
BEST SHORT SCREENPLAY, TREASURE COAST FILM FESTIVAL 2008
ACHIEVEMENT AWARD, SUPERFEST 2008
SECOND PRIZE, LAKE MICHIGAN SHORTS COMPETITION, EAST LANSING 2008
HONORABLE MENTION, ROCHESTER-HIGH FALLS INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 2008
HONORABLE MENTION, PICTURE THIS FILM FESTIVAL 2008

NOMINATIONS

FINALIST, BEST COMEDY, WEST CHESTER FILM FESTIVAL, 2008 - TBA MAY 2008
NOMINATED, BEST SHORT, BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY, TREASURE COAST FILM FESTIVAL 2008
SEMI-FINALIST, ANGELUS AWARD 2007

Third Coast International Audio Festival...

2008-03-21T06:39:00.005-05:00

My good friend Michael Slaboch reminded me that it's that time of year again. Chicago Public Radio's Third Coast International Audio Festival competition gets underway by accepting submissions in the Radio Ephemera Short Docs category beginning April 1.

Submission guidelines can be found here.

This year's requirements are very interesting. The audio doc should include the "voice of a stranger," while connecting, in any way the producer desires, the narrative of two of five pre-selected books from the Prelinger Library.

As warmer weather arrives, I plan to strap on the remote kit and hit the streets. There's nothing like the smell of field recording in the morning.

Vincent Guisetti - Hollywood Foley Artist comes to Flashpoint...

2008-03-14T21:21:00.045-05:00

Footsteps, cloth, props. It's messy; it's physical; it's a day in the life of a Foley Artist. Flashpoint Academy, in a continuing effort to bring high-profile, industry professionals inside the studios and classrooms of its educational facilities at 28 North Clark Street was fortunate enough to host renowned Hollywood Foley Artist Vincent Guisetti yesterday in two workshop sessions.

There was a simple theme to Vincent's message: Foley effects can breathe life into satisfactory, but otherwise sterile, soundtracks for motion pictures. Though it's not complicated, it does require an eye for frame accurate precision and a feel for the natural rhythms and cadences of actor's movements. "You have to be willing to get inside a character's head. In essence, become that character while you are performing Foley," he said.

Vincent treated our students to many of the stories of working on roughly 350 films, TV shows, and cartoons including Passion of the Christ, Mr. Brooks, Hostel parts I & II, The Pursuit of Happyness, Talladega Nights, Behind Enemy Lines, and the last five years of SpongeBob SquarePants.

He also let students in on some trade secrets like snapping and twisting wood shingles wrapped in denim for bone breaks, cornstarch in a pillow case for footsteps on snow, a handful of sand between several layers of small panes of glass for cracking ice, a wet shammy for all types of splats and splatters, and how a mere tablespoon of coffee grounds on cement adds just the right amount of grit to simulate exterior pavement.

Once again, FP students engage with the real-world as part of their educational development. It's built-in to the curriculum so that as graduates they can hit the ground running.

Special thanks to Steven Berger for arranging the connection.

Get up and out...

2008-03-04T22:08:00.011-06:00

A couple of weeks ago I had the pleasure of meeting Joe Shanahan, owner of Chicago's own Metro. I told him that I think his club is historic, not unlike the Haçienda in Manchester. CBGB's in New York, and the Whisky a Go Go on Sunset Blvd. are others that come to mind. R.E.M. and New Order in '82, Ministry, X, and The Replacements in '84, Minutemen, Meat Puppets, Robyn Hitchcock, Sisters of Mercy, Everything But the Girl, Jesus & Mary Chain in '85, Fine Young Cannibals, Sinead O'Connor, Skinny Puppy, Sonic Youth, Art of Noise in '86, They Might be Giants, Flaming Lips, 10000 Maniacs, and Yo La Tengo in '87, Sugarcubes, Smashing Pumpkins [first show], Jane's Addiction in '88, Nick Cave, Poi Dog Pondering, Happy Mondays, Afghan Whigs, Screaming Trees, Mudhoney, Soundgarden, Bob Mould in '89... you get the idea.

For 25+ years, Metro has been the place in the Midwest to hear emerging musical artists give old and new audiences alike the raw, uncensored, straight from the soul, essence of who they are - LIVE!

Joe mentioned an upcoming show that's "not to miss;" The Gutter Twins on March 7. When I found out GT are scheduled as the "late show" that Friday night [12:30 a.m. start], after a full-tilt performance from Bob Mould earlier in the evening, I immediately thought about getting home somewhere in the neighborhood of 3 a.m. and how I haven't done that in years.

Since that conversation, I've been thinking about live performances and how in some ways they're really all we have left. Our convenience-driven, iPod-isolating, personal preference culture has relegated us to experiencing new musical art from the comfort of our homes, the iTunes Store, and personal music devices. I think that's really true for a big segment of the folks who are old enough to afford the shows and young enough to walk to them. I am as guilty as the next person in this regard and intend to get up off my couch and change my ways. I aim to make time, like I once did years ago, to experience the community magic of a live show. Truthfully, there's nothing like it and I'm going to start this Friday at the Metro.

P-Solo installation press release...

2008-02-24T21:54:00.006-06:00

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS: Flashpoint, The Academy of Media Arts and Sciences, has purchased two TRUE Systems P-SOLO single-channel microphone/instrument preamplifiers and installed them in two sound-for-film suites in its new 32,000 square-feet production/post complex.

The educational facility, which opened in the heart of Chicago's Loop in September 2007, offers two-year courses in digital arts and entertainment technologies at its campus, which features multiple sound stages, graphics bays, Avid edit suites and audio rooms outfitted with state-of-the-art equipment.

"We bought the P-SOLOs specifically to install them in our mini suites," says Bernie Mack, a Chicago-based recording engineer and educator for over 15 years and a Flashpoint Academy Recording Arts faculty member. "They have everything we were looking for - features, controls, design and performance. They're perfect, especially for the price."

Flashpoint Academy chose the TRUE P-SOLO preamps after a lot of research, explains Mack. The physical form factor played a part in the decision, he says. "It was the fact that they are tabletop - they're heavy, solid boxes - and they have all the functions we were looking for: 48 volts, a pad and a nice big knob."

As for the sound quality, John Murray, Chair of the Recording Arts, comments, "The reason we purchased the TRUE P-SOLO is that they are very transparent and also the noise floor is significantly low. When we first plugged it in, we turned it up and said, 'Wow, that's pretty quiet.' But we really love them for the transparency. They're mostly for doing voice over work, so we wanted something that wasn't going to color the sound a lot."

Murray elaborates, "In our Recording Arts program we have a large recording room, two post control rooms for sound design and four mini suites. Two are built out right now and two more will be built out in the future. The mini suites are for doing sound for film, with Pro Tools|HD, a small control surface, a plasma television and a pair of nearfields. They're connected to a narration booth where students can record voice overs."

The two P-SOLO preamps were installed in December, he says, and although they have only been used for voice overs, it may only be a matter of time before they get used in other rooms, perhaps with visiting guest musicians, who have, so far, included Michelle Shocked and Rob Fetters, former frontman of The Bears, Psychodots and Raisins. "We have a main music control room where we do a lot of our tracking," says Murray. "We're impressed with these preamps, so we're potentially going to be looking for more in the future for other rooms. The P-SOLOs have been rock-solid so far and I can only say good things about them."

A total of approximately 150 students were accepted for the inaugural year at Flashpoint Academy, which offers two-year programs in Film, Game Development, Visual Effects & Animation, and Recording Arts. "The concept is that everyone works together," explains Mack. "What's awesome is that, for instance, the film students produced a two-minute film and were paired up with a Recording Arts student who did all the location audio as well as sound design and editing."

The academy expects the total student population, which this year includes about 45 on the Recording Arts program, to rise to about 250 next year, he says. "Our goal is to cap out at 1000 students. We never want to get larger than that. We have selective admissions and a big screening process. We look to make sure that our students are engaged and passionate about what they want to do, and that they have drive and a good work ethic."

Recording Olga Kern and the RSO..

2008-02-10T22:37:00.000-06:00

Because of the film Shine, it's hard for me to separate Rachmaninov and sanity. Whether that film had one iota of truth or not, and there's considerable speculation, the fact remains that being able to play Rachmaninov's 3rd Piano Concerto at anywhere near the accuracy and tempo the score demands is nearly inhuman. By the many accounts I researched, not only does the composer require incredible dexterity and strength, but also unflinching determination—there are sections in one of the versions of cadenzas [Ossia] where the score calls for more than 70 notes per measure!

Regardless of your affinity, or lack thereof, for piano on the concert stage, one must acknowledge the intensity and raw power of Rachmaninov. Which brings me to the performance I was fortunate enough to record last night. Olga Kern and the Rockford Symphony Orchestra presented, as the first piece of a concert showcasing 19th Century Russian music, Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. Ms. Kern is an internationally renowned pianist who was the first woman to win the Van Cliburn Piano Competition in more than 30 years in 2001 and has been in great demand ever since. To me, Rhapsody, is a far more interesting piece than any of the concertos. Alternating power and subtle finesse, Ms. Kern held captive some 1500 people for 25 continuous minutes and 24 variations, perhaps introducing them for the first time to the real greatness of Rachmaninov.

The Intruder goes to post...

2008-02-08T07:14:00.000-06:00

The Intruder wraps today with some pickups and the remainder of the visual effects shots needed for the end of the film. The crew, whose job is strictly production, are already thinking ahead to the next location. But for those of us who are firmly grounded in post, our job is just beginning.

FP Rec Arts students were fortunate enough to have several conversations earlier in the week with Director Mikael Kreuzriegler about ideas for sound design. We began first with the words "ethereal" and "eerie," and perhaps as a layer or texture beneath the delicacy "the feeling that something is off." We talked about styles of music and how much of it will work its way into the film. And because there is so little dialogue, the use of up-close "studio, not soundstage," ADR may actually help to create a slightly unusual sensation. Lastly, Mikael explained that he usually hears the entire soundtrack in his head while shooting, but this film is different.

For sound designers, that's code for "freedom." So, we left the set Wednesday and had a great brainstorming session in the morning followed by an afternoon of effects gathering and research. Yesterday, we started dropping some cut effects on the timeline of a short assembly and recorded Foley to try to get a feel for the entry and living room spaces. Our goals were not too ambitious, just sketching a few ideas to play for Mikael. Today, we'll fine-tune footsteps, clothing moves, and some of the phone and record player gags in the script.

In the end, it's entirely possible that some or all of this work will not remain, but Rec Arts students are engaging in the part of the postproduction process that cannot be learned in books, that cannot be absorbed through lecture, rather, is only discovered experientially with a lot of exploration. The Intruder's soundtrack will be better because of it, and along the way, young Flashpoint sound designers will to.

Production in Action...

2008-01-30T22:51:00.000-06:00

Nearly two-thirds of the Flashpoint student body joined a crew of Chicago film industry professionals today to begin principal photography on The Intruder. The production phase of our nine-month Production-in-Action curriculum component is a testament to a new and exciting educational approach that places students in the heart of the action, literally. Students were not only able to shadow the key department heads of set, art, camera, sound, G & E, and production office, but also shoot a film of their own [The Making of The Intruder] and operate several webcam stations capturing real-time low-res video that can be transmitted back to our main facilities at 28 North Clark.

Tomorrow, a new group of students will come on set while today's group returns to 28 to begin editing, creating sound design, and animation for their footage as well as developing after-the-fact web content. Over the course of the next seven days of shooting, these two groups will alternate, rotating through one of the most engaging and alternative educational opportunities in any media arts program in the country.

It was as amazing to see the degree of collaboration between the crew and the students as it was to witness the level of professionalism by both.

For more photos and links to daily evolving web content from the set of The Intruder, log on to Flashpoint Academy.

For the discriminating ear...

2008-01-23T22:20:00.000-06:00

In June of 2007, Mix Magazine published a great article titled Bring Down the Noise, advocating hearing protection and awareness for anyone in the audio industry. I brought that article to the readers of this blog, primarily my students and folks who can't shake loose audio idée fixe, for one simple reason: Your ears are the most important tool you have as an audio professional and damaging them is irrevocable.

I thought it was crucial for the Rec Arts students at Flashpoint to understand that so we began the program last September with a guest lecturer, Michael Santucci, president of Sensaphonics, Inc., a Chicago-based hearing conservation company that provides audiophile-quality in-ear monitoring for hundreds of high-profile musicians and protection for anyone with a few bucks to spend on a lifetime of hearing safety. Now, a new group of students have started at FP and it seems appropriate to once again bring to the fore hearing conservation.

Stand on any street corner in the Loop and you'll hear the roar of the city in which we work and live. Move from point A to point B using the city's mass transit and you're likely to encounter loudness levels exceeding accepted OSHA standards. Take a look ahead and behind and you'll see a world of iPod users, donning earbuds that can produce sound pressure levels at particularly important frequencies well beyond what would be considered safe practice. Go to a club to "hear" a show and it's almost a certainty you'll need a day or two for the ringing to stop. The list goes on. And on. What it all adds up to is a recipe for disaster if critical listening is a job requirement. And if your hearing isn't what puts food on your table, then at least consider quality of life.

The bottom line is that unlike just about every other major organ/part in your body, your hearing system comprised of the outer, middle, and inner ear does not repair itself if damaged. Ever. And very much like the things we as humans often seem to do even though it's nearly effortless to avoid them, protecting you're hearing isn't that intrusive. In fact, it's downright pleasurable to go to a show with -15dB earplugs in.

It's really pretty simple. If you need them, protect them.

HEARING HEALTH RESOURCES
Sensaphonics, Inc.
Discover what hearing loss sounds like with this online simulator:
Learn more about OSHA’s Occupational Noise Exposure Guidelines:
Get more information about tinnitus from the American Tinnitus Association:
For more about ear physiology, hygeine and safety, visit the House Ear Institute’s resource pages:

Rob Fetters at Flashpoint

2007-12-17T06:37:00.000-06:00

Rob Fetters is a superbly accomplished musician and composer, and also a wonderful guest artist.

Not surprisingly, "Be nice" was his number one piece of advice for Rec Arts students during an all-day professional workshop last Friday. He told the story of a handwritten thank you note that led to years of work with network television and how the willingness to "Save As" a mix to try it different ways often leads to better creative results. He emphasized that all work today, whether it's music for commercials, corporate films, or released on its own, is collaborative, and that the creative process never works if you try to control it on your own.

Rob brought the framework of a song he had written for his 11 year-old son into the Flashpoint recording studios with the intention of reworking some of the parts and letting Rec Arts students have a shot at mixing while Film students documented the event. During the morning part of the workshop, the students tracked several acoustic guitar parts, live drums, background vocals, and electric guitars. As Rob spoke to high school counselors and students about his career as a composer and musician in the afternoon, Flashpoint students broke away into four controls rooms and created different rough mixes. By 4:30, we were all back in the main music control room listening.

Thanks to Rob for a great day.

Michelle Shocked comes to Flashpoint

2007-12-01T07:27:00.000-06:00

Michelle Shocked is a remarkably powerful singer/songwriter I've admired since her first major label record Short Sharp Shocked was released in 1987. Late Thursday evening I found out what an engaging and sweet person she is too. Yesterday, Flashpoint Academy was fortunate to witness that power, talent, and thoughtfulness up close and personal in the recording studios and on the directing stage at 28 North Clark.

I’d inquired months ago about the possibility of Michelle coming to FPA to hold a "master-class" of sorts, and just recently received word that she really liked the idea and wanted to explore options. She told us she wanted to record a song purposed specifically for the visit and to shoot footage for a complementary music video that would be uploaded to YouTube, her own site, etc. Needless to say, we were as excited about Michelle coming in as she was about working with the students in such an intimate and experimental way.

Before entering the studios, Michelle talked to the students about her highly-successful, but turbulent career in the music industry, her life-long desire to change social stratification, her devotion to an African-American church in South Central Los Angeles, and what was particularly opportune for Flashpoint students, balancing the creative and technical with commitment, discipline, and passion. She told us the recording and video of A True Story would be the first part of a much larger project she is working on with her finacé and fine artist David Willardson called HEART or HEAR THE ART.

As she rehearsed the framework of the song with the students and staff who served as a rhythm section, it was clear that this was a special moment in the humble beginnings of our small school. By the time she was ripping through lead vocal overdubs with all the heartfelt passion of the genuine gospel singer she is, we were mesmerized.

It was a real treat for the Rec Arts students to be able to record and Film students be able to roll cameras on such a seasoned professional. The resulting recording, video, and archival documentary footage is testament to FPA’s hands-on, immersive learning. The experience and memory is a gift for committing to the ground floor of Ric Landry’s vision.

Thanks to: HAT, Paula Froehle, Mario Christopher, Ric Landry, Peter Hawley, Steven Berger, George Luif, Dan Epstein, Stephanie Nguyen, Dorian Weinzimmer, Scott Lee, Dan Macias, Claire Plowgian, Rachel Landry, Crystal Ryan, and all my Rec Arts students for working so hard to make this happen.

Special thanks to Bernie Mack for being there all along.