Mastering—transferring a recording to its final physical format—is literally the last artistic piece of a long process and one TVD is delving into over the coming months from a variety of angles with Scott Hull, mastering engineer and the owner of world-class and world-famous Masterdisk studios in New York City
Scott will be presenting a master class in mastering, from the fundamentals to the final product, as we count down to Record Store Day 2011 when a select few of you will be given the opportunity to win a personal tour of the record mastering process at Masterdisk.
Week #9: Scott chats with master cutting engineer, Tony Dawsey.
This week I’d like you to hear from one of my master cutting engineers, Tony Dawsey. Tony, like myself, started mastering before there was digital recording of any kind. Well, we’re not that old. But at that time, everything we did was focused on producing the highest quality vinyl records imaginable.
I sat down with Tony and asked him a few questions about vinyl, and about his experience as a cutting engineer. Here’s a couple of short excerpts; I hope you’ll enjoy listening to the full interview below. Regards from Austin.
—Scott
Scott: What lessons from the early days still stick with you today?
Tony: Good isn’t good enough when it comes to perfecting your craft. That’s equalizing somebody’s project or cutting it. A lot of things can go wrong in cutting and you want to make sure none of that happens. You don’t want to cut a 25 minute side with a worn stylus. That’s not cool.
Scott: What was your path to cutting your first record?
Tony: Well the shipping room was right next to Bill Kipper’s studio, so in between my responsibilities early on, I’d drift in there with him and just watch him. He did a lot of classical music as well as other things. He ended up showing me how to cut vinyl.
Scott Hull Interviews Tony Dawsey for The Vinyl District
Scott Hull is a mastering engineer and the owner of Masterdisk (founded in 1973) in New York City. In his 25-plus year career, Scott has mastered records for Sting, Bob Dylan, Steely Dan, Os Mutantes, John Zorn, Uncle Tupelo, Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings and hundreds more. Visit Masterdisk online or on Facebook.
