So far my senior project has not surprised me very much but has definitely passed my expectations. From the stories I have heard from other music studios I expected a very fast and possibly even stressful work environment, but my job so far has been far from that. The majority of my work comes in the mornings, in which I spend my first couple of hours on the clock tidying and sanitizing the studios. Once done, I am mostly fine to do personal creative work, other than the occasional phone call or snack run to do. After my work is done, I usually have 5 or 6 hours straight to work on music, and will often spend that time working with my colleagues to get outside ideas and perspectives. This is often interrupted with smaller jobs, but other than that I use almost all of that time on creative work. These first couple of weeks have led me to expect a very conducive work environment and a very conducive environment for my own creative work. I think my time at this internship during my senior project and possibly beyond will open doors to new job opportunities in the music industry and will better prepare me as a creative and a collaborator. 

On a broader note, I have been learning a lot about the workings of the music industry, and because I joined the studio at a very interesting time I have gotten a very unique glimpse into a huge shift that’s happening in the recording studio business. To summarize what I learned: the era of renting studio time is slowly dying. The traditional method of recording music is to go to one of these many recording studios and pay for studio time, with the price depending on the quality of the gear and the history of the studio. With covid, however, this format has started dying. Covid pushed people to extremes, and just like everyone, the music industry had to evolve. This has pushed many smaller artists to get home studios and has pushed many record labels to buy their own studios, which they can rent out to their artists for far cheaper than anyone else could possibly offer. This has left very little room for traditional recording studios, such as the one I work at. This is why, in my writing about my job, I often mention that it is very slow and very low stress, and that is mostly because there are very few clients to actually worry about. I would say that I see a paying client around 1 time every 1 or 2 of my shifts. Comparing this to last summer, where they had 3-4 clients every single day, it does not look good. But this is not only a phenomenon at my studio, but it sounds like it is happening all over the music industry. Other than very famous studios that continue to attract huge clients, most studios are struggling to pull the same profits as before. There is a shift happening in a lot of music studios around the country, and I do not know if it will ever be reverted.