A few weeks ago, I traveled to Minneapolis to observe the production of one of the winning songs of the All-Star Session Contest. Our members entered songs for the chance to be produced by some of the best players, producers and engineers in the world. After watching these guys work, that’s an understatement.
In November, Joey Finger, Founder and CEO of Sessionplayers.com, called to see if we’d be interested in working together. We decided to do a contest and have Session Players pick the songs they wanted to produce. One of Joey’s picks was “Shut Up” by Bryan Bryant of Houston, Texas. After listening to “Shut Up,” I understood why Joey chose it to produce: The hook is classic. I listened to some of Bryan’s other songs and his talent is obvious.
I arrived at the Institute of Production & Recording (IPR) around 3 p.m. IPR is a media institute that trains engineers and producers. Over the years, I’ve been in a few of these schools. I appreciate the fact that they exist and that they’ve made the music industry better.
IPR is an exceptional facility and the guys who started it have worked on some of the most successful records in history. They live what they teach and I was honored to witness this first hand. As I walked to the control room, I noticed the entire wall was covered with gold and platinum awards. Genesis, Paula Abdul, Jonny Lang and Prince were just a few of the names on these records.
The session was recorded for the students at IPR, who were watching from a lecture hall. It will also be used to teach future classes. Joey was the executive producer, as well as co-producer along with Paul Petersen (Prince, Stevie Wonder, Dolly Parton, Lionel Ritchie). Tom Tucker (George Benson, Prince, The Osmonds, Chaka Khan, Jonny Lang) was the recording engineer, but most impressive is that he founded IPR. Danielle Clare ran the Pro Tools rig. We all wish we had someone in our studio that could move around a program like she could. I didn’t get her credits, but I’m convinced she’s done this before. On the B3 was Ricky Petersen (Billy Joel, John Mayer, Prince, Sheryl Crow)
Oops, made a spelling goof on the above post. It’s Los Cuates.
We’re in Mexico and discovered the finest group of musicians I’ve ever had the pleasure to play with, Los Quartes, The Twins. They’d never been recorded before we produced a CD. Check them out on CD Baby, or on our website, Gatorlegs.com.
They’ve also become our sessions group. These guys can play anything. We just completed some live recordings at an open mike night we run for snicks and grins. Uploaded some of our stuff,replacing the old uploads. We discovered how the baud rate of the upload affects the quality. Hope these new ones sound much better. It’s kind of Trop rock country. Hope to get feedback.
What a beautiful production on “Shut up”. I can’t wait to hear what Joey and his incredible producers and group of musicians do with my song “Bigger Plans”.
Thanks for believing Joey… See ya in Nashville in June.
Until then -
Donna Britton
http://www.donnabritton.com