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NZAMP co-sponsors University of Auckland’s Songwriter of the Year 2012

By | News

The University of Auckland’s Songwriter of the Year is a prestigious award for current University of Auckland students studying popular music and for emerging songwriters from secondary schools across the North Island.

Popular Music student Sam Springett is The University of Auckland 2012 Songwriter of the Year.

 

Sam was judged the best amongst the six talented finalists at the Grand Final concert, held at the Raye Freedman Arts Centre on 20 September.

His title win also includes a swag of prizes courtesy of MusicWorks, Roundhead Studios, Kog Studio, Amstore, the New Zealand Association of Music Producers (NZAMP) and KiwiFM.

“To win when I was up against so many talented musicians was amazing. I was nervous but tried hard just to enjoy the experience. I’m so stoked. Couldn’t have done it without the support from my lecturers and friends”, says 18 year-old Sam, who grew up in Nelson, and only shifted to Auckland last year.

In addition to original performances by the six finalists, the concert also featured guest appearances by the winners of the Songwriter of the Year: Schools Competition, which was held earlier this year. Talented young musicians Petra Bullock (Takapuna Grammar School, Auckland) and Evan Sinton and Hamish Jackson, performing as Intone (Glendowie College, Auckland) each performed a set of their original songs.

 

Earl Ho wins the University of Auckland’s Songwriter of the Year 2011

By | News

The Songwriter of the Year 2011 is Earl Ho, who is currently studying for a Bachelor of Arts/Bachelor of Music conjoint degree at the University. His original song and performance were judged the best amongst those of the six talented finalists at the Grand Final concert, held at the Maidment Theatre on 29 September.

Earl was also awarded some great prizes courtesy of MusicWorks, KiwiFM, the New Zealand Association of Music Producers (NZAMP) and Roundhead Studios.

“The final was such a fantastic night, with so much talent on show… I’m really stoked about the win and it will be a memory that I will cherish till the end of time”, he said.

As well as the performances of the six finalists, the concert also featured guest performances from the winners of the Songwriter of the Year: Schools Competition held in June this year. Talented young musicians Evean Hunt (Otahuhu College, Auckland) and Emmeline Lee (Botany Downs Secondary College, Auckland) each performed a set of their original songs.

Congratulations to Earl and the other finalists

Earl Ho
Sam Allen
Samantha Jones
Larrisa King
Phil Kim
Callum Martin

Jack Joseph Puig: Logic And Romance In Production And Artistry

By | General | No Comments

 

Iconic producer/mixer/engineer Jack Joseph Puig has some invaluable advice for new producers and bands alike. Coming from a Grammy winning producer, this is something that should definitely be taken to heart. To sum it up, Jack Joseph says that an artist should never, under any circumstances, produce his or her own album – doing so, according to Mr. Puig’s extended metaphor would be … well, you do the math.

 

The Farmers’ Tale

By | General | No Comments

I met with the man. We talked of cows, farmers and delivery of milk products to market.

‘Cows?’ he said.

‘The cows are the artists; we, the industry infrastructure, are the farmers’, I replied and hoped the rest was pretty obvious.

The man scribbled boxed illustrations of the link between cows, farmers and the market on his paper, soon to be added to a pile I estimated to be around 13 cm thick to his right.

After an hour or so it was time for the man to go.

‘I must go and talk to some more cows!’ he said as he left.

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Auto-tune: A lesson to listen to your track as your listener and not from the point of view of your computer!

By | General | No Comments

It’s easy to get caught up in the cul-de-sacs that present themselves while seeking out recorded ‘perfection’.

Rather than relying on your producer to ‘fix up’ what you’ve done at home, utilise your producer resources to maximise what it is that you have to offer that is unique to you as an artist — that’s what will make you stand out and get noticed.

At the same time, don’t fool yourself that you can start your assault on the musical world without first perfecting what you can deliver as the artist — this may include, depending on your genre, singing to the best of your ability.

Losing sight of those goals could lead to the equivalent of musical plastic surgery, musical botox, perfectionism destroying authenticity — not so much from a lack of vision, but from the vision being mis-directed in the pursuit of pseudo-technical perfection above genuine artistic communication. A ‘bland’ sameness waters down your message and prevents it from cutting through perhaps…

A discussion on these issues with music critic Grant Smithies and producer Simon Holloway on Graeme Hill’s ‘Weekend Variety Wireless’ from Radio Live, Sunday March 6, 2011 is here: https://www.radiolive.co.nz/Autotune-A-musical-invasive-weed/tabid/506/articleID/19025/Default.aspx

 

Andre Upston

By | Executive Committee

Andre Upston is an Auckland recording engineer, producer, and musician. He had long been the resident engineer for Auckland’s Helen Young Studio and Radio NZ.

Andrew Buckton

By | Executive Committee

Andrew Buckton began his career as in house engineer at York Street Studios for five years, where he helped build, design, and manage the now infamous Studio Two.

Ben King

By | Executive Committee

Producer Ben King started out working as a production duo with legendary New Zealand engineer Nick Abbott (Datsuns/Pluto/Goldenhorse). A founding member/ writer in Goldenhorse, Ben has worked variously as producer, writer, musician and arranger with Goldenhorse, Renee-Louise Carafice, Bic Runga, Boh Runga, Dave Dobbyn, Brooke Fraser, Hello Sailor & Daniel Bedingfield, among others. His real strength is in honing a strong, unique sound for genuinely talented bands and musicians.

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Bryan Bell

By | Executive Committee

Bryan is a double APRA Silver Scroll  and ISC (International Song Writing Competition) finalist whose judges included such musical heavyweights as Robert Smith, Ray Davis, Tom Waits and NZ’s own Neil Finn

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Captain Hook

By | Executive Committee

Captain Hook worked at York Street as the head engineer after a decade of running Dudley Studios out of Hamilton. In that time he produced gold albums for Goodnight Nurse, and his own band 48May. Bringing an all in one approach from pre production through to mastering, Hook has created albums for Falter, Arms Reach, All Left Out, Vegas Brown, Stardrunk and the Hamilton County Bluegrass Band among others, as well as various singles/E.Ps for Fast Crew, Simple Day, Doppler, Quarter2, My Life Story, Radiator, Stu Strawbridge, Antagonist, and Kimbra, to name a few.

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Chris Chetland

By | Executive Committee

One of the founders of the Kog Transmissions label, Chetland still works at the Kog studios, doing lots of mixing and mastering work for New Zealand artists.

Dave Goodison

By | Executive Committee

Producer Dave Goodison has over a decade’s experience in rock and pop performance and production, while still finding time to moonlight as guitarist with Boh Runga, Elemeno P and Carly Binding.

Evan Short

By | Executive Committee

Evan Short is an in-demand producer and engineer running his company Mercury Audio which offers many different music and audio related services from music creation and production to recording, mixing and mastering.

David Holmes

By | Executive Committee

David Holmes started his first studio in 1999 in Hawkes Bay providing local production houses and ad agencies with a much needed digital audio facility. During this time he worked with scores of local bands cutting his teeth in the producer’s chair.

After a year long stint running the studio in Wellington he moved to Auckland in 2003 and began to focus mainly on album production. He has since completed more than 60 albums and worked with the likes of Autozamm, Gramsci, Anika Moa, An Emerald City, Jakob, Pitch Black, Concord Dawn, State of Mind and Battle Circus to name just a few.

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Jonathan Campbell

By | Executive Committee

Website: https://www.1212music.com

With over 20 years experience in the industry and a strong background in music, he understands both the technical as well as artistic merits of a recording. He has produced and mixed artists from a wide variety of musical genres in USA, Canada, and New Zealand.

After graduating with top marks at the internationally recognized School of Audio Engineering, Jonathan went straight into employment working on mainstream charting material with a renowned producer. Since then he has worked on multiple records which have had top ten chart placements, gold and platinum sales, #1 charting album, multiple songs which have achieved number one for national main-stream radio play, and mixed the first New Zealand song to enter the top 40 singles charts on digital downloads alone!

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