 I recently caught up with my friend Amy Moreland via our Wednesday Night Chat series on Instagram. I’ve known Amy for many years through the Austin music scene... in fact, my last live gig was sharing the stage with her band, Brand New Key . In our chat, Amy and I talked about Crosspick Studio , her various pandemic projects, and which instrument has been Amy’s quarantine buddy. What were you up to pre-pandemic? Pre-pandemic, my business partner, Ashley Welch, and I ran this studio together. It’s a small ensemble live sound and mixing space. We can do production as well. We would have one or two bands in a month. We started it in 2017, and in 2018, we started making a little income with it. We’ve recorded about two dozen albums in the studio at this point. Since then, we’ve been doing complete production work, in the box. I really miss musicians up here. I know that you credit Ashley quite a bit with being your audio tech in that studio, but what have you learned over the last few years? Really tightening the simplicity of the signal chain. That has been really exciting. I came into the audio world with some experience, some education, and intuition. My own aesthetic is acoustic instruments, so my gut instinct is, put a good mic in a good location with a good musician. Build the vibe and that’s what should come out on the other end. I went on a journey where I questioned that sensibility. “We have to have this plugin, or that plugin!” Pro Tools made me question everything that was in the “simple” zone. But I think you come out the other side and realized Pro Tools is just a tool. It’s a tool that can help fortify, but you still have to know where the chains are coming from. It requires a really patient person to be able to do that. Yeah, absolutely. And going back into the digital space after getting that decent recording, really cleaning the tracks, and spending that time on cleaning the visual space in Pro Tools. I’m a sucker for organization. I love the lifelong learning.This is definitely a field to get involved with if you like non-stop learning. You can’t stop learning in this field. What do you want to learn next? I have access to the LinkedIn Learning series. I started a Pro Tools class. It’s really good, going back to basics. I dip into that if I feel a little rusty from not recording anybody. Musically, I’m looking into using some new apps for recording to record myself as I’m learning a new instrument. I’ve been working on some mixes that were recorded before the pandemic, so I’m getting through the backlog. Sometimes I’m just looking around the studio and thinking, “It might be time to learn [how to use that]”. More about Amy : Amy Moreland co-owns and runs Austin’s Crosspick Studio with business partner and head engineer, Ashley Welch. Established in 2017, Crosspick Studio is a queer women-owned professional recording and production studio for musicians and creatives. Amy is a 20-year veteran of the Austin music scene, playing guitar, bass, or mandolin in a variety of bands, from early bluegrassers Cedar Fever to the mid-2000s indie-arthouse-weirdo troupe Darling New Neighbors. For the last 8 years, she plays mandolin and manages the queergrass Americana band, Brand New Key . Crosspick Studio - Instagram Written by Lisa Machac : Lisa Machac is a musician and director of the Omni Sound Project, an organization dedicated to being the most accessible point of entry to the music and audio industries. Omni Sound Project strives to provide affordable opportunities for learning to under-represented communities as well as spotlight the talents of female and gender non-conforming audio professionals. Connect with Omni Sound Project : Website | Facebook | Instagram
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