Sacramento’s Florin High School recently established its Audio & Music Production (AMP) Academy, with John Cronin at its head. Classes offered include Introduction to Audio & Music Production, Intermediate Audio & Music Production, and Advanced Audio & Music Production, with 146 15-18 year-olds currently enrolled in the programme.
Integral to the practical side of the programme is an Audient ASP8024-HE analogue mixing console chosen by Cronin. At present, studio time is afforded to intermediate and advanced students only, about half of these will get their hands on the console this year.
‘We opted for the double producer desk configuration with 24 tracks on the left-hand side, and the mastering section on the right-hand side,’ Cronin says. ‘We have an Avid S3 for DAW control under a curved, widescreen computer monitor, and an external patchbay to the right of the console.
‘The studio features a large control room and tracking space separated by an acoustically treated wall with a large window,’ he adds. ‘Our Audient ASP8024-HE console resides the centre of the control room between two rack bays for outboard gear.
As Commercial Music Program Director at American River College – and a seasoned Audient console user – Kirt Shearer was ideally placed to help out. ‘I have to give a major shout out to Kirt for helping me configure our new recording studio, including the selection of our console configuration,’ Cronin says. ‘I had only worked with large-format recording consoles in college classroom settings prior to this one, so I’m eternally grateful that I had Kirt to steer me in a direction that has proved optimal for my programme.’
Cronin has cultivated the school audio programme over the past seven years, building it up from a couple of singleton electives to the three-year California Partnership Academy program that it is today. Unusually for a high school, the programme, which resides within the Career Technical Education (CTE) department, now spans many areas of the audio industries, making it quite comprehensive as a jumping-off point for students pursuing a career in audio, whether in general digital music production, studio recording techniques, sound design or sound for film.
‘Additionally, our students dig into a variety of industry software, with Ableton Live being our bread and butter, Logic Pro as a secondary DAW, Izotope software including Rx, Kontakt and other Native Instruments tools, Xfer’s synthesiser Serum and the Krotos suite for sound design,’ Cronin says.
‘We also have an extracurricular programme where students can sign up to participate in managing lights and sound for DJ events, live sound reinforcement and recording for our school band and choir, weekend studio recording sessions with local jazz bands, mixing/mastering projects and doing some field recording as well.’
Cronin likes his students get to use the studio as much as possible: ‘We have had many jazz ensembles record here, a few singer/songwriters and several rappers. We also have two aspiring rock groups at our school who are constantly practising in our studio space whenever it’s free, so we’ll be recording them soon. Our students also regularly engage in recording voiceover work, podcasts, and Foley as well. Oh, and our AMP Academy teacher team has a jam band to fill in when one of our scheduled jazz groups has had to cancel a session.’
Although generally only for teaching, the studio sometimes gets used out of school hours, too. ‘We occasionally have one of our industry partners bring some of their clients in on a weekend, on the basis that they make it an educational experience for students,’ Cronin says.
During the coming year, Cronin is making it a priority to expand the number of field trips on offer. ‘We want to visit places like Chico State’s Recording Arts programme, Kirt Shearer over at American River College and a Southern California weekend studios trip is in the works. We are also expanding our extracurricular offerings and have started fundraising by DJing our local middle school dances, providing a very professional sound and lighting setup, complete with live light shows. So far, we have eight of these gigs on the calendar and our students have been doing a stellar job.’
Inspiring his students comes naturally to Cronin, perhaps because he himself has been inspired by a host of industry luminaries: ‘The legendary Kirt Shearer is certainly one of those figures, having worked with the band Cake (a childhood favourite), long before I had the pleasure of meeting him,’ he says. ‘Dann Sargeant and David Dvorin over at Chico State are really doing some amazing things. I often think about their programme when planning my own curriculum. A friend of mine by the stage name of KSHMR has had an incredibly inspirational career in music and education.
‘Locally I’ve had the privilege of being mentored by two stellar engineers, John Bologni and Stephen Bingen. I’ve also taken many classes through Berklee’s Online programme, where several of the professors have been very inspirational to me. Last, there are many inspirational music producers I follow, but I would be remiss to not mention Deadmau5, as his music changed my own trajectory in music years ago, leading me to ultimately teach Ableton Live to our students today.’
More: https://audient.com
