JAZZ ARTIST RICK BRAUN BROADENS HIS MUSICAL HORIZONS WITH BLUE SKY 5.1 MONITORS
(Press Release | Posted 2003-11-15)
Acclaimed instrumentalist and producer Rick Braun, whose award-winning album Beat Street topped the contemporary jazz charts for a record-breaking 13 weeks, has purchased a Blue Sky 5.1 Sky System One monitoring system. The system has been installed in Braun’s Los Angeles-area home studio, where he is preparing to do remixes on several of his solo recording releases.
“I first encountered the Blue Sky monitors at [film scoring composer] Gary Chang’s personal studio, and I was told by several musicians that these were the monitors to get,” remarks Braun, a Warner Records recording artist. Braun, whose work as a producer has led to number-one records for artists David Benoit, Marc Antoine, Avenue Blue, and Bryan Savage, has outfitted his home studio facility with Cubase and Nuendo software systems and a Yamaha DM2000 digital console. He explains, “What I needed was a great surround monitoring system so that, in preparation for remixing my own records in 5.1, I could give myself an education in surround mixing by listening to what other artists I respect have done with it. The Blue Sky 5.1 system has really let me hear those recordings in a way that no other speaker system has ever done.”
Braun has spent months listening to numerous recordings on the Blue Sky 5.1 system. “It’s been a critical tool in educating myself about the nuances of surround audio,” he says. “When surround is done well, it’s something to inspire goose bumps. It pulls you into the music so much more than stereo can. One of things I’ve decided on in this effort is that I want the perspective of my mixes to be from within the group of musicians, putting the listener in the center, as Al Schmitt did on the Diana Krall concert video. When she releases the foot pedal on the piano, it sounds as though you’re standing on stage with her. Surround is an amazing experience, and it’s made all the more amazing when you do it with Blue Sky monitors.”
