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Issue #152
by L. Swift and Jeff McQ
“I walk in,” he says, “and the first thing Joey said is like, ‘Call me Uncle Joey.’ And I’m like, ‘Oh my God, this guy is so cool already.’ When I was in high school, I played a lot of jazz music in the jazz orchestra and band…And he’s a horn player, he plays trumpet. And we’re both talking about playing jazz music and playing just horn instruments. So we’re talking about that. We’re talking about kind of what inspires us and why we want to do audio and things like that…So I knew right off the bat he was going to be a great inspiration. But the other thing was him showing me around the studio, and my jaw was on the floor with the equipment that he had…It was like love at first sight…I was just totally nerding out.”
Zachary’s love for audio and music was sparked in his teenage years, growing up in Ohio, helping out in the audio department at his church. “I was doing audio with them on pretty big setups out there till last year,” he says. “When I started with them, I realized how much I loved it, and they were gracious enough to give me actual hands-on live experience…That was a really great opportunity. I realized how much I enjoyed it and how much it brought me closer to music.”
Even so, Zachary says he was hesitant to pursue audio engineering as a career, in part because he wanted to be the best at what he did and was insecure about whether he could be “good enough.” But shortly after a move to Philadelphia with his wife, he was encouraged to try. That’s when he found the Recording Connection online.
“I’d been looking at schools for a while and I didn’t see one that I really liked,” he says. “I worked with other audio engineers before, but I hadn’t had any formal schooling and stuff. So when I saw that the way you guys set it up with Recording Connection was that you mentor with somebody who’s already in the industry…that’s when I signed up.”
The on-the-job training proved to be everything Zachary hoped it would be, and more.
“When I first got there, I had my first question,” he recalls. “[Joey] was like, All right, here is how this is going to go; I’m going to give you the technical answer and then I’m going to give you the Uncle Joey answer.’ He gave me the technical answer and I’m like, ‘Oh, that’s fascinating.’ And then he gave me the Uncle Joey explanation, and I will remember it forever. It just made perfect sense.”
The Lunar Year
When RRFC students learn on the job from their mentors, not only do they acquire important hands-on skills and make industry connections, but they often also get to share in their mentor’s opportunities and successes. Film Connection students working in Miami, Florida with mentor Kevin Sharpley recently got such an opportunity when Kevin’s documentary film-in-process was accepted into the prestigious Sundance Labs program of Sundance Institute!
“We just started the film,” Kevin explains. “It got accepted into the lab portion of it, and the way that works is they work with you with the particulars of your film, and then as you start to develop the film, you check back with them, until you finish with the film…It’s an incredible process because not only does the gentleman that’s over at the Sundance documentary institute outreach come down, they also bring other mentors. So we had an Academy Award nominated mentor, they come and they really help you to rethink what your film is all about. And this was really exciting…because most of the crew that worked on this were students from the Film Connection. So I think that this is a great start for them…When you talk about film, this is where it’s at. It doesn’t get much bigger than Sundance.”
The documentary, Kevin explains, is about a Miami-based African-American artist named Purvis Young, one of Florida’s most pre-eminent artists whom many in the art world have compared to New York’s Jean-Michel Basquiat. For Kevin, it’s a passion project he’s wanted to do for about 10 years.
“The first time I saw a Purvis painting, I just fell in love with the power of his work, the distinction of his work,” says Kevin. “He passed in 2010…So I was able to connect with the executor of his estate, and some of the other surrounding people…He’s [in the] Smithsonian, he’s in the new African American Museum that just opened…One of his last managers got his meat hooks into him, and next thing you know he declared him mentally incompetent—because you can do that in Florida, the only state in the country that you can do that, otherwise, you have to be in the family. And it was just kind of downhill from there. And his estate currently is hundreds of thousands of dollars into debt…In this film we’re using several techniques: we’re using animation, we’re using archival footage, of course, in an attempt to kind of bring him back to life.
Documentary on Purvis Young by Kevin Sharpley
Impromptu shot of Recording Connection student Dawnette Scolari (Los Angeles, CA) during a mixing class at ES Audio. Dawnette has amazing ears and business sense too! We don’t know what she’s got planned next but we’re sure it’s heady and fun.
Film Connection student, Cecelia Sayler (Denver, CO): “I’m learning so much, and everything is so exciting. I’ve went on to use so many different tools with my mentor Johny, I learned how to use a jib, slider, Steadicam, shoulder rig, and then last week I learned how to use the Ronin-M which is basically another camera stabilizer…I have been messing around with my camera a lot more, not only taking video but also messing around with photography as well and taking lots of pictures. I’m just trying to get myself involved in as many things as I can, and I’m very excited for the future and this upcoming class and weekend.”
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