By Leon Georgiou
MOUNT Gambier music producer Tom Wilson will host a masterclass for musicians and recording artists tomorrow at Sir Robert Helpmann Theatre.
The four-hour session focuses on tracking, mixing and mastering techniques, with Mr Wilson taking the audience through a recent recording he did with Mount Gambier band, Chelsea Manor.
Unlike other masterclasses, Mr Wilson wanted to take a finished piece of work and walk people through the development process.
“I know there’s a lot of classes online, where they’ll show you from scratch how they do something. Whereas I want to show everyone… a finished product, that’s actually going to be played on the radio,” he said.
“What we did [in session] isn’t always going to be pretty, but that’s how it was actually done.
“Rather than being like, you could do this or you could do that, this is how we did this and this is why we did this.”
Chelsea Manor drummer Michael Collins will join Mr Wilson in class to perform a live recording, demonstrating to the audience the process involved from initial recording of a raw instrument through to post production.
Originally a drummer for Mount Gambier band Admella, Mr Wilson went on to open his own recording studio, Badanimal Productions, whilst also teaching drums on the side.
Operating for around four years, Badanimal Productions produced several records for local artists such as Obsidians Curse, Human Garbage and The Stiff Nips.
Self-taught, Mr Wilson, picked up music production techniques talking to sound engineers whilst in the recording studio with Admella.
“Every time we went to record somewhere in the city, I’d just be watching every little thing the producer was doing, being really annoying, asking a million questions and stuff like that, and then forming relationships with them, and just getting guidance off of them,” he said.
Whilst the current masterclass is a one-off session, Mr Wilson hopes to see it turn into a recurring event.
“It’s definitely just cool to share this stuff with people,” he said.
“If there’s a bunch of like minded people, then we can all help each other and come up with cool ideas. And I’d definitely love to do more of it.”
The masterclass, which starts at 1pm, is part of Country Arts SA’s Local and Live initiative, a program aimed at supporting regional artists.
Places are limited.
Tickets are $10.
