Everybody and their kid brother go by the title of “music producer” or “audio engineer” these days. So, it is with some reluctance that I use these seemingly hollowed out monikers. Nevertheless, here’s a brief overview of my experience in the field.
Having cut my teeth in my late teens on an eight-track tape based setup, recording local bands, I decided it was time for a more committed approach. I enrolled in the Rotterdam “Sound Seminar”, an audio engineering course hosted by the RBS studio group. Upon graduating, I continued the homebrew eight track productions, some of which surprisingly made it to high rotation airplay on national radio. By the end of the nineties, I landed a spot as assistant engineer at Louisstudio, a state of the art facility sporting all the real toys: SSL9000J console, analog and digital multitrack and heaps of desirable mics and outboard. Collaborating with a range of national and international producers, engineers and bands allowed me to hone my skills in producing, engineering and mixing. When Louisstudio sadly closed doors, I ventured out as a freelancer and started accumulating both a resume as producer/engineer and a considerable pile of gear, the latter allowing me to complete much – if not all – of my production tasks outside of commercial studio environments.
My production goal tends to be a simple one: at the end of the day, I want to be excited and/or moved by what I hear from the left and right speakers. Whatever it takes in terms of tracking strategy and mixing approach to reach that goal, l will pursue – there is no fixed, one-size-fits-all approach. Samples of my work can be found on the music player in the sidebar, and on the Discography and References pages.
Mixes and overdubs are most often done in my own tonekitchen.be studio. At the core of this is a hybrid setup, marrying a Pro Tools HDX system – loaded with tons of plugins – with a healthy array of juicy analog outboard (mic preamps, EQ’s, compressors, stompboxes). If you have an insatiable tech lust to feed, please find out more details here.
For programming and preproduction, my workroom is packed with vintage and modern keyboards, and my hard disks contain a huge sound library with advanced searching and indexing tools, so you can actually _find_ sounds in there. In fact, I can actually play those keyboards, a fortunate by-product of my classical piano training as a kid, three years at the Antwerp Jazz Studio, and a decade and a half of being a somewhat in demand keyboard player on the Belgian scene (check out some of my employers on the References page).
Starting 2010, I also teach a course in music arranging and recording at the PXL Music department in Hasselt, Belgium.
And to wrap it up, in case you are intrigued by the “Translations” section on the References page: I hold a Masters degree in Germanic Philology from the University Of Antwerp (UA), that I occasionally put to use by doing English-Dutch translation work.
Luc Weytjens
