Nothing wrong with posting it here. If you think it will get more responses in a different forum, let me know and I'll move it for ya. (Maybe the mixing forum?)

Full sail is great, definitely go there!! I haven't personally gone, but I have 4 friends that have and they speak highly of it. Orlando is a fun city too, you can buy a FL residence pass for all 4 Disney parks for $175 and go as much as you like. We go about 15 x's a year.

Best Regards,
Nathan Eldred
[[url=http://[/URL]="http://www.atlaspro…"]atlasproaudio.com[/]="http://www.atlaspro…"]atlasproaudio.com[/]

...In 1990...I taught at Full sail.

Loved my class times....120AM till 550Am...keeps you abreast of "musicians hours"...

Since the Campus is spread out all over the town from the beltway around (17/92) to colonial (50)...you have to ride around to different classes.

I loved teaching at Full Sail then...but I hope the house front jams on hyw.50 are still bringing good artist.

At that time we got to produce some episodes of "In Living color" and Queensricht came in and performed and the cats were very cool.

Mike Davis....And Bill Smith...where are your fuck*in asses...you need to be here dudes.......

Full sail can be fun...but no guarantees of you progress...just a school...and it will cost you dearly at this time( 75 K???)...perhaps I need to revisit the school and do some more teaching...it has been 10 years now,....

Good times...the Meier ones and the Neve in studio one+ the yellow staircase handles...you know.....you know...if you been there....

Been a long time folks.......

Thanks for the help gentlemen!!! It's $28 large just for the audio engineering program. I'm just trying to decide if I want to start a career fresh off in heavy debt. I guess it would be the same for a college offering music tech. I visited a few small schools in N. Hollywood a while ago, and I just want the best education possible. I know it's not just the education it's the studio experience as well. Ahhh the frustration! It does help asking people that have been in your shoes before. Thanks for the advice everyone!!!

Mikey Lewis

We had a thread a while back that listed out a bunch of schools. Don't know if it made it to the archives or not. Try doing a search and see if it comes up.

I'd seriously check out the program at USC in Los Angeles. I took the SSL course there and was extremely impressed. It appears to be very demanding academically however provided you can cut it, an extensive internship at a major facility is also an integral part of the program. This includes BOTH working in the shop and in the studio. They told me that major facilities compete to hire the tiny number of people who graduate and I had no trouble believing it.

I also wouldn't go into debt just to attend Full Sail. You'll still need to come up with the considerable cost of relocating to a major recording center and living expenses for while you intern and work your way towards a decent-paying assisting position. Full Sail also gets mixed reviews because they are notorious for producing people having extremely unrealistic expectations. I know several people who will no longer take Full Sail graduates on as interns because of too many attitude problems.

Austin Community College here in Austin, Texas, offers an Associate's Degree in Professional Music Management that includes some really good recording courses. They even intern at some of the bigger studios here in town. ACC is pretty cheap, and does a good job. Food for though.

I went to Full Sail a while back. That ish is very pricey. Thankfully, I've had great success & paid off my student loans in 2 years. I think audio schools are a lot of people's only real doorways into the music industry. I'm still in touch with a lot of my study partners & love seeing their names along mine in Billboard. In retrospect, I'd probably rather goto a cheaper school & save the rest of the money for gear. Plus, I probably learned about 80% of what was important my 1st year in the industry as a runner. Look at audio school like 1 expensive introduction class. But if you think you want to goto an audio school, make sure you ain't b.s.'ing around. At Full Sail, I'd be at school from 2a.m. to 9p.m. sometimes & hang out trying to learn ish from instructors even after I had finished my classes.

Every person I've run into that has been to Full Sail has needed a serious attitude adjustment upon graduation. I've seen many of 'em come to our studio for internships and they certainly know what all the buttons on an SSL do, but they always seem to be a bit too big for their britches. A technical foundation is important, but these cats expect to be making records in their first week of interning! They just don't yet have to experience yet to match up with their egos. Plus, most of 'em have mommy and daddy pay their 30K tuition, so that already explains why they want everything their way. I like to call it "Full Pail"

Well, do you think the attitude is learned or they had it to begin with? Plus, the only reason I'm considering Full Sail is not because mommy and daddy will be paying the bill. I was in a car wreck and almost died = settlement. Right at the time of the wreck I was checking out some schools and decided I wanted the most education I could get. I know I won't walk away from school knowing 50% of what's needed in the studio. The other 50% will take time through experience. I see the education not only as training but "networking" (hate the term). I just haven't had the opportunity to ask graduates what they thought about the program; until this board. Plus, I'll only have the money once to do this. Thank you everyone for responding to this post!

Personal oppinion here but my feeling on the "formal" recording type schools is that they allow the students to become "comfortable" around the technology however......we all know that the "technology" makes up a very small part of whats important in the studio. The students attending these schools are getting younger and younger thus graduating with the attitude of "I know everything"

Most not all but most lack a certain level of maturity needed to act professionaly in any professional job, while a typical college student has a few years to burn off there wild side, these tech schools dont afford the students that opportunity. Soo what I see is students who go into there first and only year of schooling, partying and screwing off and by the time they open their eyes, its graduation. heh

Just a personal view.

I don't think any school will even give you 20 percent of what you need. The FIRST goal you should have is to become an intern at a major recording facility. Your second is to find the ways to make yourself indispensable.

The first thing I would do is to invest in the manuals and prepare yourself to take some of the manufacturer-sponsored training programs for Neve and SSL consoles. Taking these will involve some travel but the information you'll gain will be priceless as will the contacts you'll make. I'd also take some basic electronics along with some basic music theory. Even rudimentary technical chops will send you right to the head of the line for internships at many studios.

Studios need people who can make sessions happen using their technical chops, communications ability and people skills. There's a million folks who are wanna-be producers but not very many who'll go out of their way to make every first engineer look good and who can swing a mean soldering iron in a pinch. For all of the millions of people wanting to break into the music business there always seems to be a chronic shortage of truly dedicated people.

Hey Bear,

How do you like it down there in austin? I usualy swing down there every 3 months or so.

:)

First time I visited autsin was about 2 years ago, my girlfriend moved there because it was her home town. All she kept doing was ranting over the music in austin, I thought she was nuts.

I really dig the amount of music there but your right.....it is $$$ to live there. I couldnt believe it the first time I went and visited some Music Labs, soo many musicians.

Ive been thinking of moving there allthough I know there isnt much of a studio scene I was thinking of bringing one more into austin.

Bear's 100% correct! The cost of living here in Austin sucks! The ACC program is pretty good, though, and you can find less expensive digs if you don't mind the commute. I don't know if it's the place to "settle down", but for the two years it'd take to get an Associate's degree in Professional Music Management, it may be worth the hassle. There are literally hundreds of small studios in the area, and thousands of musicians, so the competition is fierce. As a result, you see studio time going for $15-25 per hour, five-song demo packages for a few hundred, CD pressing for pennies per disk. As long as you don't have to live in the city limits, it's not too bad.

FWIW about ten years ago the price of lumber went straight through the roof taking the cost of housing all over the U.S. with it.

The days of less expensive digs are numbered everywhere in the U.S.

Originally posted by Bob Olhsson:
FWIW about ten years ago the price of lumber went straight through the roof taking the cost of housing all over the U.S. with it.

man, tell me about it. my day job back then was remodel construction...ooof!

The driving force behind Full Sail, the person who developped the curriculum and got Full Sail'a accreditation was Gary Platt, who got dissilutioned, left, and formed the ex'pression center for new media just north of San Fransisco.
Outstanding facilities, teachers etc., IMHO a big cut above Full Sail.
http://www.xnewmedia.com/bio/bio_platt.htm