180 Svjetlana Bukvich
soon, and mom too, and that all was good in the world. What I didn’t
know is that I became a producer on that day. All the sounds that I heard
that afternoon – the mix of voices, languages, accents, and machine – was
a language that would later become part of my own.
EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND, 1984
The George Heriot School Symphony is rustling in the pre-final rehearsal
state of neurosis. I am playing Beethoven’s Second concerto by heart
that night in the hall larger than any of my biggest classical performance
experience up until then. I am wearing an earring that says: “I’m a loud,
super sparkly, prismatic, and fake aquamarine!” After a roaring premiere,
the second violinist comments that the earring was too much, especially
since I didn’t come from affluence (in so many words), and was there on
scholarship. I smile and say that, perhaps, she regrets not being the soloist
herself with the freedom to set standards about proper attire. That same
night, my gay Boy-George-with-raven-black-hair-looking school friend
who came to the concert takes me to a bar stacked up with two floors –
one for gay men and one for gay women. I had never been to a place like
that. He buys me and his friends a drink (he exchanged music with me ever
since I showed up in Edinburgh’s oldest castle-school) and gives a speech.
Some girls from school came, too. Everything is happy in a Harry Potter
kind of way. That night I learned about inclusivity, the power of connec-
tion through music, the power given by music, and all that is larger than a
lonely stint at a private school.
TROY, NEW YORK, 1993
Robert Ashley is fumbling through reels of tape he wanted digitized. He is
preparing Empire, an excerpt from Atalanta, one of his several multi-dis-
ciplinary spoken-word TV-operas, which is to be produced at Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute (RPI), where he is visiting artist. I am his beaming
student sound director, assigned to him in a program that favors an inte-
grated approach to electronic arts, the first of its kind in American aca-
demia. No one really knows what we are doing: a Grass Valley video rig,
early Kurzweil keyboards, and Studio Vision sequencing software with
OMS are among the beauties we are installing in the studios as we relent-
lessly pursue the idea of converging technologies to fit our artistic visions.
Things are discovered as we go: our teachers are open, curious, and gifted
artists, and our efforts are reinforced by lofty postmodernist theories that
seem to odiously lag behind. I have no knowledge of music production, so
to speak. Previous to this, I had played with Atari computers in Sarajevo
for the recording of my first symphony with the Yamaha DX 7 synthe-
sizer, and had bartered my keyboard chops with boys in bands to let me
record my songs, as long as they turned the knobs. So, I have to expand
and adapt fast. In Ashley’s piece we have video, pre-recorded sound, live
performance, post-production, and words like Campbell soup to handle.
Ashley is already highly regarded in his career, and yet, he appears to me
181 Women in Audio
as one of the most generous, patient, and open human beings I had ever
met. And yes, he had that beguiling voice as a weapon. In a classic ‘teach
by example’ fashion, Ashley had us experience the power of collabora-
tion, insightful guidance, and grace. This discovery continues to serve me
well as I find myself swimming upstream in many facets of collaborative
sound work.
NEW YORK, NY, 1994
Looking Glass studios on Broadway proves to be a thriving artistic hive.
The first Blue Man Group album was recorded there, as well as works by
David Bowie and Goran Bregovic, among others, and of course, by Philip
Glass, who is one of the co-founders and owners. What intrigues me so
much as an intern there isn’t Glass’s compositional prowess as much as
the fact that he owns a studio which expresses art that would otherwise
not be heard, and that he uses electronic keyboards in new classical music
requiring a conductor. His opera La Belle et la Bête based on J. Cocteau’s
film is being recorded here, and I am one of the assistants. His larger-
than-life producer Kurt Munkacsi, responsible for the MIDI room and
things of mysterious nature pertaining to the operation of the premises,
teaches me one important lesson. The soprano is coming, the MIDI tracks
need to be printed, all the audio interns are entangled with cables routing
the MIDI from one MOTU Mark of the Unicorn rack-mount interface to
another. (As a side note, I liked those interfaces because they had a picture
of a unicorn that supposedly left a mark. I later wrote “Sabih’s Dream”,
a piece about a flight on an Arabian horse, akin to those I used to have
riding on a mountaintop back in the homeland.) Notwithstanding being
inspired by my reverie, the MIDI isn’t working for us, and the three interns
are trouble-shooting for an hour to no avail. Enter Munkacsi, so tall that
he can barely get through the door. Slowly, he walks to about the middle
of the distance between the door and the gear, listens to our problem, and
responds in an equally languid manner with about ten words. Then he
swivels on one foot and disappears. The appearance was part comical
and part surreal. His advice was gold, and we solved the puzzle, but what
stuck with me more is the way in which it was delivered. It made the ‘less
is more’ proverb more poignant to a budding know-it-all, and taught me
about the importance of knowing how to balance coolness and efficiency
in a stressful situation and to plain have a good time.
KINGSTON, NY, 2011
Incredibly, I just drove to Kingston to meet Tony Levin, the electric bass
hero on the many records I adore. Next to me is Paul Geluso, the engi-
neer from New York University’s (NYU) Music Technology department,
where I teach part-time. I feel grateful to Geluso for being my right hand
in this – tracking Levin in his own house is something neither of us have
imagined doing anytime soon. I don’t know what to expect and am feeling
a bit apprehensive. I had sent Levin the tracks with the bass part notated.
182 Svjetlana Bukvich
Yes, I came with a recommendation, but he tells me on the spot that he
accepted to do this because I can write for bass and because he wanted to
play on ‘something different’. Generously, he pulls out more basses than
I’d ever seen in one place: a couple of electric basses, a few uprights, and
The Chapman Stick. Levin is completely prepared and full of ideas. The
three pieces on my new album Evolution require ‘big bass’, and we fol-
low Levin’s lead to record with no frequency equalization, and no sound
compression, using just one little pre-amp that he loves. His timing feels
like pouring hot concrete over a bumpy surface, evening the bumps out.
He seems to delight in odd time signatures and everything is going well.
We utilize sliding and thumbing, but there is one section that just doesn’t
gel. What I wrote doesn’t work so, quietly in panic, I decide to give up
my structures and ask Levin to improvise with a bow on the Chapman.
This technique produces a sound I have never heard before – a sound that,
supported by the altered tuning in strings, so perfectly embodies the ideas
of that particular section of the piece that I want to cry. That was one of
the moments in my producing life where I tasted the power of making a
decision that is right for the context. The decision was part-composition,
part-production. Virgil Moorefield’s book The Producer as Composer
illustrates this profoundly: The role of the record producer was evolv-
ing from that of organizer to auteur; band members in some case became
actors in what Frank Zappa called a “movie for your ears” (Moorefield
2005: 15).
As we parted, Levin shook my hand and said: “It was great. I hope we
get to play again”.
NEW YORK, NY, 2012
I’m producing my album Evolution at Stadium Red studios in Harlem.
Many years in the making, this album contains Before and After the Tekke,
considered by many to be my groundbreaking piece for violin, voice,
piano, analog synthesizers, electric bass, and electronic sound in origi-
nal tuning. Mixing with me are the classical producer David Frost (18
Grammys) and avant-garde jazz producer Tom Lazarus (7 Grammys). I’m
excited, and hearing everything they do, and more. I ponder the hourly rate
they must be getting with other, ‘more commercial’ projects, and the fact
that I can shamelessly call the shots on every millisecond of sound on the
tracks. Time comes to mix Tekke, and Lazarus kindly offers to do some
premixing in order to save time. I gleefully accept and the next morning,
solidly caffeinated, the three of us listen to the premix. My heart sinks. It
is completely not the direction I want to go with the mix. Luckily, I had
earned some feathers in the preceding sessions for the album, so I can
speak. There’s a pounding thought in my head: I am finally starting to feel
validated in the studio (I embrace happily the question “have I arrived?”),
but all this is also a favor to me bestowed by the two of them – helping an
artist manifest her vision fully, for a price that she can afford. I don’t wish
to seem ungrateful. It is hard and we find a way. Lazarus and Frost are
genuine gemstones, with music’s best interest on their minds. We laugh
183 Women in Audio
eventually. This episode taught me that what a music producer really does
is manage people, their legacies, personal histories, lives and wants, their
talents and peculiarities. For that, one needs to walk the path of integrity,
love, and respect, and, on that same path, to put the music first.
NEW YORK, NY, 2018
I am post–Thomas Dolby concert at the Cutting Room in NYC, a venue
I hold dear in my heart. I managed, by a stroke of luck and some 150 email
messages, to produce my album release concert here. Dolby plays through
his oeuvre with nuance and humor, and with an informed technological
wand in hand. I know his music and the innovation it brought about. After
the concert I wait in line, holding my CD in hand. I approach Dolby, tell
him I am a fan and why, and then throw in the names of friends and col-
laborators we have in common. His book The Speed of Sound is promoted
on this tour. We exchange goods. I give him my self-produced CD, and
he gives me his book – signed. A happy conversation ensues. It is a good
night. I feel like I have ‘arrived’.
NEW YORK, NY, 2019
The Dolby Laboratories midtown is a place I am initiated into by Mick
Gochanour, a brilliant producer and director. I am in what seems like a
tower, surrounded by the misty May clouds floating by the windows of the
28th floor studio. It’s very zen-looking. The gear just got moved to another
location, and what’s left is the very essentials. I am getting a demonstra-
tion in Atmos, Dolby’s cathartic new foray into 3D sound by none else
than Darin Hallinan, the chief shaman. We fire up the engine. I feel like
I’m hearing my music for the first time. My life is realizing itself.
So, this is my movie. And while some of these small, personal accounts
may seem like a listing of milestones in my professional life, it is precisely
these milestones that made me feel like I’m peeling away the onion of rec-
ognition; the insecurities about not having the opportunity to do the work
drop away and instead of ‘a woman producer’ I become just ‘a producer’.
I am acutely aware of the general lack of female heroines, and like to tell
stories that interest me in that regard. As someone born at the crossroads of
East and West, I have always been interested in connections between fields
that are not necessarily apparent “at first listening”, and in finding/adjust-
ing mediums through which these connections can take form – recording
arts, concert stage, film, performance art, architecture, and dance. My her-
oine is omnivoracious and about connections. In the world I come from,
men and women had equal pay and equal access to education. In Sarajevo,
a mosque, a cathedral, an Orthodox church, and a synagogue all used to
greet me while I strolled. Yugoslavia fell apart after a civil war, and the
sense of unity in that part of the world shifted. My sense of myself as a
person shifted, too. I evolved into a kind of a fractal split – an inhabitant of
many worlds. However, I am not bitter about it. I have learned to adapt and
to understand my place in history and purpose in life better.
184 Svjetlana Bukvich
Pre- and post-war history in Yugoslavia has undeniably influenced me
as a producer. As with every societal upheaval in the past, the changing
of hierarchical structures offered a unique look at what forces create us
and change us. Having my nose “rubbed” in war – psychological and
physical – felt like flying into an abyss, into another dimension from
which to gather knowledge. That knowledge, however subjective, is part
of my consciousness when I work. I left under tenuous circumstances,
and I feel richer for those lessons. The experimental nature of society in
Yugoslavia, coupled with the solid education I received there in classical
music, the rich general education, and a coming-of-age within a vital rock
scene all gave me a sense of curiosity about the world and the tools with
which to explore it. My thirst for looking at things from different angles
was intensified with my pursuit of electronic music and media in the US.
I came of my own volition, on American stipends, and not because of war.
I stayed because of it. In the 1990s, all I wanted to do was learn the tech-
nology so that I could fully produce my sound, and expand it into visions
of genre-busting, hybrid performance. My influences back then were
Meredith Monk, Laurie Anderson, Andrei Tarkovsky, Mesa Selimovic,
Mikhail Bulgakov, Kate Bush, Led Zeppelin . . . and many more. This all
happened at the time when multimedia in America was at its onset. Those
were exciting times, and it felt like the war didn’t actually slow me down.
It taught me about the impermanence of things, yes, but I somehow con-
tinued to ride on the wave of innovation, fueled by the opportunity the US
offered me. I clearly saw the historical chance for people like me to do
new things and, potentially, leave things better than they found them. My
influences now are stretched somewhere between early Igor Stravinsky
and Jacob TV.
Women and men coming from different cultures have different ideas
about the monetary value of the goods performed, patriarchal hierarchy,
leadership, history, and politics. Post-Gregorian chant, music became a
product and a powerful tool in the hands of, first, the church, and later,
the executive producer, a male in most cases. Women producers don’t
make the same amount of money in music as their male counterparts. We
all know that women who are successful in this field feel like they work
twice as hard. Why? Because, in addition to the economy of things (related
to their titular role in raising offspring), they need to overcome the still-
prevalent understanding of them in a primordial sense – as muses whose
purpose is to arouse magic. Yet, the (male) producer will get the credit and
control the product and the money. So, there is plenty to overcome here – a
few millennia?
So what are my solutions?
In my experience, when a woman walks into an all-male recording stu-
dio (or a man walks into an all-female studio, or a bunch of women walk
into an all-male studio), there is a palpable vulnerability in the air. There
simply aren’t that many examples of the aforementioned scenarios, and
people generally don’t know what to do. The best result is achieved when
there is openness in spirit and respect of each other’s vibration. Most of the
time, this has nothing to do with the actual knowledge of audio by anyone
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