Studio West

Staff

Peter Dyson – Owner
A native of England, Peter came to San Diego from the musical town of Austin, Texas in October of 2004. The third owner in Studio West’s forty year history, Peter spearheaded the studio expansion and remodeling project in 2005, determined to bring to fruition his vision of a world-class, fully integrated San Diego-based recording studio, comparable to the top facilities in Los Angeles. His thirteen years of professional expertise in strategic business planning, leadership training and human resources for Motorola’s Semiconductor Group in Austin and his passion for music have uniquely equipped Peter to assemble a top notch team of engineers and producers at Studio West, and to identify and develop services to better meet the needs of clients. As a drummer, Peter has played and recorded with bands in both England and Austin, and has a musical taste that is as diverse as the artists who have recorded at Studio West over the years.

Mark Kirchner - Co-Owner / Facilities Manager / Post Production Engineer / Producer
With nearly three decades of experience working with audio and video production, Mark brings his encyclopedic knowledge of Avid technology and his vast expertise in post-production techniques into the studio. Originally from the San Francisco Bay Area, Mark found his interest in music and audio production early in high school. After finishing college in Southern California he returned home to work for one of the area's largest recording studios, The Music Annex. That same year Mark was offered a job with a little-known newcomer to the audio industry called Digidesign, where he spent 14 years leading groups in Technical Support and Marketing Communications. He was instrumental in developing the service group responsible for supporting the company's products used in the professional audio post production market. Later, in his role as Technical Marketing Manager, Mark's group developed the highly successful Dealer Training Program, which in recent years has become the Digidesign Training and Education Program. After leaving Digidesign in 2001, Mark co-founded The Mindlab Learning Center and AudioMe, technical training centers located in the Bay Area. Mark joined forces with Studio West in 2006, and keeps his practical experience up-to-date by engineering and mixing sessions for top film, TV and broadcast clients. Some of these shows include hit television series such as Cold Case, Prison Break, Veronica Mars, Kings and Dora the Explorer. Other projects include work for Nickelodeon, NBC Sports, ESPN, and The Discovery Channel. He has also contributed to such feature films as Iron Man, Meet Dave, My Life in Ruins, (500) Days of Summer, W, and RED. In his day to day tasks at Studio West when not engineering or teaching, Mark ensures that studio operations run smoothly and efficiently.

Jesse Maxson - Studio Manager

Jesse studied Audio Engineering and Audio for T.V. and Film at Mediatech Institute in Dallas. Originally working as an Engineer for the Dallas Sound Lab he became very involved with the Austin City Limits and SXSW music festivals. He worked on various live and studio projects including REM, Steve Winwood, Cake, The Reverend Horton Heat and Franz Ferdinand.  In 2005 Jesse moved to southern California to further pursue his love of music and surfing. Once again he found himself immersed in the music industry working as a live sound engineer and a Pro Tools instructor at the LA Recording School. Finally deciding to firmly plant his roots in San Diego he has come to work as the Studio Manager at Studio West. His hobbies include surfing, music and sports.

Kellogg Boynton – Senior Staff Engineer

A versatile and talented engineer, Kellogg attended Berklee College of Music in Boston and received a BAS in Sound Engineering from Ex’pression College for Digital Arts in the San Francisco Bay Area. With extensive knowledge about Solid State Logic consoles and an Avid Certified Pro Tools Expert, he brings a wide variety of technical and musical knowledge to both tracking and mixing sessions at Studio West. Specializing in rock genres from alternative to the heaviest rock, along with other musical styles such as folk, jazz and classical, he particularly enjoys tracking live drums and mixing. Kellogg has also started his own mixing service, The Mix Factory Online. Recent music credits include sessions with internationally acclaimed artists Taylor Swift, Plain White T's, Anoushka Shankar (as the mixing engineer for her world music album Traveller, Kellogg earned his first Grammy nomination in 2012), Wolfmother, Simple Plan and Elan. Local San Diego band projects include recording and mixing music for Endoxi, Erick Macek and Astra Kelly. Kellogg’s knowledge of ISDN and ADR technology also make him a valuable asset to Studio West’s post-production and broadcast clients. His ADR and voiceover recording credits include Richard Dreyfuss, EA Games (with Colts’ running-back Marshall Faulk), Southwest Airlines, Kashi Company and the hit TV series Veronica Mars. A native San Diegan, Kellogg grew up in the North County coastal town of Encinitas.

Darrell Harvey – Engineer
A San Diego native, Darrell’s 20+ years of experience as recording engineer at Studio West and his deep knowledge of music theory and perceptual acoustics (why and how we hear what we hear) make him a tremendous asset to any session, be it rock, orchestral, jazz, gospel, classical or alternative music. With feature film, local band and national artist credits under his belt, Darrell has a long list of repeat clients who know and trust him with their recording projects. Darrell’s film credits include The Usual Suspects, his album credits include Blink-182’s Enema of the State and he has recorded artists including Midnight Oil, Natalie Merchant and Patti Smith. Darrell is a student of classic recordings of the 60’s and 70’s. His musicality, attention to detail and his ability to use vintage gear and recording techniques in unexpected or cutting edge applications make him a valuable commodity on the Studio West team.

Gary Miranda - Engineer

A recent addition to the Studio West team, Gary earned his first of several Pro Tools certifications in 2005. Gary's passion lies in post-production projects and video game audio. His recent projects include trailers for the video games Thor and Captain America developed by SEGA. He also contributed music, and finalized the mix, for the video game trailer for Iron Man 2. In between teaching Pro Tools classes, Gary has worked on several voiceover and dialog sessions for clients such as Lucas Arts, FX Network, Richard Dreyfuss, and Nickelodeon. He also completed the locally produced short film Well Done in which his credits included ADR recording, foley, sound design and sound mixing.  Gary's music projects lie in the metal genre and have included work with Draconis, Scrap Metal, Defeated Sanity, Deprecated, and Derek Boyer of Suffocation.

Brandon Papsidero - Engineer

Brandon joined the Studio West team after graduating from The Conservatory of Recording Arts & Sciences with a Degree in Audio Engineering and a Bachelors Degree in Information Technology from WGU. He's worked with many bands spanning the genres of rock, hip hop, jazz, vintage blues, orchestra, reggae, metal and pop. He's also done commercial production for Sony Games, EA Sports, The Discovery Channel, Nickelodeon, and Bullrun on Spike TV. His experience in post-production sound includes local feature films and cinematic sequences for three blockbuster video games: Red Faction: Guerrilla, Singularity and Iron Man 2. His skills include original sound design, foley recording, sound editing, and mixing in surround for theater and DVD.

Ben Hasdovic - Engineer

Ben has over fourteen years of experience in the audio industry. In the late 90’s he worked for Soundcraft before deciding to attend Full Sail and get an Associates of Science degree. In the early 2000’s Ben was assisting and engineering in studios all over California for producers such as Trevor Horn, Brian Wheat (of the band Tesla), and Perry Margouleff. In late 2004 Ben began to split time between San Diego and LA. He has recorded and mixed for such artists as Portugal.The Man, Louis XIV, Anya Marina, and Transfer. Ben has also engineered for various local artists like Silent Comedy, Republic of Letters, and Maren Parusel to name a few. Recently, Ben has finished up drum editing for the upcoming Three 6 Mafia album.

Hunter Levy - Engineer / Internship Program Manager

Hailing from Austin,TX, renowned as the live music capital of the world, Hunter found his love for music jumping to the other side of the glass while attending courses at The Recording Arts Center. After taking almost all the courses TRAC offers, he began an internship that eventually landed him a job at Studio West. Working at Studio West has helped him gain vast experience in recording, producing and mixing, which allows him to offer a variety of audio based services. Hunter writes, engineers, plays different instruments, manages the studio's Internship Program and runs his own small studio-based company, True Wave Productions.

Marti Amado – Independent Composer / Arranger / Producer

Composer, arranger and producer Marti Amado specializes in original music for television, film, advertising and animation post-scoring as well as artist production for singer-songwriters.  A Midwestern native, Marti has created music for clients in Los Angeles, Chicago, Nashville, San Diego and Europe, including:  LEGOLAND’s Pirate Shores Attraction, The Odyssey TV Network - The Muppets V-Chip (winner of a Pro-Max Gold Medallion Award), Warner Brothers Films (Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang), Universal Music Publishing, Entertainment Tonight, Chevrolet, Ford, Sears, Qualcomm, Big Sisters, Bumblebee Publishing and many others.  She has worked with international artists including Jewel, Kenny Rogers, Rita Coolidge and Michael Bolton and local artists like Berkley Hart, Leonard Tucker, Eve Selis, Peter Sprague and Billy Thompson. Wreck N’ Sow, produced by Marti and Americana duo Berkley Hart, won top honors at the San Diego Music Awards.  Marti’s stylistic strengths as a composer and producer include quirky and humorous music, poignant heartland music, choral music and acoustic genres including Classical Orchestral, Gypsy Swing, Jazz, Acoustic Rock, Bluegrass and Americana.  A graduate of Northwestern University’s School of Music, Marti is jazz and classically trained as a pianist and singer.  Marti is now on-site and available to Studio West clients.  Office: 858.451.9582 / Cell: 760.877.0619 / Email: marti@amadomusic.net / Internet: www.amadomusic.net

Larry Czoka – Mastering / Digital Editing
Larry is a classically trained musician with degrees from CSU Long Beach and UCSD, where he began his recording training. He worked with a major label as editing and mastering engineer for over 15 years before coming to Studio West in 1997. Larry also is a transcriptionist, music copyist and score preparation guru. He was copyist and worked closely with orchestrators to prepare the musical score for the film The Usual Suspects, as well as working on many other film scores recorded at Studio West. Larry is the studio’s primary mastering engineer and has worked with Blues Traveler, Natalie Merchant, Joan Osbourne, Frankie Laine, Dishwalla, Buck-O-Nine, Unwritten Law and a slew of other loacal and national artists in genres ranging from hip hop, to rock, to pop, to classical.