Press

Ruckus: Giant Steps

By Gabe Gomez

Published: January 24, 2007

Surreptitiously tucked away on Jose Street, Stepbridge Studio is a professional music recording facility that has been in Santa Fe for more than 20 years. Edgar Rivera recently purchased the studio from original founder and owner Tim Stroh in October 2006. Feeling quantifiably inadequate with my Radio Shack Sony M-430 microcassette recorder next to a G Series Solid State Logic 4000 mixing console, I managed to catch a glimpse of the studio’s ambitious reinvention. Along with the new ownership came the newest digital technology, balanced with a philosophy of inclusion, as well as access to an established group of engineers and producers.

Rivera, originally from Puerto Rico, also owns another recording studio in Santa Fe, Rancho Digital. With the recent acquisition of Stepbridge, Diego Deaguero, a 21-year-old engineer and producer trained at the Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences in Tempe, Ariz., is hosting recording sessions at Digital. Rivera plans to make Digital’s multitrack equipment even more accessible for home studio users to mix and refine their recordings.

Rivera manages administration and public relations for both studios, while his partner, engineer and house producer Michael Chavez, Edgar Rivera and Andrew Click enjoy every minute of their long days at the mixing board. (Photo by Gabe Gomez.)

Andrew Click, who at 25 already has 13 years of experience, manages the technical end. “He is the knowledge that I count on and completely trust to keep this operation going,” Rivera says. Click started as a musician and slowly began making the transition behind the board. He states, “I realized my passion was in being the conduit for other people’s music and being the enabler "I love helping people make the best record that they possibly can.” Click permanently joined Stepbridge as a managing partner last October, when Rivera purchased the studio. The pair have been collaborating for almost six years. “We have a history together, that’s for sure,” Click says. Joining Click and Rivera at Stepbridge is producer, engineer and now part owner Michael Chavez, who has been with the studio for four years and was pivotal in bringing Stepbridge up to technological speed by solidifying the use of digital recording software, Pro Tools, in addition to analog tape.

Immediate upgrades in recording equipment upon purchasing the studio make it New Mexico’s only SSL, Neve and Pro Tools HD facility, complemented with an impressive collection of vintage amplifiers and microphones. “Both Andy and I recognize the years of meticulous choosing of gear by Tim Stroh to make this studio balanced the way that it is,” Rivera says. Click adds: “It’s all integrated. Lots of great, hard-to-find, vintage microphones that have very special sounds. You put it all together with all the vintage preamps and tube EQs, you can’t go wrong.”

Stepbridge boasts three studios: one large, traditional tracking studio and one smaller studio geared for voiceover work. Cutting-edge equipment is only part of the equation when recording a band; years of experience and a natural sense for sound doesn’t hurt. “It’s in the gear and in the ear,” Rivera says.

With the advent of home recording equipment becoming relatively inexpensive within the last few years, compounded with an overbloated music industry increasingly passing down costs to artists, the question turns to the viability of professional recording studios such as Stepbridge. Rivera, a home studio enthusiast himself, welcomes recordings in all shapes and sizes and is confident that the equipment housed at Stepbridge and the considerable experience from Click and Chavez will create a superior recording. On par with his beliefs, Rivera has designed a plan he calls “afford to record” that helps to ease recording costs for musicians already in the studio. “We’ve made a name for ourselves financing bands that show real potential. Allowing them terms of payment, which is unheard of,” Rivera says. “I want good music on the streets, and when bands and artists or producers begin to make decisions that affect the quality of the music based on their budget, that’s when we step in and say, ‘Look, I understand the limitations; let me see if I can help,’ and if I can help, then it’s a situation where that music will be industry quality and stand up to any corporate CD out there.”

Stepbridge is branching out into the community even further by partnering with Brian Hardgroove on two projects. The multi-instrumentalist, Public Enemy bandleader, radio host and now proprietor of Zen Tone Productions will soon be on the search for new talent. Zen Tone is a production company that will record and mix at Stepbridge Studios. Hardgroove states: “As a ‘new’ New Mexican, I’m just starting to learn about the rich musical history of the region and am excited to make recordings that capture the uniqueness of the area.” Hardgroove is also at the helm of “Indie Lounge at Stepbridge,” a new collaboration with Indie 101.5 FM. Hardgroove will be recording and interviewing touring bands at the studio, and these recordings will be featured on Indie 101.5. The Sean Helean Band is scheduled for the next recording on Jan. 30.

When thinking of Muscle Shoals, Electric Ladyland, Sun and Chess Studios, these are places that captured pieces of a culture through collaboration among engineers, producers and artists, a sense of community seemingly lost by way of corporate efficacy. It’s within this spirit of community that the new Stepbridge Studio operates, and where Rivera and his crew hope to define, support and revere the music they record.

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