VIDEO FEATURE & WEB-EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW Musician:  BONEY JAMES Video:  “Honestly” featuring Avery*Sunshine SAXOPHONIST AND COMPOSER BONEY JAMES’ HONESTLY REFLECTS MUSIC’S POWER TO TRANSPORT Four-time Grammy Nominee Celebrates 25 Years with September 1, 2017 Release Featuring Vocalists Avery*Sunshine and Eric Roberson Boney James released his 16th album on September 1, 2017, titled Honestly—25 years after his debut recording, Trust.... 

SONG PREMIERE & WEB-EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW Musician:  SARAH McGOWAN Exclusive Song Premiere:  “Riding in Cars with Men” Women’s Safety and Vulnerability Are the Focus of Sarah McGowan’s Dark Dream Pop Track “Riding in Cars With Men” A Potentially Dangerous Encounter Inspires a Compelling Song, as a Young Artist Hopes to Spark a Conversation About Consent Indie pop/rock artist Sarah McGowan is no stranger to praise. Over the last... 

VIDEO FEATURE & WEB-EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW Artist: MINDY SMITH Song: “Starting Over Again” Songwriters: Mindy Smith & Cliff Goldmacher Producer: Cliff Goldmacher Animation: Paul and Sandra Fierlinger Mmusicmag.com has the exclusive online world premiere of the new video, “Starting Over Again.” This is the third song Mindy Smith has contributed to the Shelter Me project. AllMusic.com describes Smith as a singer-songwriter who “blends... 

VIDEO FEATURE & WEB-EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW Musician:  BILL REICHENBACH Music Video: “Carols From the Bells” Musicians: Trombones-L.A. Non-profit Benefit: Hearts of Music Fund “My idea,” says Bill Reichenbach, “was to create this non-profit fund called the Hearts of Music Fund—for musicians who don’t have insurance. Back then, there were a lot of musicians who didn’t have insurance. And sadly there’s a good possibility starting... 

Avid’s Pro Tools HD Native Thunderbolt  DITCH THE TOWER When Avid announced Pro Tools HD Native in the fall of 2010, they made huge waves in the recording world. For the first time it was possible to get the near-zero latency of Pro Tools HD, but without the added expense of DSP acceleration. The trouble was musicians still needed a tower-format computer with PCIe slots to run it. With Avid’s Pro Tools HD Native Thunderbolt, you can get the... 

REC ROOM An insider’s guide to creating a home studio that’s right for you    Not so long ago, recording in a studio was a pricey ordeal. A musician or band had to select a studio, ensure it had a quality engineer—and because the meter was running, hope to capture the necessary tracks without breaking the bank. Enter the digital age: Now nearly anyone can set up a quality studio right in his or her home. Sure, there’s gear to acquire,... 

DAW DEAL Digital Audio Workstations can help you make a masterpiece—if you use them correctly  For decades making a record meant big studios, big budgets and countless feet of analog tape—but all that has changed. Today nearly any musician can get access to a computer and the necessary software required to craft an entire album in the comfort of his or her own home. So what exactly is this powerful software that makes the magic happen? The... 

HOWARD BENSON  From aircraft to songcraft and from aerospace to star power            By Michael Gallant For multiplatinum, Grammy-nominated producer Howard Benson, the crucial skill that led to success in the music business was … aerospace engineering? “Music has a math component to me,” Benson explains. “It’s complicated and fun, and I’m blessed to do it every day. Plus the same organizational skills apply. Just instead of making... 

Al Schmitt Five decades of sterling productions and still going strong “Legendary” is a term that is often bandied about too freely. But what other word could you use to describe a man whose first recording session was for the Duke Ellington Orchestra and whose work continues to dominate the charts to this very day? After more than five decades behind the board, Al Schmitt is universally acknowledged as one of the absolute masters of his trade.... 

Inside one of the most crucial and mysterious steps of the recording process MASTERING ENGINEERS HAVE ONE  of the most specialized and hard-to-define roles in the music business. They sit in finely tuned rooms surrounded by boutique and vintage equipment, often finishing a record a day. But what does it mean to master a completed mix? Especially in this age of affordable digital home recording, asking five experts might elicit five different...