Home Recording Boot Camp

Interview with Ronan Chris Murphy

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International recording engineer, producer, and musician, Ronan Chris Murphy, whips home recordists into shape at intensive courses via Home Recording Boot Camp. With locations in Los Angeles, CA; Seattle, WA; and Northern Italy and a staff of world-class instructors, students from around the world of all skill levels receive personalized instruction in the art of recording and music production. We recently interviewed Ronan about the program.

[ taps on the mic ] Is this thing on? [ feedback ] Testing, 1, 2. Mic check... mic check.

Studio Reviews: Before we dig in to the boot camp and what it's all about, could you give us a little background on yourself as a musician, engineer and producer? How'd you get started in engineering and where and how did you hone your engineering chops to the point where you were comfortable being the man behind the desk in a recording session?

Ronan Chris Murphy: My musical path has been a strange and winding one that could take a long time to read but I will see if I can get it in a nutshell:

I started playing in bands when I was about 11 but did not really gig semi-professionally until I was about 15. My first significant bands were in DC hardcore bands in the early 80's called Freak Baby and The Last Laugh where we played with bands like Beefeater Iron Cross, etc. The funny thing is that Freak Baby is actually in some of the rock history books because after I quite Dave Grohl (Nirvana, Foo Fighters) joined the band. Through the second half of the 80's I was in Richmond, VA playing in the scene that later became known as "alternative". My bands were gigging with the likes of The Flaming Lips, The Rollins Band, Dinosaur Jr. etc. I was doing a lot of touring as a musician and roadie at the end of the 80s. Around that time my bass player quit and in the down time I started experimenting more seriously with recording, composing and arranging and I got totally sucked into it and I never looked back. As is the case with most people that get into recording, it ended my career as a performing musician on the spot. But I have always played on lots of the records I produce.

I became obsessed with recording and spent every free moment trying to learn on a 4 track cassette and an old IBM XT. I read everything I could get my hands on, recorded tons of my own stuff and any one that I could get to come down into my basement apartment studio. I had really basic tools starting out, which I think in retrospect was a real blessing.

At the start of the 90's, I moved to Boston where I had a chance to go to Berklee for a couple semesters and study in the synthesis department. Which as a very cool opportunity because at the time digital audio was not really some thing that "recording" people were dealing with a lot and I got a chance to get my hands on a lot of technology early on. I was working with Pro Tools 1.0 the day it came out. Although I am often an analog evangelist, it was having some of this knowledge early on that opened up a lot of doors for me. At the same time I was at Berklee I got my first job in a commercial studio hoping to be an assistant and get to learn from other engineers, but I ended up doing very little of that. The studio did a lot of dance oriented stuff and it turned out that I was the only one there that actually knew how to mic drums (I had taught myself and read a lot) so all of a sudden I was the producer/first engineer on any of the rock or jazz sessions that came in. I was also the only one that that was into hip hop, so I got all those gigs as well. So to answer one of your questions, I have always been the man behind the board almost from day one. I kind of regret that I never really got to be an assistant.