Producing, Reproducing and Exposing the Myths of Creativity Inside the Recording Studio (original) (raw)
Related papers
Producing Music, Producing Myth? Creativity in Recording Studios
Journal of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music, 2016
This paper presents research on the power of myth (Barthes 1972) and commonly accepted beliefs, or "doxa" (Bourdieu 1977), in shaping creative practices inside recording studios. Drawing from two ethnographic case studies of rock and hip-hop artists in recording studios, this paper addresses the (re)production of myths during studio sessions. Through critical incident analyses, we challenge romanticized representations of studios as individualistic spaces and highlight how mythic representations of creativity influence musicians' technical expectations of recording processes. Additionally, we illustrate the circulation of, and moments of resistance to, myths from cultural domains outside of the studio that pervade practices within studios. In sum, we show that studios-sites involving the intense scrutiny of music-making-offer insightful contexts in which to examine how myth can shape recording processes and studio practices.
Popular Music
possibly in that, that my biggest compliment lies. I would feel comfortable recommending this text to students, colleagues and non-academics who are interested in the recording studio, but who are completely new to the area. However, I would also feel comfortable recommending the book to people who have worked extensively in a studio environment. The text offers entry points and critical analyses that are relevant, and exciting, irrespective of your previous experience. Thompson's main premise is to combine ways of understanding creativity with ways of understanding how a popular music recording is made. What distinguishes Creativity in the Recording Studio: Alternative Takes is its application of Csikszentmihalyi's systems model of creativity to the process of studio recording. For some, this systems model is somewhat 'static', and we could potentially run the risk of homogenising complex practices. However, Thompson's application demonstrates a flexibility. For instance, when considering David Bowie's 'Heroes', he notes that the knowledge of microphones and their placement couldand should be considered within 'the domain field of [studio] engineering' (p. 163). Through this process, Thompson is also successful in demonstrating that popular music, and the process of recording (popular, classical, or anything in between or outside of that music) is a collaborative effort, and that if we want to fullyunderstand how and/or why listeners are responding to a particular release, we consider isolated components and individual efforts at our own peril. As such, Thompson is also able to address various notions and myths surrounding romanticism and the lone, creative genius in terms of sound recording specifically, but also popular music more generally. Considerations of the recording studio and record production from a popular music studies perspective are relatively new, and while there is some great academic work available for those who are interested in the field, I would argue that Creativity in the Recording Studio marks a maturity, a 'coming of age', that is both exciting and responsive. Since reading the book, I have already recommended it several times to colleagues and students, and imagine I will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. It is an enjoyable, and educational book, and I would recommend it to you too.
Getting it on record: Issues and strategies for ethnographic practice in recording studios
The recording studio has been somewhat neglected as a site for ethnographic fieldwork in the field of ethno-musicology and, moreover, the majority of published studies tend to overlook the specific concerns faced by the researcher within these contexts. Music recording studios can be places of creativity, artistry, and collaboration, but they often also involve challenging, intimidating, and fractious relations. Given that recording studios are, first and foremost, concerned with documenting musicians’ performances, we discuss the concerns of getting studio interactions “on record” in terms of access, social relations, and methods of data collection. This article reflects on some of the issues we faced when conducting our fieldwork within British music recording facilities and makes suggestions based on strategies that we employed to address these issues.
It has been proposed that creativity comes about as result of a system in operation rather than, as a Romantic ethos would have it, being the result of the action of single individuals alone. Furthermore, Pierre Bourdieu has argued that the field in which cultural production occurs can be described as an arena of social contestation. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi suggests, as well, that conflict within a field may also have an effect on that creative field's output. If these statements are true then questions of power relationships become important in any analysis of creativity. In particular, analyzing Csikszentmihalyi's systems approach to creativity and Bourdieu's understanding of cultural production and what these conceptions have to say about the distribution of creative power in the studio may reveal important truths about creativity itself. It may also shed some light on the nature of the collaboration that occurs within creative groups; in this case those that consist of musicians, producers, record companies and technicians.
The romantic and inspirationist understandings of creativity appear to be cemented into place in the music industry so much so that they have become common sense. However rationalist research does not support these views (e.g. . In fact these views have been described as myths (Boden, 2004) and are therefore explanations lacking veracity. If this is the case what is available to describe the phenomena of creativity in studio practice? Historically, most rational research into creativity has focused at the level of the individual neglecting the broader social and cultural structures that shape and enable creativity and cultural production . Nonetheless, recent research has been moving towards confluence models one of which is the systems model . According to this approach creativity comes about through the ongoing operation of "a system composed of three elements: a culture that contains symbolic rules, a person who brings novelty into the domain, and a field of experts who recognise and validate the innovation" (Csikszentmihalyi, 1996:6). By taking this model and applying it ethnographically to what occurs in the recording studio, from preproduction through to production and postproduction, a greater understanding of the creative process, one that goes beyond common sense and mythic assumptions, may be forthcoming.
During recording sessions, record producers and sound engineers play the role of cultural intermediaries between musicians and their future audience. Their role differs from that of artistic leaders, such as film directors, who express their own ideas through a collective creative process. Studio professionals aim to achieve the best possible representation of a given musical project, similarly to photographers, whose goal is to capture the most significant image of their models. Recently, the delocalisation of well-equipped studios to home studios, combined with the collapse of the traditional business model of record companies, has led musicians to produce their recordings without necessarily hiring studio professionals. And when hired by musicians, producers and engineers often take on both roles at once. This client relationship without the intermediary of record companies modifies the collaborative aspects of the production process. In such a do-it-yourself context, studio professionals need to reinvent their job while musicians need to learn the art of recording and define their expectations when collaborating with studio professionals. This chapter is based on my professional and teaching experience, as well as five research studies conducted with professional producers, engineers, and musicians. In three sections, it highlights the best practices in conducting recording sessions from the perspectives of musicians and studio professionals coming from different musical backgrounds, countries, and generations. The first section focuses on the preparation of studio sessions to produce successful musical recordings. The second discusses record producers' and sound engineers' skills, as well as the mission and specificities of each profession. The third addresses the myths of artistic direction by making explicit the impact of producers ' comments on musical performance.
"What Happens in the Cabin . . .": An Arts-Based Autoethnography of Underground Hip Hop Song Making
2014
Taking an autoethnographic perspective that foregrounds the interplay between the author's artist-self and researcher-self, this article explores the relationship between agency and structure in the activities surrounding underground hip hop music making within a home studio recording space. It aims to demystify the aura of in-studio music creation by focusing on the nexus of oral/written, pre-composed/improvised, and pre-recorded/live creative practices as experienced within the context of performance. Utilizing Harris Berger's notion of stance, I discuss how hip hop recording artists transcend performative self-consciousness in the pursuit of creativity. Ultimately, this article presents hip hop home recording studios as spaces that facilitate particular kinds of musical innovation through a mix of collective and individual pursuits, as well as routinized and spontaneous activities.
The purpose of this article is to examine the creative and collaborative agency of a young, professional home-based studio producer of popular music, who identifies as a tracker/producer. The study seeks to illuminate how music production technologies and practices shape our understanding of the agency of the contemporary aspiring music producer and to provide insight into the music production studio as a socially constructed cultural space. In this article the music producer is seen to do more than just work with an artist on an existing work. Producing here means having a creative input on a song from the very beginning of the compositional process up until the point where the song is sent to the mastering engineer. By combining cultural study of music technology (Théberge 1997; Taylor 2001; Greene & Porcello 2005), which understands music technologies as cultural practices that produce and mediate musical meanings and experiences, and ethnographical methods, I approach the home-based music production studio as a cultural space (Bates 2012) where social and musical performances and interactions take place and meanings of music and its authorship are constantly in negotiation.
2019
Differences and similarities in the creative agency of the producer in the production process of urban pop music produced in a home studio, rock music produced in a conventional studio facility and classical concert hall music produced in a concert hall setting is explore in this paper. Starting from the premise of record production being a collaborative effort, I approach agency as the capacity to make and effect decisions within a structure or even to alter it to some extent, and creativity as contributing to the domain of existing works through exercising aesthetic decision-making. Based on these understandings of agency and creativity, I will examine how different cultures in different production settings and different studios conceived as cultural spaces affect the construction of the producer’s agency within creative communities in the production process. Furthermore, I will discuss how differences in understandings of the ontology of the music contribute to the level of creat...
Morrow, G., 'The Psychology of Musical Creativity: A Case Study of Creative Conflict in a Nashville Studio', Colombo, B (ed.) The Psychology of Creativity, Nova Science Publishers: Hauppauge, New York, 2013., 2013
This chapter addresses the question of whether the conflict that occurred between the band Boy & Bear and the record producer Joe Chicarrelli, and within the collaborative web surrounding them, was necessary for the production of an album that became commercially successful. It is clear that a certain degree of conflict within this creative group was necessary for the production of a commercially successful album. However the album is less creative or ‘novel’ than the producers would have liked. This is because the conflict that occurred during the sessions was at times creative and at other times destructive. While conflict may not be a necessary part of making records in and of itself, ‘group flow’ (Sawyer, 2007) does necessitate there being a certain degree of creative conflict. This chapter contributes to our understanding of the ways in which conflict and power can be productive.