54-506: Anita Jean Kerr ( née Grilli ; October 13, 1927 – October 10, 2022) was an American singer, arranger, composer, conductor, pianist, and music producer . She recorded and performed with her vocal harmony groups in Nashville , Los Angeles, and Europe. Kerr was born in Memphis, Tennessee . In 1947, she married Al Kerr, and they moved to Nashville the following year so that he could take
108-489: A Grammy nomination, the Recording Academy defines a producer: The person who has overall creative and technical control of the entire recording project, and the individual recording sessions that are part of that project. He or she is present in the recording studio or at the location recording and works directly with the artist and engineer. The producer makes creative and aesthetic decisions that realize both
162-402: A film director though there are important differences. It is distinct from the role of an executive producer , who is mostly involved in the recording project on an administrative level, and from the audio engineer who operates the recording technology. Varying by project, the producer may or may not choose all of the artists. If employing only synthesized or sampled instrumentation,
216-479: A Vocal Group. In addition to recording as themselves, the Singers continued to perform as backup singers in Nashville . Using Kerr's arrangements, they can be heard on songs by Hank Snow , Brenda Lee , Perry Como , Pat Boone , Rosemary Clooney , Bobby Vinton , Roy Orbison , Willie Nelson , Floyd Cramer , Al Hirt , Ann-Margret , and many other artists. Under her RCA contract, Kerr also arranged and produced
270-520: A Woman , released as a single on Warner Bros. Records. In early 1967, Kerr signed on as choral director for the first season of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour . She also conducted the choir and orchestra during the sessions for It's Real , a 1967 Capitol LP by singer Dale Evans . In 1967, Kerr, collaborating with poet Rod McKuen , composed, arranged, and conducted music for an instrumental/spoken-word album called The Sea . In 1969, Kerr signed with Dot Records . The Anita Kerr Singers Reflect on
324-423: A broad project, the creation of a popular music recording may be split across three specialists: the executive producer , who oversees business partnerships and financing; the vocal producer or vocal arranger, who aids vocal performance via expert critique and coaching of vocal technique, and the record producer or music producer, who, often called simply the producer, directs the overall creative process of recording
378-999: A contest on the Arthur Godfrey 's Talent Scouts national television program. Now, cut to a quartet at Godfrey's suggestion, the group travelled to New York City two weeks out of every six to appear with Godfrey on his daily television and radio broadcasts. The group contributed backup vocals on Patsy Cline 's first studio album . A few years later, Kerr and her singers performed five times a week with Jim Reeves on his national radio program at WSM . The quartet's roster at this time featured tenor Gil Wright (1930 – April 30, 2017), baritone Louis Nunley (October 15, 1931 – October 26, 2012), alto Dorothy "Dottie" Dillard (August 3, 1923 – May 6, 2015), and Kerr herself as both soprano and arranger. Singers and arranger soon began contributing to between twelve and eighteen recording sessions weekly. Having previously backed Faron Young , Chet Atkins , and Webb Pierce on SESAC radio transcription sessions,
432-471: A cylinder. By the 1930s, a gramophone etched it laterally across a disc. Constrained in tonal range, whether bass or treble, and in dynamic range , records made a grand, concert piano sound like a small, upright piano, and maximal duration was four and a half minutes. Selections and performance were often altered accordingly, and playing this disc—the wax master—destroyed it. The finality often caused anxiety that restrained performance to prevent error. In
486-439: A first-class musician for her significant contributions to the birth and development of the Nashville sound ." Between 1977 and 1988 she continued to perform and record for a variety of record labels. Her work from this period includes: Anita Kerr Performs Wonders , as singer/arranger; The Sound of Warm , as pianist/arranger; and In The Soul , as composer/arranger. In 1985, Kerr conducted her own composition of Piano, Piano as
540-417: A job as a dee-jay on WKDA . The performances of a vocal quintet she organized attracted the attention of a WSM radio program director, who then hired her to lead and arrange an octet choir on the radio station's "Sunday Down South" broadcasts. Joining her were singers Carl Garvin, Jim Hall, Doug Kirkham, Mary Ellen Puckett, Evelyn Wilson, Mildred Kirkham , and Don Fotrell. The group's first recording session
594-407: A leading A&R man of the 1950s. During the decade, A&R executives increasingly directed songs' sonic signatures, although many still simply teamed singers with musicians, while yet others exercised virtually no creative influence. The term record producer in its current meaning—the creative director of song production—appearing in a 1953 issue of Billboard magazine, became widespread in
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#1732791118072648-516: A musical element while playing a previously recorded record, Les Paul developed a recording technique called "sound on sound". By this, the final recording could be built piece by piece and tailored, effecting an editing process. In one case, Paul produced a song via 500 recorded discs. But, besides the tedium of this process, it serially degraded the sound quality of previously recorded elements, rerecorded as ambient sound. Yet in 1948, Paul adopted tape recording, enabling true multitrack recording by
702-542: A new technique, " overdubbing ". To enable overdubbing, Paul revised the tape recorder itself by adding a second playback head, and terming it the preview head . Joining the preexisting recording head, erase head, and playback head, the preview head allows the artist to hear the extant recording over headphones playing it in synchrony, "in sync", with the present performance being recorded alone on an isolated track. This isolation of multiple tracks enables countless mixing possibilities. Producers began recording initially only
756-1108: A series of albums for The Living Voices on the RCA Camden budget label. These Living Voices recordings included the Anita Kerr Quartet, with the addition of four other vocalists to form an octet. In 1964, together with Chet Atkins , Bobby Bare and Jim Reeves , the Anita Kerr Singers toured Europe. In the 1960s, Kerr composed and recorded numerous jingles for use by American radio stations, including: Gene Autry 's KMPC AM-710 in Los Angeles, California; WMCA AM-570 in New York City; WLS AM -890 in Chicago and at WGH AM-1310 in Newport News, Virginia . The Anita Kerr Singers or The Jordanaires sang background on just about every Nashville hit in
810-471: A set of recordings in Los Angeles. Later, folklorist Archie Green called this perhaps the earliest printed use of A&R man . Actually, it says neither "A&R man" nor even "A&R", an initialism perhaps coined by Billboard magazine in 1946, and entering wide use in the late 1940s. In the 1920s and 1930s, A&R executives, like Ben Selvin at Columbia Records , Nathaniel Shilkret at Victor Records, and Bob Haring at Brunswick Records became
864-448: A woman the reins of an immense, creative project like making a record." Ultimately, the reasons are multiple and not fully clear, although prominently proposed factors include types of sexism and scarcity of female role models in the profession. Women producers known for producing records not their own include Sonia Pottinger, Sylvia Robinson and Carla Olson. In January 2018, a research team led by Stacy L. Smith, founder and director of
918-660: Is more forgiving of overmodulation , whereby dynamic peaks exceed the maximal recordable signal level: tape's limitation, a physical property, is magnetic capacity, which tapers off, smoothing the overmodulated waveform even at a signal nearly 15 decibels too "hot", whereas a digital recording is ruined by harsh distortion of " clipping " at any overshoot. In digital recording, however, a recent advancement, 32-bit float , enables DAWs to undo clipping. Still, some criticize digital instruments and workflows for excess automation, allegedly impairing creative or sonic control. In any case, as production technology has drastically changed, so have
972-665: The Ampex album A Christmas Story , and she felt privileged to conduct the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra during the recording sessions. Grob and Kerr bought Mountain Studios in Montreux , Switzerland. They sold it, in 1979, to the rock band Queen . In 1972, Kerr wrote—and MCA Music published—a 103-page book (accompanied by five 45rpm records) called VOICES. With Complete Recorded Examples . That same year,
1026-825: The Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, based in the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism , issued a report, estimating that in the prior several years, about 2% of popular songs' producers were female. Also that month, Billboard magazine queried, "Where are all the female music producers?" Upon the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative's second annual report, released in February 2019, its department at USC reported, "2018 saw an outcry from artists, executives and other music industry professionals over
1080-707: The "bed tracks"—the rhythm section , including the bassline , drums, and rhythm guitar—whereas vocals and instrument solos could be added later. A horn section , for example, could record a week later, and a string section another week later. A singer could perform her own backup vocals, or a guitarist could play 15 layers. Across the 1960s, popular music increasingly switched from acoustic instruments, like piano, upright bass , acoustic guitar , and brass instruments , to electronic instruments, like electric guitars , keyboards , and synthesizers , employing instrument amplifiers and speakers. These could mimic acoustic instruments or create utterly new sounds. Soon, by combining
1134-462: The 1940s, during World War II, the Germans refined audio recording onto magnetic tape—uncapping recording duration and allowing immediate playback, rerecording, and editing—a technology that premised emergence of record producers in their current roles. Early in the recording industry, a record was attained by simply having all of the artists perform together live in one take. In 1945, by recording
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#17327911180721188-574: The 1950s, on simply improving the record's sonic match to the artists' own live performance. Advances in recording technology, especially the 1940s advent of tape recording —which Les Paul promptly innovated further to develop multitrack recording —and the 1950s rise of electronic instruments, turned record production into a specialty. In popular music, then, producers like George Martin , Phil Spector and Brian Eno led its evolution into its present use of elaborate techniques and unrealistic sounds, creating songs impossible to originate live. After
1242-522: The 1960s. Still, a formal distinction was elusive for some time more. A&R managers might still be creative directors, like William "Mickey" Stevenson , hired by Berry Gordy , at the Motown record label. In 1947, the American market gained audio recording onto magnetic tape. At the record industry's 1880s dawn, rather, recording was done by phonograph , etching the sonic waveform vertically into
1296-501: The 1980s, production's move from analog to digital further expanded possibilities. By now, DAWs, or digital audio workstations , like Logic Pro , Pro Tools and Studio One , turn an ordinary computer into a production console, whereby a solitary novice can become a skilled producer in a thrifty home studio. In the 2010s, efforts began to increase the prevalence of producers and engineers who are women, heavily outnumbered by men and prominently accoladed only in classical music. As
1350-471: The Anita Kerr Singers recorded two LPs for Philips and Kerr scored and conducted original music for the motion picture soundtrack to Limbo , a drama starring Kate Jackson . During the early 1970s, Kerr also made numerous personal appearances on television in the Netherlands . In 1974, Kerr began a five-year professional relationship with Word Records . In addition to recording four gospel albums with
1404-407: The Anita Kerr Singers were invited to record their own songs for SESAC. Between 1959 and 1963, the group waxed sixty SESAC tracks. In 1960, as "The Little Dippers," the group recorded a hit single, " Forever ", for Unirock Music Inc, of Little Rock, Arkansas, which was released on its University Records label. Crediting herself as "Anita & Th' So-And-So's," Kerr multi-tracked her own voice to record
1458-480: The Hits of Burt Bacharach & Hal David was the group's first and Edison-Award-winning album for Dot. The Anita Kerr Singers also recorded a pair of Dot Christmas-music LPs . In the late 1960s, Kerr not only recorded and performed with her own group, but she also arranged and produced records for other artists, including The Mystic Monks, Les Tres Guitars, and Teresa Bennett. Kerr's 1970 Dot album, Touchlove ,
1512-647: The Kinks produced some of their own songs, although many such songs are officially credited to specialist producers. Yet especially influential was the Beach Boys, whose band leader Brian Wilson took over from his father Murry within a couple of years after the band's commercial breakthrough. By 1964, Wilson had taken Spector's techniques to unseen sophistication. Wilson alone produced all Beach Boys recordings between 1963 and 1967. Using multiple studios and multiple attempts of instrumental and vocal tracks, Wilson selected
1566-485: The San Sebastian Strings Record producer A record producer or music producer is a music creating project's overall supervisor whose responsibilities can involve a range of creative and technical leadership roles. Typically the job involves hands-on oversight of recording sessions; ensuring artists deliver acceptable and quality performances, supervising the technical engineering of
1620-642: The Singers for Warner included a cover version of the song " All You Need Is Love " by The Beatles , and one of the LPs was exclusively devoted to the songs of composer Bert Kaempfert . Disguising the group as the Mexicali Singers, Kerr also recorded a trio of mariachi -flavored albums with musical arrangements reminiscent of the Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass sound. The Anita Kerr Singers won another Grammy Award for their recording of A Man and
1674-410: The Singers, Kerr arranged and produced a series of Hallelujah... instrumental albums for Word . She received Grammy nominations twice for her Word inspirational recordings. During these years, Kerr also wrote choral and instrumental arrangements for Hal Leonard Corporation , the world's largest music print publisher. In 1975, Kerr received a special ASCAP Award saluting "[a] lady of class and
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1728-982: The Swiss entry for the 1985 Eurovision Song Contest in Göteborg, Sweden . There she earned her rank as the third female conductor in Eurovision history since the debut of two female conductors at the 1973 Eurovision Song Contest, these being Monica Dominique for Sweden and Nurit Hirsh for Israel. In 1992, Kerr received a NARAS Governors Award "[in] recognition of [her] outstanding contribution to American Music." Anita married Al Kerr in 1947. They had two daughters, and later divorced. She married Alex Grob in 1965. Kerr died in Carouge, Geneva, Switzerland on October 10, 2022, three days short of her 95th birthday. As The Living Voices As The Mexicali Singers With Chet Atkins With Perry Como With Rod McKuen &
1782-409: The artist's and label's goals in the creation of musical content. Other duties include, but are not limited to: keeping budgets and schedules; adhering to deadlines; hiring musicians, singers, studios, and engineers; overseeing other staffing needs; and editing (Classical projects). The producer often selects and collaborates with a mixing engineer, who focuses on the especially technological aspects of
1836-469: The best combinations of performance and audio quality, and used tape editing to assemble a composite performance. The 1980s advent of digital processes and formats rapidly replaced analog processes and formats, namely, tape and vinyl. Although recording onto quality tape, at least half an inch wide and traveling 15 inches per second, had limited "tape hiss" to silent sections, digital's higher signal-to-noise ratio , SNR, abolished it. Digital also imparted to
1890-517: The capabilities of tape, multitrack recording, and electronic instruments, producers like Phil Spector , George Martin , and Joe Meek rendered sounds unattainable live. Similarly, in jazz fusion , Teo Macero , producing Miles Davis 's 1970 album Bitches Brew , spliced sections of extensive improvisation sessions. In the 1960s, rock acts like the Beatles , the Rolling Stones , and
1944-460: The industry are Logic Pro and Pro Tools. Physical devices involved include the main mixer, MIDI controllers to communicate among equipment, the recording device itself, and perhaps effects gear that is outboard. Yet literal recording is sometimes still analog, onto tape, whereupon the raw recording is converted to a digital signal for processing and editing, as some producers still find audio advantages to recording onto tape. Conventionally, tape
1998-669: The knowledge demands, although DAWs enables novices, even teenagers at home, to learn production independently. Some have attained professional competence before ever working with an artist. Among female record producers, Sylvia Moy was the first at Motown , Gail Davies the first on Nashville's Music Row , and Ethel Gabriel , with RCA , the first at a major record label . Lillian McMurry , owning Trumpet Records , produced influential blues records. Meanwhile, Wilma Cozart Fine produced hundreds of records for Mercury Records ' classical division. For classical production, three women have won Grammy awards, and Judith Sherman 's 2015 win
2052-507: The lack of women in music" and "the plight of women in music", where women were allegedly being "stereotyped, sexualized, and shut out". Also in February 2019, the Recording Academy 's Task Force on Diversity and Inclusion announced an initiative whereby over 200 artists and producers—ranging from Cardi B and Taylor Swift to Maroon 5 and Quincy Jones —agreed to consider at least two women for each producer or engineer position. The academy's website, Grammy.com , announced, "This initiative
2106-533: The late 1950s and early 1960s. After she and Al Kerr divorced, she disbanded the Nashville version of her Anita Kerr Singers and relocated to Los Angeles in August 1965 with her second husband, Swiss businessman Alex Grob, and her daughters Suzie & Kelly. She no longer wanted to just be a background singer or arranger on country songs – she wanted to do pop music, jazz and "do more orchestral writing and music that
2160-576: The manufacturing of record discs. After World War II , pioneering A&R managers who transitioned influentially to record production as now understood, while sometimes owning independent labels, include J. Mayo Williams and John Hammond . Upon moving from Columbia Records to Mercury Records , Hammond appointed Mitch Miller to lead Mercury's popular recordings in New York. Miller then produced country-pop crossover hits by Patti Page and by Frankie Laine , moved from Mercury to Columbia, and became
2214-774: The music a perceived "pristine" sound quality, if also a loss of analog recordings' perceived "warm" quality and better-rounded bass. Yet whereas editing tape media requires physically locating the target audio on the ribbon, cutting there, and splicing pieces, editing digital media offers inarguable advantages in ease, efficiency, and possibilities. In the 1990s, digital production reached affordable home computers via production software. By now, recording and mixing are often centralized in DAWs, digital audio workstations —for example, Pro Tools , Logic Pro , Ableton , Cubase , Reason , and FL Studio —for which plugins , by third parties, effect virtual studio technology . DAWs fairly standard in
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2268-438: The precursors of record producers, supervising recording and often leading session orchestras. During the 1940s, major record labels increasingly opened official A&R departments, whose roles included supervision of recording. Meanwhile, independent recording studios opened, helping originate record producer as a specialty. But despite a tradition of some A&R men writing music, record production still referred to just
2322-438: The producer may be the sole artist. Conversely, some artists do their own production. Some producers are their own engineers, operating the technology across the project: preproduction, recording, mixing , and mastering . Record producers' precursors were "A&R men", who likewise could blend entrepreneurial, creative, and technical roles, but often exercised scant creative influence, as record production still focused, into
2376-463: The recording process, namely, operating the electronic equipment and blending the raw, recorded tracks of the chosen performances, whether vocal or instrumental, into a mix , either stereo or surround sound. Then a mastering engineer further adjusts this recording for distribution on the chosen media. A producer may work on only one or two songs or on an artist's entire album, helping develop the album's overall vision. The record producers may also take on
2430-418: The recording, and coordinating the production team and process. The producer's involvement in a musical project can vary in depth and scope. Sometimes in popular genres the producer may create the recording's entire sound and structure. However, in classical music recording, for example, the producer serves as more of a liaison between the conductor and the engineering team. The role is often likened to that of
2484-438: The role of executive producer, managing the budget, schedules, contracts, and negotiations. (Artists and Repertoires) In the 1880s, the record industry began by simply having the artist perform at a phonograph . In 1924, the trade journal Talking Machine World , covering the phonography and record industry, reported that Eddie King, Victor Records ' manager of the "New York artist and repertoire department", had planned
2538-399: The song Joey Baby , in 1961. The Anita Kerr Singers signed with RCA Victor in 1961. Their first album for the label was From Nashville...The Hit Sound . Subsequent RCA Victor LPs extended the quartet's repertoire as they explored the soul songs of Ray Charles and the compositions of Henry Mancini . The group's 1965 album We Dig Mancini won a Grammy Award for Best Performance by
2592-431: The song in its final mix. The producer's roles can include gathering ideas, composing music, choosing session musicians , proposing changes to song arrangements, coaching the performers, controlling sessions, supervising the audio mixing , and, in some cases, supervising the audio mastering . A producer may give creative control to the artists themselves, taking a supervisory or advisory role instead. As to qualifying for
2646-481: The vast majority have been men. Early in the 2010s, asked for insights that she herself had gleaned as a woman who has specialized successfully in the industry, Wendy Page remarked, "The difficulties are usually very short-lived. Once people realize that you can do your job, sexism tends to lower its ugly head." Still, when tasked to explain her profession's sex disparity, Page partly reasoned that record labels, dominated by men, have been, she said, "mistrustful of giving
2700-658: Was an early female record producer, having produced both of her Ivor Novello award-winning songs. Across the decades, many female artists have produced their own music. For instance, artists Kate Bush , Madonna , Mariah Carey , Janet Jackson , Beyoncé (even that of Destiny's Child and the Carters ), Lana Del Rey , Taylor Swift , and Lorde have produced or coproduced and Ariana Grande who produces and arranges her vocals as well as being an audio engineer. Still among specialists, despite some prominent women, including Missy Elliott in hip hop and Sylvia Massy in rock,
2754-455: Was her fifth. Yet in nonclassical, no woman has won Producer of the Year , awarded since 1975 and only one even nominated for a record not her own, Linda Perry. After Lauren Christy 's 2004 nomination, Linda Perry 's 2019 nomination was the next for a woman. On why no woman had ever won it, Perry commented, "I just don't think there are that many women interested." In the U.K., Lynsey de Paul
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#17327911180722808-475: Was not just country.". She hired some lawyers to get her out of her contract with RCA's Nashville division, got a contract with Warner Bros. Records , and formed a Los Angeles version of the Anita Kerr Singers. The new group, for the next five years, would include the following personnel: alto B.J. Baker or Jackie Ward , tenor Gene Merlino or Bill Cole, baritone Bill Lee , bass Bob Tebow, and Kerr herself as soprano and arranger. The half dozen albums recorded by
2862-506: Was the first LP to showcase her skills as a pianist. Kerr moved to Switzerland in 1970. Her recording sessions held in London, she launched the Anita Kerr Singers anew with UK talent: Anne Simmons, Ken Barrie (Postman Pat narrator & singer), and Danny Street . In 1971, the Singers recorded the LP A Tribute to Simon and Garfunkel . That same year, Kerr wrote original music and lyrics for
2916-523: Was with Red Foley , and their collaboration resulted in a No. 16 hit on Billboard 's Pop chart in 1950: Our Lady of Fatima. The following year, producer Owen Bradley signed them to record for Decca Records . Their talents in demand, Kerr's group continued to sing backup for other country artists in Nashville , including Eddy Arnold , Burl Ives , and Ernest Tubb . The group's recording sessions—initially averaging two per week—increased to eight sessions weekly by 1955. In 1956, Anita Kerr's singers won
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