Winter News (I Skipped Fall)

I’ve been mastering, digitizing, restoring, traveling, speaking, educating. And I got a dog! Welcome my new studio pal, the very chill beagle-chihuahua-dachshund-who know’s what else rescue pup, Eddie Thompson.

October means AES in NYC. This was my second year chairing the Archiving & Restoration track, and I was completely thrilled by how the programming came together. I moderated a marquis panel on Long Term Preservation of Audio Assets, with the goal of pushing this conversation beyond well-established best practices and the usual complaints about lack of time and lack of money. We talked about everything from more favorable licensing deals for small labels to AIML (Artificial Intelligence Markup Language). Props to Cheryl Pawelski (Omnivore Recordings) for summing it up thusly: Preservation through Proliferation. Support your favorite reissue label. They are often the ones facilitating and paying for the preservation work.

I also spoke about the importance of incorporating history into audio education, a true passion of mine. Is it possible to get a degree in fine arts without taking an art history class? Then why are we graduating audio engineers with no exposure to the history of recording and recorded sound?

Thanks to all the contributors who helped put together such excellent panels and talks! We covered metadata, preserving podcasts, multi-tracks, funding options, early digital formats, and more. Truly an educational and entertaining and exhausting-but-worth-it week!

Hey, I also mastered some records. Here are a few highlights:

A sweet and lovely bluegrass record by mandolin player and vocalist Kate Prascher; an epic piano-centric album by composer / pianist Ross Avant, Running Across America, produced by Ted Young; more reissues from Awesome Tapes From Africa, including Antoinette Konan’s “eponymous 1986 electro-Baoulé blaster” and Nahawa Doumbia’s La Grande Cantatrice Malienne Vol 1, plus a new forthcoming album by Ethiopian composer / multi-instrumentalist keyboard genius Hailu Mergia, Yene Mircha, out March 27; Stephen Thirolle’s rich and rollicking The Sounds of This Life; a reissue of seminal shoegaze/punk/emo/none-of-the-above Pot Valiant’s Transaudio, out on Numero Group; a dreamy reissue of lofi post-punk, Gary Davenport’s Scattered Thoughts, also out on Numero Group; and so many more.

I’m still working with the Arhoolie Foundation on the Harry Oster Collection, and I’ve had the utter privilege and joy to revisit my public radio roots by consulting with the Kitchen Sisters on preserving their incredible collection of audio recordings. More on that in the coming months…