How would you define your main role on most of the projects you work on at the moment?
I am a self-producing singer-songwriter, so I write, compose, arrange, produce, record and mix every aspect of my work, from initial raw idea to the final mix. The production incorporates a range of real and midi-based instrumentation. I perform all the vocals, guitars, bass, piano and all programmed midi/synth parts and beats but bring in session players to perform the orchestral parts. On my most recent project, they included live drums (Cath Evans), violin/viola (Jim O’Toole), cello (Phillip Trzebiatowski), trumpet/flugelhorn (Dave Land), flute (Anne Bryant), clarinet (Rachel Cannon) and soprano sax (Simon Jarrett).
Please tell us a bit about your musical background. How did you get started in the music industry? What was your pathway to your current role?
I had sung and acted since a young child but only discovered songwriting through some busking friends when I went to university to study English and Spanish. On graduating, I passed two auditions: one as an actor-singer with an experimental voice theatre company in London and the other as a rhythm guitarist and vocalist with a Manchester punk-folk band signed to the Probe Plus label in Liverpool. I chose the band. The band was my gateway into the industry and although I didn’t stay with them for long, I stayed in Manchester for over a decade developing my craft as a singer-songwriter and recording in various studios. It felt very natural, therefore, to progress into self-production where I found myself part of the first generation of female artists who, in the late 1990s/early 2000s, embraced the opportunities of digital recording software to take control of our sound. However, I noticed we were a distinct minority. This raised important questions and a desire to address them, in addition to developing my career as a self-producing, self-releasing artist. What followed was an MA which morphed into a PhD and a book, Women in The Studio: creativity, control and gender in popular music sound production (Routledge 2020). Nominated for The Excellence in Historical Recorded Sound Research Award 2020, from the Association for Recorded Sound (ARSC), and the International Association for The Study of Popular Music (IASPM) Book Prize 2021, the book examined the wide-ranging impact of music production as a gendered field of practice and the underlying cultural and historical frameworks that sustain inequalities of gender, class and race in the music industry, paying particular attention to their consequences for female music producers and for female self- producing artists. In this dual capacity as both artist-producer and researcher, I have been delivering guest lectures at universities throughout the UK, as well as in Europe, the US and Canada, since the autumn of 2019, contributing to a number of panels at both academic and public-facing music industry events and am now providing doctoral supervision in music production, creativity and identity as a part-time senior lecturer at the London College of Music, University of West London. Simultaneously writing and producing, all my releases have been well received. I am currently mid-way through a triple re-issue cycle of my re-worked back catalogue (long story!) ahead of my fourth album.
What or who inspired you to follow this path?
In terms of production, the early soundscapes of Rickie Lee Jones, that married so well sonic and lyric narratives, were very inspiring to me as a young songwriter and aspiring producer. As to navigating production and academia, I always found myself the only artist-producer giving papers at production conferences that tended to be dominated by ex- (male, white, middle-aged, middle-class) engineers and producers.
Instead, I took my inspiration from the world of literature where it is commonplace for an author or poet to write academic essays or lecture in creativity in addition to their own practice. For me they are all creative acts, they are all about seeing the connections between things. In fact, I have always seen a close connection between music production and poetry and in the book compare Coleridge’s famous description of poetry as the ‘best words in the best order’ to music production as the ‘best sounds in the best order.’
Are there any highlights from your work that you are particularly proud of?
The simultaneous publication of the book and release of my third album White Dots (Sib Records 2019). Even though, I did not reference my own production in the book at all, the synergy from the culmination of two separate, but ultimately connected, bodies of work, felt very special.
I have done a similar thing, but on a smaller scale, with the current releases, with a published paper about the creative process of self-production. I have a new book in mind to accompany my fourth album.
What’s one tip you can share with other MPG members that could help their workflow?
The one tip I would suggest to other MPG members who are self-producing artists is to not confuse great production ideas for a great song. We have so much at our fingertips with our DAWs, it is very easy to misjudge whether a song really ‘works’.
What’s one tip you would like an MPG member to share with you?
What is your best mixing tip? Hopelessly huge question I know, but it would be wonderful to learn from the MPG’s wealth of mixing knowledge.
Do you have any words of wisdom for people wanting to get into a similar music production role to yours?
I have long argued that self-production is an art form distinct within music production. In addition to being aware of the interconnected different acts of creativity that characterise it, you have to know how to get the sound you want technically, as well as creatively. This ensures that you do not miss a trick: firstly by making sure that the song itself is good enough, secondly by being mindful always of the song’s intention when composing the arrangements, thirdly by being physically, mentally and emotionally alert for the best performances, fourthly by having everything set up to capture them (both your own and those of others you might bring into a project) and finally by knowing how to create a mix that showcases their sound—the sum result of all the creative processes that have come before—in their best light. The best tone of the best sounds in the best order.
