Author: Moorefield, Virgil
Title: The Producer as Composer: Shaping the Sounds of Popular Music
Description: Cambridge [MA], MIT Press, (2005). orig.cloth. 23x15cm, xix,143 pp.. Minor rubbing. VG. ¶ The evolution of the record producer from technician to auteur, from Phil Spector and George Martin to the rise of hip-hop and remixing. In the 1960 s, rock and pop music recording questioned the convention that recordings should recreate the illusion of a concert hall setting. The Wall of Sound that Phil Spector built behind various artists and the intricate eclecticism of George Martin's recordings of the Beatles did not resemble live performances - in the Albert Hall or elsewhere - but instead created a new sonic world. The role of the record producer, writes Virgil Moorefield in The Producer as Composer, was evolving from that of technician to auteur; band members became actors in what Frank Zappa called a "movie for your ears." In rock and pop, in the absence of a notated score, the recorded version of a song - created by the producer in collaboration with the musicians - became the definitive version. Moorefield, a musician and producer himself, traces this evolution with detailed discussions of works by producers and producer-musicians including Spector and Martin, Brian Eno, Bill Laswell, Trent Reznor, Quincy Jones, and the Chemical Brothers. Underlying the transformation, Moorefield writes, is technological development: new techniques - tape editing, overdubbing, compression - and, in the last ten years, inexpensive digital recording equipment that allows artists to become their own producers. What began when rock and pop producers reinvented themselves in the 1960s has continued..." - Publisher's description.

Keywords: Popular Music, Record Producers, Production, Pop, Sound Recordings, Musical, History, ,