THE ART OF SOUND
BRIAN BAKER GIVES US AN EARFUL
By Carla Valencia de Martinéz | Photography by Collin Kelly
You could call the sounds we hear daily the soundtracks to our lives . This fifth sense of perception – hearing – has the ability to make us feel a plethora of emotions with a single sound . But as we take these sounds for granted , from music to commercials to background noise , people like BRIAN BAKER propel them to an art form .
Baker is a recording engineer , producer , director and consultant . As he shows me around his small , yet organized studio , I notice clusters of equipment , including decades-old , finely engineered mics ; classic Fender , Marshall and Vox amps ; and a giant soundboard where Baker manually makes his magic .
Founded by musician Jeff Wells ( of the band Tempest and Barbara Pennington Band ) in a building off Mangum , then moving in 1992 to its current location on Westview , SOUND ARTS RECORDING has been cutting records since 1974 . Baker says , “ I almost want to call this thing we do here production sickness . Once you start building , you just keep building and building . It starts with one piece of equipment and moves to two pieces of equipment and moves to three and before you know it you have rooms full of stuff and you ’ re trying to trade things out , always trying to find the next best thing to make things better . You do this for love more than for money , because all your money goes back into it .”
The passion in Baker ’ s voice is palpable . Originally from Corpus Christi , he reminisces , “ When I was 16 years old , I decided I wanted to make records and I walked into Hacienda down there – the big Spanish label – and hit it when they needed help . I swept the floors , rolled the cables and learned the trade .
He landed in Houston in 1991 . “ It was a busy time back then . Rap-A-Lot Records was doing a whole bunch with us . The whole industry was changing from rock to R & B and hip-hop and stuff like that . I met some good clients who kept me working and I kind of became a thing here , too .”
Wells passed away in 2011 . Today , Baker runs the show – and is a rarity in the field . He ’ s a bridge connecting vintage tape recording techniques of years past to today ’ s tech-savvy computer ways . And in addition to having a mastery of the equipment , he has access to the best talent . “ People come to me with a song and ask , ‘ What do you think ? How can I do this ?’ and that ’ s when I get into my director and producer mode , assembling the best players in town . I get on the phone and say , ‘ What are you doing this week ?’ I know how to get a band together !”
56 LOCAL | may 17