{"id":27868,"date":"2026-08-06T14:44:27","date_gmt":"2026-08-06T19:44:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/?p=27868"},"modified":"2026-08-06T16:16:39","modified_gmt":"2026-08-06T21:16:39","slug":"jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/","title":{"rendered":"Jonathan Wyner on Mastering David Bowie, Nirvana, and Music Education in the Age of AI"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-the-berklee-online-instructor-reflects-on-nirvana-s-bleach-frank-zappa-and-david-bowie-remasters-mastering-engineering-music-technology-and-teaching-the-next-generation-of-producers\"><strong>The Berklee Online Instructor Reflects on Nirvana\u2019s <em>Bleach<\/em>, Frank Zappa and David Bowie Remasters, Mastering Engineering, Music Technology, and Teaching the Next Generation of Producers<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>For a mastering engineer who has worked with an incredible range of artists across nearly every genre, it makes sense that Jonathan Wyner\u2019s musical awakening came when a substitute teacher plugged a trombone into a synthesizer. That combination of innovative experimentation and deep appreciation for musical tradition has continued to define Wyner\u2019s career: He has performed with the Buffalo Philharmonic and mastered recordings by Nirvana. In between these extremes, he has worked with artists such as Frank Zappa, David Bowie, Josh Groban, Kiri Te Kanawa, and more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Along the way, he\u2019s never lost his affection for the French horn, a \u201cdevilishly difficult\u201d instrument that he jokes is like being in a bad relationship. Today, he brings that same blend of humor, wonder, technical precision, and musical perspective to Berklee Online, where he teaches <a href=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/courses\/advanced-audio-music-mastering-theory-and-practice?campaign_id=7010Z000001ZkQgQAK&amp;pid=&amp;utm_source=takenote&amp;utm_medium=blog&amp;utm_campaign=bol-gen-takenote-article-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><em>Advanced Audio\/Music Mastering: Theory and Practice<\/em><\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/courses\/audio-mastering-techniques?campaign_id=7010Z000001ZkQgQAK&amp;pid=&amp;utm_source=takenote&amp;utm_medium=blog&amp;utm_campaign=bol-gen-takenote-article-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><em>Audio Mastering Techniques<\/em><\/a>, which he co-wrote with <a href=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/instructors\/marc-dieter-einstmann?campaign_id=7010Z000001ZkQgQAK&amp;pid=&amp;utm_source=takenote&amp;utm_medium=blog&amp;utm_campaign=bol-gen-takenote-article-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Marc-Dieter Einstmann<\/a>. In this Q&amp;A, he reflects on the artists who shaped him, the technologies that transformed the recording industry, the innovations that will shape its future, and the curiosity that continues to guide him through it all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>What\u2019s the first song you remember hearing? <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> Oh my goodness, the first song I remember hearing. I\u2019m going to say it was one of two; either <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/AdGwcc83k0g?si=ERcKskB64aDPlxWz\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u201cTubby the Tuba\u201d<\/A> from a Danny Kaye record of kids\u2019 songs that had me howling when I was young. And the other one was something called <em>The Lieutenant Kij\u00e9 Suite<\/em>, written by Prokofiev. I was intrigued by the brass instruments and the trumpet when I was a young kid. It has some amazing trumpet writing. The shape of it and the melodies were kind of broadcasting the heroic aspect of the character. And it was also set in a musical vocabulary that came from Russian culture and my family originally was of Ukrainian descent. So there was something very familiar to me about the harmonic vocabulary in the music.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Prokofiev Lieutenant Kij\u00e9 (Suite), Op. 60\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/YbaY7p5ahZo?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>You got your degree in the French horn. When did your relationship with that instrument begin?\n <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> I\u2019ve gotta say, being a French horn player by definition means you\u2019re involved in a bad relationship. [Laughs] Most people, if they go to the symphony orchestra, if you think about it for a moment, if there\u2019s going to be a clam from the orchestra, just one clam, one mistake that\u2019s made, it always comes from the French horn section. And that\u2019s not because French horn players aren\u2019t amazing. It\u2019s because you never know what the instrument\u2019s going to give you back. It\u2019s devilishly difficult to play with accuracy and consistency. I think French horn, for me, was an opportunity that arose. I was playing other brass instruments and we needed a French horn in the orchestra. Nobody else wanted to play it, probably because they were smarter than me, so I said, \u201cSure, that seems like an interesting challenge.\u201d And that\u2019s really what set it off. The thing that really got my interest early on was how to extend the musical vocabulary and use instruments in unconventional ways. I think this came about because I was listening to a lot of pop music in the 1960s and growing up in a household that was filled with experimental classical music, so I mashed those two things up together. I was really intrigued by the non-conventional, so it didn\u2019t take long for me to figure out what I could do with the French horn. That was something that nobody had ever heard before. I wasn\u2019t especially interested in playing Mozart or Wagner for the rest of my life, but I started as a mid-teenager.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>There was something in your Berklee bio about playing a horn into a synthesizer. Here\u2019s the quote: \u201cDriving CV triggers on an ARP 2600 from his French horn in 1977 set him on a lifelong journey to explore how technology can expand our creative vocabulary.\u201d I think I\u2019m going to need to know more about that. <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> That\u2019s right! Actually, when I was a teenager in high school, one of the most important figures to me was a fellow, this substitute teacher, a real tall guy with a huge Afro, who walked in with his trombone and ARP 2600. He had drilled out the mouthpiece on his trombone and was running it through the filter sections on the ARP 2600. He just started playing for us. It blew my mind! It absolutely opened my mind up to what\u2019s possible. Not just technically, but just goodness gracious, how can electronics augment what we do? That inspired me to undertake some of the same experiments myself. It took a few years before MIDI came along after that, but once MIDI was introduced, I got this thing called a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.muzines.co.uk\/articles\/ivl-pitchrider-guitar-to-midi-converter\/11192\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Pitchrider<\/a>, which was one of the earliest commercially available pitches-to-MIDI converters, and so I was driving MIDI synthesizers with various horns and playing duets with myself.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>Do you remember that substitute teacher\u2019s name? <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> I don\u2019t! I feel so inadequate that I don\u2019t. I can see him, though. \n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>What year was that?\n <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> It was 1975, I believe. \n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>Tell me about your education in music and how after connecting so much with the unconventional, you decided to pursue it in a conventional way. What was your thinking, pursuing a degree in music?\n <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> Originally for me, music was what I was going to do. It was the thing that I felt most affinity for. It was my native language. I started playing instruments before I spoke English, so there was kind of no question. I pursued it in school. It was part of my schooling in elementary school, junior high school, high school, and then it was most certainly going to be what I was going to do in college. That meant getting involved in a traditional sort of learning about traditional Western and classical harmony, composition, writing, reading, and practicing in that context.\n<BR><BR>\nSo my earliest education around music was sort of a traditional Western classical training. My introduction to audio as kind of an overlay on top of that goes to the story of the substitute music teacher who came into my class and kind of blew our minds by mashing up technology with what we were doing in the class. But also going back before that, I remember listening to \u201cBall of Confusion\u201d by the Temptations, which was a record, I think it came out in the late 1960s or early \u201970s. It\u2019s got an introduction that uses a delay loop, but it\u2019s not really a loop. It\u2019s more like a slapback decay and a lot of reverb. It almost feels like sound design and sound effects.\nI was like, \u201cOh my God, this is amazing!\u201d So that was part of my musical vocabulary. While I was studying the classical side of things and traditional methods, it was clearly embedded in my brain that not only was that not all there was, but that was what <em>was<\/em>, not what was going to be. \nSo I was really hungry and eager to figure out where we were going, what the new technology was going to give us, what new musical directions might be. This sort of notion of mash-ups between genres was something that was a relatively new idea, at least in the context of pop music in the 1960s and \u201970s.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Ball Of Confusion - The Temptations (1970)\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ydPaSWObL6E?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\">That\u2019s really what set me on fire. That was my own personal experience with music education. Fast-forward a little bit, and I graduated with a degree in French Horn Performance and Music Composition. I had one foot in the door at New England Conservatory, spent a semester there playing the French horn, and realized that really wasn\u2019t where I wanted to go. So I found my way to a small program called the <a href=\"https:\/\/therecw.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Recording Workshop<\/A> in Chillicothe, Ohio. There was nothing to do there but be in the studio, which meant it was perfect. After six weeks, it really set me on fire. It really validated that that\u2019s what I wanted to do, so much so that the day that I graduated from that program, they asked me to stay and teach. And so, on the topic of education, one of the things that I\u2019ve discovered is that the best way to test your knowledge, refine your knowledge, challenge yourself, and sort of look inside and investigate what you know and what you <em>think<\/em> you know, is to try to teach.\nSo I spent a couple of years doing that, and  I think that was invaluable in terms of developing my craft. I stepped away from teaching for a couple of decades after that point, but a formal education has many roles in my life and my history.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n<BR>\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>When in your timeline did you start getting into mastering? <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> I finished the program in Ohio, and then, after a couple of years of teaching, I\u2019d had some wonderful experiences meeting some musicians from there. Between Kool &#038; The Gang, the Ohio Players, and James Brown, there was so much great funk that was coming out of that zone, and a lot of jazz, from Cincinnati and Columbus. I had started to develop some relationships with some musicians and started to produce some records, but I felt like it was time for me to move. So I found my way back to Boston at that time, and Boston was a wonderful place that hosted a diversity of music. I mean, name a genre and it was here; early classical music, traditional classical music. There was a jazz scene at Berklee. There was a jazz scene in the suburbs, Club Passim had the folk scene, there was a new wave thing that was happening here that was really rich. There was sort of the beginnings of [the band] Boston and the rock scene. It was rich and diverse, and that really suits me. So I started to develop relationships here. I started to work at a studio and started to produce. I was originally a recording engineer and a mixing engineer. Then one day, kind of out of the blue, there was an opportunity to go work in a mastering studio.\nIt wasn\u2019t something I was looking for. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>So then what was the hook for you that really got you interested? <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> Well, there were a couple of things, but really, the thing at the time was that it was the first place that digital audio was really viable. The compact disc, born in 1983, had only been out for a year. It was a relatively new thing to try to figure out how to use the new technology and use it well. It was living on the bleeding edge. It was a little bit like a house of cards, dealing with digital audio systems. There was a lot to learn. It was exciting. It was terrifying. It was very expensive. It was an opportunity for me to learn about how to map the studio craft and the production craft to this new technology. Mastering is also awesome because it requires you to work across diverse genres. If you\u2019re a fully employed mastering engineer, one day it\u2019s a classical record, the next day it\u2019s a rock record.<BR><BR>\nThat kind of maps to what suits me, what keeps me interested. Lastly, this is maybe a less noble reason for having gotten involved in mastering, but immediately, everything that I was working on was of release quality! Before I started mastering, I might work on some demos with artists and I might work on some records that may or may not ever come out. I also might spend weeks or months working on a record, and it may not be my favorite record, but that\u2019s what I was doing at the time.<BR><BR>\nMastering was a new thing every day. It was going to be released, which meant that it had to live up to a certain qualitative standard, whatever you might say that is. By the way, in 1984 and 1985, that meant something very different! Today, anybody can create something on a laptop, hit <em>publish<\/em>, and it\u2019s on the internet. But back then it meant investing time, money, and resources into planning a release, because it was going to be a physical object that you were making. So that\u2019s all of the context for when I adopted mastering, or it adopted me.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>When you say it was a new thing every day, were you in charge of that at that point? Would you say, \u201cOh, I have a pile of stuff in front of me. I\u2019m going to pick this one.\u201d Or would it be different assignments coming in from different labels?\n <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> As a music professional, you are for the most part at the mercy of the projects that present themselves. It\u2019s rare that you\u2019ll find somebody who can pick and choose everything they do on any given day, and that was certainly true as a mastering engineer. We would have a backlog of work that needed to be done and a schedule that we had to adhere to in order to make sure that we could hit the release dates, or the record labels could hit the release dates for the artists.\nTo some extent, I had some latitude to decide what I was going to do on what day, but for the most part, that was kind of preordained by what was in the queue.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>What was the first release that you worked on that you knew you\u2019d done really well? <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> It\u2019s a little bit challenging for me to remember what came first, but a couple of the earliest records that got me most excited were a Frank Zappa release. There\u2019s a record called <EM>Roxy and Elsewhere<\/em>, which was a favorite record of mine as a teenager. It\u2019s got some amazing trombone solos by Bruce Fowler. It\u2019s an amazing, amazing band.\n<BR><BR>\nWhen that record came into the mastering studio, I was equal parts nervous and excited, and a lot of each! And this was made all the more so by the fact that Frank Zappa and Gail, his wife, were absolute control freaks. So, when the record came in, they wanted to make sure that everything that they put on the tape, was as it were\u2014and by the way, Zappa was an early adopter of digital technology, so he was sending us digital reels to master from, which was pretty unusual at the time\u2014but we knew we had to make sure that we paid attention to every last tiny little bit of detail because he had the ears of a bat. He could hear the tiniest little flaw.\nThe challenge was on to make sure that it went out in good shape and that we didn\u2019t mess it up in any shape or form. \n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"819\" height=\"819\" src=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Zappa-roxy-by-proxy-album-art.jpg\" alt=\"An image of the album cover for Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention's Roxy and Elsewhere album, which Wyner remastered.\" class=\"wp-image-27869\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"overflow:hidden; margin:20px 0;\">\n\n  <figure style=\"float:left; width:250px; margin:0 24px 16px 0;\">\n    <img decoding=\"async\"\n      src=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Bowie-remasters-image.png\"\n      alt=\"1990 Billboard advertisement for the David Bowie remasters\"\n      style=\"display:block; width:100%; height:auto;\"\n    \/>\n    <figcaption style=\"margin-top:8px; font-size:14px; line-height:1.4; color:#666;\">\n      A 1990 advertisement in <em>Billboard<\/em> magazine promotes the series of remastered David Bowie albums that Wyner worked on.\n    <\/figcaption>\n  <\/figure>\n\n  <p style=\"margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0;\">\n    The other record or series of records that I think really kind of set me on fire was remastering the David Bowie catalog. Word came in that the studio I was working in was going to undertake remastering everything that he released on RCA records, which was everything from <em>The Man Who Sold the World<\/em> to <em>Scary Monsters<\/em>, and some things that had never been released.\n  <\/p>\n\n  <p>\n    We were tasked with archiving, and remixing in some cases\u2014I did a bunch of mixes that showed up on those records\u2014and then, remastering those records. I was a huge fan. So I thought, \u201cOkay, well, if this is the last thing I ever do, this has been a great career.\u201d [Laughs]\n  <\/p>\n\n  <p>\n    So, it was thrilling, and a testament for me to how much I really was a fan of his music is that I probably listened to <em>Ziggy Stardust<\/em> more than anybody else on the planet. I could still listen to it! I never got tired of it. I discovered new things partly because of my newfound knowledge of music production, so I listened to it differently than maybe I did when I was 14 or 15 years old.\n  <\/p>\n\n  <p>\n    For me, it\u2019s deep and rich, and I enjoy it very much.\n  <\/p>\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>I remember an anecdote you shared about being nervous that you might damage the tapes with those Bowie releases. Can you please share that story again? <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> Oh, sure. A lot of the reels that came in from the Bowie archive were in pretty rough shape and some of them were just <em>pancakes<\/em>! If you\u2019ve ever seen a reel of tape, most people have seen it with what\u2019s called the flanges that hold the tape in place. Pancake means no flanges. So you\u2019ve just got the raw tape spooled around something, and if that gets loose, then all hell can break loose if you\u2019re not enormously careful in handling the tape! You also have to be careful\u2014even with the oil on your fingers getting on the tape\u2014because that can degrade it. I mean, tape is basically rust on plastic. So the oil from your fingers can be a little bit corosive to the rust of the oxide side of the tape. So great care needs to be taken. You have to always be mindful of the heavy responsibility when you have an artist\u2019s work in your hands. In this case, that responsibility felt amped up quite a bit.\n<\/p>\n<\/div> \n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n   <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>In a blind listening test, could you identify the version you mastered or remastered among versions mastered by other engineers?\n <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> I think that if I were to listen to the RCA releases of the Bowie Records, and by the way, they initially rushed everything out. The contract between Bowie and RCA was ending, just before the contract between Bowie and Ryokodisc, who was my client, began. If I listen to the RCA recordings compared to the remasters that have been done since, I\u2019m pretty sure I could hear the difference.\nIt wouldn\u2019t take me long. When you remaster something in a different period of time, I think the technology improves. You might think that when you\u2019re remastering something, you\u2019re trying to make it sound as good as you can for itself. Inevitably, there\u2019s the influence of what\u2019s going on in the wider culture. So the remasters that <a href=\"https:\/\/superdeluxeedition.com\/interview\/ken-scott-on-remixing-david-bowies-ziggy-stardust-album\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Ken Scott<\/a> participated in about 20 years later sound pretty different from what we did.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>Is there any degree of propriety amongst mastering engineers? I recall a funny piece from the satire site, <em>The Hard Times<\/em>, where the <a href=\"https:\/\/thehardtimes.net\/music\/guy-who-did-original-mastering-on-album-guesses-he-will-just-go-fuck-himself\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u201cguy who did original mastering\u201d<\/a> was pretty unhappy that the band had even wanted to remaster it.\n <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> When I go back and listen to the masters that we did, I probably would make some slightly different choices now. The technology has gotten so much better. We were converting everything from the analog tapes and the converters at the time weren\u2019t that great. The kind of differences I\u2019m talking about are relatively small. It\u2019s not like the songs have changed, but the new converters nowadays would recognize the difference in the warmth and the sense of depth in the recordings.\nBoy, I wish we had that technology back then! But do I think that we did as well as we could, given what we had at the time? Am I really happy with the results? Yes! Do I agree with everything that\u2019s happened since then? Maybe not, but also I don\u2019t ever feel what I would call <em>hubris<\/em> to say that I always have the right answer. When I\u2019m mastering something, I have my take on it. I\u2019m trying to interpret what an artist is doing and serve the art as well as I possibly can. Somebody else is going to do their version of it. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>How competitive is the field? Any anecdotes you can share about that?\n <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> I had the occasion to do a number of mastering projects for a band called Aerosmith, and some of which were complete albums, some of which were some archival work. But there was one case in particular where I was working on a single that was going to be included in a movie.\nI mastered it and I came to find out after the fact that\u2014and this is what I was told, of course, you never really know\u2014but they had also sent it out to a couple of other mastering engineers and that the band had chosen my master, but they didn\u2019t end up using it because they wanted the mastering engineer who had a bigger name than mine! That was an interesting lesson, in really causing me to sort of understand some things about the industry and also to understand what was important to me about the work. Did I really want to believe that what they told me was true? You bet I did! But that was a case where I got some feedback that I wasn\u2019t really expecting.\nNobody had told me upfront that they were going to be doing a shoot out, but there you have it. <\/P><\/div>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>Give me any anecdotes you have about an artist giving you positive feedback or do it again.\n <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> There have been a number of moments over the course of my career. It\u2019s not a straight line. It\u2019s not like everything goes well. It\u2019s not like everything\u2019s positive. But I think one has to have an attitude that there\u2019s always something to be learned from every encounter, positive or otherwise.\nThe things that are challenging, ultimately, looking back, I truly believe I gained things from\u2014learnings or experiences\u2014that I would not have otherwise.\nI think I\u2019m struggling to come up with a great story about feedback. I had a long relationship with a producer named <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.berklee.edu\/2018\/07\/in-memoriam-mike-denneen\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Mike Denneen<\/a>. Mike actually had been a faculty member here at Berklee, and was the owner of <a href=\"https:\/\/qdivisionstudios.com\/word\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Q Division Studios<\/a> here in the Boston area, where lots of really great records have been made since the late 1980s.\n<BR><BR>\nHaving a longstanding relationship with somebody who trusts you, and who can be honest with you, is invaluable. It\u2019s the best kind of friendship and the best kind of professional relationship. I remember the day that Mike came to me and asked me to master a record by an artist named <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jentrynin.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jen Trynin<\/a>, a local artist who ultimately got signed to Warner Brothers. This was her first record for an indie label, and I knew that this was important to Mike because, ultimately, Jen became his wife. So I think this may have been his audition for him, for bigger things in life! Anyway, when he gave me the record to work on, and when I handed it back to him, he was just over the moon, talking about how he was hearing things in the music that he didn\u2019t even realize were there anymore. It was so satisfying and so gratifying. When an artist says, \u201cI\u2019m hearing myself\u201d or a producer says, \u201cI\u2019m hearing the music in the way that I had hoped I could hear.\u201d Or \u201cI never realized I could experience it in this way,\u201d that\u2019s just the best feeling in the world.\nI mean, we\u2019re ultimately providing a service back to the artistic world, so it\u2019s validating and satisfying.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>I remember another anecdote you shared with me one time about digging through some tapes to work on, and there was a tape called <em>Bleach<\/em>, by a band called Nirvana. I think we need to get that story on the record, as it were!<\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> This is why I\u2019m not in A&#038;R. In the late 1980s, it\u2019s probably 1988 or 1989. I was doing a bunch of work for a small record label. It was just getting started in the Seattle area called Sub Pop. They were producing some interesting\u2014I think \u201cgrunge\u201d was not really a thing yet, but it was kind of the beginning of what would become grunge\u2014cool, vibey, raw records, for bands from that area.\nI remember on one particular day getting a box of reels, I\u2019m pretty sure it was mid-July. I remember it was kind of warm in the studio, and I actually can remember the place and even almost the smell of the tapes coming out of the box. These were all quarter-inch reels. I had a couple of days to work on these records, and the first one I pulled out was by an artist named Mark Lanegan, and the record was called <a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/album\/7nB7r0yBmVMDJfnADLdMie?si=6ftG4F_LTP-m7-wLWeYwNw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em>The Winding Sheet<\/em><\/A>. Really interesting, almost kind of prog-folk, is how I would describe it. Then there was another record by the Screaming Trees, their first record, which was awesome! Great energy, great writing. Then there was another record by a band called Nirvana who I\u2019d never heard of before and the name of the record was <em>Bleach<\/em>. It was a cool record, but it didn\u2019t grab me the way the other ones did. All the records together kind of set a sense of place and genre from that area, but that wasn\u2019t the one that really grabbed me.\nSo back to the punchline. I never really saw that Nirvana was going to become Nirvana, and maybe they weren\u2019t at that time. But I do look back and think, \u201cWow, I just missed that!\u201d\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"instagram-media\" data-instgrm-captioned data-instgrm-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reel\/DW4XkrnpHXD\/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading\" data-instgrm-version=\"14\" style=\" background:#FFF; border:0; border-radius:3px; box-shadow:0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width:540px; min-width:326px; padding:0; width:99.375%; width:-webkit-calc(100% - 2px); width:calc(100% - 2px);\"><div style=\"padding:16px;\"> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reel\/DW4XkrnpHXD\/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading\" style=\" background:#FFFFFF; line-height:0; padding:0 0; text-align:center; text-decoration:none; width:100%;\" target=\"_blank\"> <div style=\" display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;\"> <div style=\"background-color: #F4F4F4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;\"><\/div> <div style=\"display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;\"> <div style=\" background-color: #F4F4F4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;\"><\/div> <div style=\" background-color: #F4F4F4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;\"><\/div><\/div><\/div><div style=\"padding: 19% 0;\"><\/div> <div style=\"display:block; height:50px; margin:0 auto 12px; width:50px;\"><svg width=\"50px\" height=\"50px\" viewBox=\"0 0 60 60\" version=\"1.1\" xmlns=\"https:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" xmlns:xlink=\"https:\/\/www.w3.org\/1999\/xlink\"><g stroke=\"none\" stroke-width=\"1\" fill=\"none\" fill-rule=\"evenodd\"><g transform=\"translate(-511.000000, -20.000000)\" fill=\"#000000\"><g><path d=\"M556.869,30.41 C554.814,30.41 553.148,32.076 553.148,34.131 C553.148,36.186 554.814,37.852 556.869,37.852 C558.924,37.852 560.59,36.186 560.59,34.131 C560.59,32.076 558.924,30.41 556.869,30.41 M541,60.657 C535.114,60.657 530.342,55.887 530.342,50 C530.342,44.114 535.114,39.342 541,39.342 C546.887,39.342 551.658,44.114 551.658,50 C551.658,55.887 546.887,60.657 541,60.657 M541,33.886 C532.1,33.886 524.886,41.1 524.886,50 C524.886,58.899 532.1,66.113 541,66.113 C549.9,66.113 557.115,58.899 557.115,50 C557.115,41.1 549.9,33.886 541,33.886 M565.378,62.101 C565.244,65.022 564.756,66.606 564.346,67.663 C563.803,69.06 563.154,70.057 562.106,71.106 C561.058,72.155 560.06,72.803 558.662,73.347 C557.607,73.757 556.021,74.244 553.102,74.378 C549.944,74.521 548.997,74.552 541,74.552 C533.003,74.552 532.056,74.521 528.898,74.378 C525.979,74.244 524.393,73.757 523.338,73.347 C521.94,72.803 520.942,72.155 519.894,71.106 C518.846,70.057 518.197,69.06 517.654,67.663 C517.244,66.606 516.755,65.022 516.623,62.101 C516.479,58.943 516.448,57.996 516.448,50 C516.448,42.003 516.479,41.056 516.623,37.899 C516.755,34.978 517.244,33.391 517.654,32.338 C518.197,30.938 518.846,29.942 519.894,28.894 C520.942,27.846 521.94,27.196 523.338,26.654 C524.393,26.244 525.979,25.756 528.898,25.623 C532.057,25.479 533.004,25.448 541,25.448 C548.997,25.448 549.943,25.479 553.102,25.623 C556.021,25.756 557.607,26.244 558.662,26.654 C560.06,27.196 561.058,27.846 562.106,28.894 C563.154,29.942 563.803,30.938 564.346,32.338 C564.756,33.391 565.244,34.978 565.378,37.899 C565.522,41.056 565.552,42.003 565.552,50 C565.552,57.996 565.522,58.943 565.378,62.101 M570.82,37.631 C570.674,34.438 570.167,32.258 569.425,30.349 C568.659,28.377 567.633,26.702 565.965,25.035 C564.297,23.368 562.623,22.342 560.652,21.575 C558.743,20.834 556.562,20.326 553.369,20.18 C550.169,20.033 549.148,20 541,20 C532.853,20 531.831,20.033 528.631,20.18 C525.438,20.326 523.257,20.834 521.349,21.575 C519.376,22.342 517.703,23.368 516.035,25.035 C514.368,26.702 513.342,28.377 512.574,30.349 C511.834,32.258 511.326,34.438 511.181,37.631 C511.035,40.831 511,41.851 511,50 C511,58.147 511.035,59.17 511.181,62.369 C511.326,65.562 511.834,67.743 512.574,69.651 C513.342,71.625 514.368,73.296 516.035,74.965 C517.703,76.634 519.376,77.658 521.349,78.425 C523.257,79.167 525.438,79.673 528.631,79.82 C531.831,79.965 532.853,80.001 541,80.001 C549.148,80.001 550.169,79.965 553.369,79.82 C556.562,79.673 558.743,79.167 560.652,78.425 C562.623,77.658 564.297,76.634 565.965,74.965 C567.633,73.296 568.659,71.625 569.425,69.651 C570.167,67.743 570.674,65.562 570.82,62.369 C570.966,59.17 571,58.147 571,50 C571,41.851 570.966,40.831 570.82,37.631\"><\/path><\/g><\/g><\/g><\/svg><\/div><div style=\"padding-top: 8px;\"> <div style=\" color:#3897f0; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; font-style:normal; font-weight:550; line-height:18px;\">View this post on Instagram<\/div><\/div><div style=\"padding: 12.5% 0;\"><\/div> <div style=\"display: flex; flex-direction: row; margin-bottom: 14px; align-items: center;\"><div> <div style=\"background-color: #F4F4F4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(0px) translateY(7px);\"><\/div> <div style=\"background-color: #F4F4F4; height: 12.5px; transform: rotate(-45deg) translateX(3px) translateY(1px); width: 12.5px; flex-grow: 0; margin-right: 14px; margin-left: 2px;\"><\/div> <div style=\"background-color: #F4F4F4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(9px) translateY(-18px);\"><\/div><\/div><div style=\"margin-left: 8px;\"> <div style=\" background-color: #F4F4F4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 20px; width: 20px;\"><\/div> <div style=\" width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 2px solid transparent; border-left: 6px solid #f4f4f4; border-bottom: 2px solid transparent; transform: translateX(16px) translateY(-4px) rotate(30deg)\"><\/div><\/div><div style=\"margin-left: auto;\"> <div style=\" width: 0px; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-right: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(16px);\"><\/div> <div style=\" background-color: #F4F4F4; flex-grow: 0; height: 12px; width: 16px; transform: translateY(-4px);\"><\/div> <div style=\" width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-left: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(-4px) translateX(8px);\"><\/div><\/div><\/div> <div style=\"display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center; margin-bottom: 24px;\"> <div style=\" background-color: #F4F4F4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 224px;\"><\/div> <div style=\" background-color: #F4F4F4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 144px;\"><\/div><\/div><\/a><p style=\" color:#c9c8cd; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; line-height:17px; margin-bottom:0; margin-top:8px; overflow:hidden; padding:8px 0 7px; text-align:center; text-overflow:ellipsis; white-space:nowrap;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reel\/DW4XkrnpHXD\/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading\" style=\" color:#c9c8cd; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; font-style:normal; font-weight:normal; line-height:17px; text-decoration:none;\" target=\"_blank\">A post shared by Berklee Online (@berkleeonline)<\/a><\/p><\/div><\/blockquote>\n<script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>When did you have that moment with Nirvana where you heard them again and thought, \u201cwait a second\u201d? <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> I do remember hearing <EM>Nevermind<\/em> and thinking, \u201cOh? Yeah, I didn\u2019t see <em>this<\/em> coming, but these are the same people. Somewhere in there was the DNA.\u201d And, you know, \u201cKudos to the production team that made that happen!\u201d \n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>Tell me a little bit about the work you\u2019ve been doing with AI and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.berklee.edu\/beatl\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">BEATL<\/a>, coming along with the work you\u2019ve done with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.izotope.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">iZotope<\/A> and AI mastering. What is the wisdom you deliver to students when talking about AI? <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> I feel that one of the things that I can bring to discussions about music technology is the perspective that comes from having seen different technologies be introduced and understand ways that they\u2019ve impacted esthetics, workflows, and the economy around music-making, and music distribution. If you look back at MIDI or at music streaming, the onset of MP3s, and file-sharing, there are lots of different interesting takeaways and stories to tell, and insights that can be gathered by looking back at what has happened.\n<BR><BR>\nSo looking back to look ahead, thinking about AI, it is in some qualitative ways, a different phenomenon from anything that we\u2019ve encountered before, particularly from the perspective of generative AI. But it\u2019s not all <em>that<\/em> different in the sense that it\u2019s a new technology, it\u2019s here, and I think it\u2019s really important that everybody learns what it is and how it becomes useful in different contexts.\n<BR><BR>\nIt has very different utility in the context of songwriting, compared to mastering, compared to music distribution. There\u2019s AI all over playlist curation and delivering preferences out to listeners, so it shows up in lots of different ways. It\u2019s important that we learn about it, learn about what it\u2019s good at, learn about what it\u2019s good for, and learn about ways in which it\u2019s actually not yet up to par. The quality of the signal that comes out of generative AI is not good enough today to be featured in a high-level music production. There are generative components that might show up in a mix or in a production, but as a wholly fully formed thing, generative AI still doesn\u2019t sound that good, or good enough. That\u2019s not to say that it won\u2019t! I think it\u2019s important that we pay attention, learn about it, and stay informed. There\u2019s all of the conversations about the ethics around it. People use this word, \u201cethics,\u201d I think, to talk about the morality around it, but also about the economy and the implications around AI.\n<BR><BR>\nI think it\u2019s important to have robust discussions about that\u2014which I do all the time with my students\u2014to parse those topics, like \u201cHow do you feel about it?\u201d and \u201cHow might IP change?\u201d and \u201cWhat will it look like to you in your career, going forward?\u201d as well as \u201cHow might you be able to use it as a collaborative tool with people?\u201d\nSo I think breaking it down and having more nuanced discussions about this new technology is not only critical, it would be irresponsible of us to <em>not<\/em> do that.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>After such an illustrious career, which is still going, what brought you back to teaching?\n <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> I think teaching has always been a natural extension of what I do. Whether I\u2019m teaching other people or whether I\u2019m teaching clients. When you\u2019re collaborating with people around a part of music production that they may not be that familiar with, there is some education that is required. I also found myself starting to make YouTube videos, partly as a promotional sort of component of what I did at my studio in the 1990s that started to become a thing that one needed to do.\nAn aspect of that is giving back to people. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Reverb in Mastering\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Wn1d1Jz_xgE?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\">\nThere\u2019s another aspect of it, which is, for me, personally, the myth-busting. I think there\u2019s a lot of misinformation that accrues. So if there\u2019s some way that we can have a fact-based information share, rather than leaning totally into the vibey vernacular that sometimes develops around music production, I think that\u2019s incredibly important to help people realize their goals and get better at what they\u2019re doing.\n<BR><BR>\nSo all of that was sort of in me, and was a component of the work that I did. I started to work with a company called <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/E-6Lnp8RB00?si=CyR_X1jm6xJyXLBq\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">iZotope<\/A>, and to their credit, they were an innovative, inventive bunch of computer science students coming out of MIT, who also had some affinity for music but knew nothing about music production and they knew that they didn\u2019t. When I started working with them, they were eager for me to bring my expertise and help educate their customers and developers, and product designers. That is really kind of what kicked off my return to education in a more dedicated way. <BR><BR>\nSeveral years after that, I was asked to author a course for Berklee Online. I was called by the brick-and-mortar school here to come back and teach a couple of sections of a mastering course. It\u2019s been kind of the most organic, longest sort of audition for a full professorship at Berklee College of Music. Teaching is something that has grown out of my interest. The experience that I\u2019ve had qualifies me to talk to people about the ins and outs of the topic that I teach around.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>How would you describe your teaching philosophy?\n <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> My teaching philosophy is, first of all, to meet the students where they are, to understand where their brains are. Ultimately, what we are doing is trying to train our brains and integrate information, upgrading our knowledge so that we can bring that to bear on something creative. I think the word \u201cintegration\u201d is ultimately what\u2019s most important to me.\n<BR><BR>\nIt\u2019s not about just delivering facts. It\u2019s not about memorizing things, but it\u2019s about understanding the implications of everything that we do as it serves art, and as it serves music. My method is to create a lab, a place where students can engage in experiments, observe what happened, and then figure out what went well and what didn\u2019t go well. Then rinse and repeat, and gradually scaffold and upgrade on top of those experiments. I try to break things down to a very basic, digestible idea instead of trying to boil the ocean all at once. We go a cupful at a time. But for me, it\u2019s all about trying to upgrade a student\u2019s perception by introducing an idea, having them experiment with the idea, encouraging them and helping them unpack what happened, and then going back and doing it again.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: 1.5em;\">\n    <h2 class=\"long-title\" style=\"margin-bottom: 0.1em;\"><strong>Do you have any students that you\u2019re especially proud of? <\/strong><\/h2>\n    <p style=\"margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;\"><strong>Jonathan Wyner:<\/strong> I\u2019m enormously proud of, humbled, and pleased in the same way that I have some children of my own. [Laughs] I take great pride in seeing them succeed in the world. I\u2019ve had both interns and students who have gone on to do very well. <a href=\"https:\/\/ayanmastering.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Adam Ayan<\/a> was an intern of mine who became Bob Ludwig\u2019s protege and now is doing incredibly well with more Grammys than, well, you need a bigger room than this to hold his Grammys! There\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/jettgalindo.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jett Galindo<\/a>, who graduated, I believe in 2012, and she became a protege for Doug Sax, and is now off doing her own thing, doing incredibly well in LA, and she has Grammys. <a href=\"https:\/\/zampolproductions.com\/oscar-zambrano-2\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Oscar Zambrano<\/A>, who graduated I think maybe a few years before, is in New York and he was both an intern and a student of mine. There\u2019s also  <a href=\"https:\/\/joshsebek.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Josh Sebek<\/A>. He\u2019s cutting a bunch of records at the 1979, and he <a href=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/berklee-online-certificate-was-a-stepping-stone-for-mpe-student-josh-sebek\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">graduated just a few years ago<\/A> from the Boston campus. Just amazing people. There are others who are doing well. Any time that we have a student succeed, it\u2019s validating, but mostly it makes us feel so good to see that people are getting to do what they want to do. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jonathan Wyner has mastered recordings by Nirvana, and remastered classics by David Bowie and Frank Zappa. In this Q&#038;A, he reflects on decades of technological change, unforgettable artists, and the curiosity that continues to drive his work as a mastering engineer and Berklee Online instructor.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":27866,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,35,9563,9560],"tags":[10225,69,9643,9908,169,172,10226,225,10220,10238,10216,393,10228,10230,541,10219,700,708,10224,10227,6667,6449,10221,10235,795,10223,915,10222,10233,7691,991,8332,1038,10234,10229,10237,10236,10232,10218,8263,6154,10217,1374,7449,10231],"class_list":["post-27868","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","category-instructor-profiles","category-music-production-articles","category-spotlight","tag-adam-ayan","tag-aerosmith","tag-arp-2600","tag-beatl","tag-berklee-college-of-music","tag-berklee-online","tag-bob-ludwig","tag-boston","tag-bruce-fowler","tag-club-passim","tag-danny-kaye","tag-david-bowie","tag-doug-sax","tag-frank-beard","tag-frank-zappa","tag-gail-zappa","tag-izotope","tag-james-brown","tag-jen-trynin","tag-jett-galindo","tag-jonathan-wyner","tag-josh-sebek","tag-ken-scott","tag-kool-the-gang","tag-kurt-cobain","tag-mark-lanegan","tag-midi","tag-mike-denneen","tag-mit","tag-mozart","tag-music-production","tag-new-england-conservatory","tag-nirvana","tag-ohio-players","tag-oscar-zambrano","tag-q-division-studios","tag-rca-records","tag-recording-workshop","tag-richard-wagner","tag-rykodisc","tag-screaming-trees","tag-sergei-prokofiev","tag-sub-pop","tag-the-temptations","tag-tom-scholz"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.9 (Yoast SEO v27.9) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Jonathan Wyner on Mastering David Bowie, Nirvana, and Music Education in the Age of AI - Berklee Online Take Note<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Mastering engineer Jonathan Wyner discusses David Bowie, Nirvana, Zappa, AI, mastering, and four decades of music production and teaching.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Jonathan Wyner on Mastering David Bowie, Nirvana, and Music Education in the Age of AI\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Mastering engineer Jonathan Wyner discusses David Bowie, Nirvana, Zappa, AI, mastering, and four decades of music production and teaching.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Berklee Online Take Note\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/berkleeonline\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-08-06T19:44:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-08-06T21:16:39+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jonathan_wyner_article_image_2026.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1920\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Pat Healy\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@berkleeonline\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@berkleeonline\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Pat Healy\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"26 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Pat Healy\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/2ff5be49c1e0e9c9d92848f38e40fb9d\"},\"headline\":\"Jonathan Wyner on Mastering David Bowie, Nirvana, and Music Education in the Age of AI\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-08-06T19:44:27+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-08-06T21:16:39+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":5761,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/#org\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/08\\\/jonathan_wyner_article_image_2026.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Adam Ayan\",\"Aerosmith\",\"ARP 2600\",\"BEATL\",\"Berklee College of Music\",\"Berklee Online\",\"Bob Ludwig\",\"Boston\",\"Bruce Fowler\",\"Club Passim\",\"Danny Kaye\",\"David Bowie\",\"Doug Sax\",\"Frank Beard\",\"Frank Zappa\",\"Gail Zappa\",\"iZotope\",\"James Brown\",\"Jen Trynin\",\"Jett Galindo\",\"jonathan wyner\",\"Josh Sebek\",\"Ken Scott\",\"Kool &amp; the Gang\",\"Kurt Cobain\",\"Mark Lanegan\",\"MIDI\",\"Mike Denneen\",\"MIT\",\"mozart\",\"Music Production\",\"New England Conservatory\",\"Nirvana\",\"Ohio Players\",\"Oscar Zambrano\",\"Q Division Studios\",\"RCA Records\",\"Recording Workshop\",\"Richard Wagner\",\"Rykodisc\",\"Screaming Trees\",\"Sergei Prokofiev\",\"Sub Pop\",\"The Temptations\",\"Tom Scholz\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Articles\",\"Instructor Profiles\",\"Music Production\",\"Spotlight\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/\",\"name\":\"Jonathan Wyner on Mastering David Bowie, Nirvana, and Music Education in the Age of AI - Berklee Online Take Note\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/08\\\/jonathan_wyner_article_image_2026.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-08-06T19:44:27+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-08-06T21:16:39+00:00\",\"description\":\"Mastering engineer Jonathan Wyner discusses David Bowie, Nirvana, Zappa, AI, mastering, and four decades of music production and teaching.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/08\\\/jonathan_wyner_article_image_2026.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/08\\\/jonathan_wyner_article_image_2026.jpg\",\"width\":1920,\"height\":1200,\"caption\":\"In this portrait, Jonathan Wyner sits against a gray background, wearing a black T-shirt and blue blazer. His gray hair is pushed back and his hands are clasped.\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\\\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Jonathan Wyner on Mastering David Bowie, Nirvana, and Music Education in the Age of AI\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/\",\"name\":\"Berklee Online Take Note\",\"description\":\"Inspiration for Music Makers\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/#org\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"EducationalOrganization\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/#org\",\"name\":\"Berklee Online\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/logo\\\/image\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2016\\\/04\\\/Berklee_Logo_Square_Avatar_Linkedin.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2016\\\/04\\\/Berklee_Logo_Square_Avatar_Linkedin.png\",\"width\":500,\"height\":500,\"caption\":\"Berklee Online\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/logo\\\/image\\\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.facebook.com\\\/berkleeonline\",\"https:\\\/\\\/x.com\\\/berkleeonline\",\"https:\\\/\\\/www.instagram.com\\\/berkleeonline\\\/\",\"https:\\\/\\\/www.youtube.com\\\/@Berklee_Online\",\"https:\\\/\\\/www.tiktok.com\\\/@berkleeonline\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/2ff5be49c1e0e9c9d92848f38e40fb9d\",\"name\":\"Pat Healy\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2020\\\/02\\\/patHealy-portraitsmaller-1.jpg\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2020\\\/02\\\/patHealy-portraitsmaller-1.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2020\\\/02\\\/patHealy-portraitsmaller-1.jpg\",\"caption\":\"Pat Healy\"},\"description\":\"Pat Healy is the editor-in-chief of Take Note and the associate director of content creation for Berklee Online. He hosts the Music Is My Life podcast and served as a writer and copy editor for the Disgraceland podcast during its first nine seasons. His work has appeared on Pitchfork, Spin, Paste, and numerous other music sites.\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/online.berklee.edu\\\/takenote\\\/author\\\/pat-healy\\\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Jonathan Wyner on Mastering David Bowie, Nirvana, and Music Education in the Age of AI - Berklee Online Take Note","description":"Mastering engineer Jonathan Wyner discusses David Bowie, Nirvana, Zappa, AI, mastering, and four decades of music production and teaching.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Jonathan Wyner on Mastering David Bowie, Nirvana, and Music Education in the Age of AI","og_description":"Mastering engineer Jonathan Wyner discusses David Bowie, Nirvana, Zappa, AI, mastering, and four decades of music production and teaching.","og_url":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/","og_site_name":"Berklee Online Take Note","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/berkleeonline","article_published_time":"2026-08-06T19:44:27+00:00","article_modified_time":"2026-08-06T21:16:39+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1920,"height":1200,"url":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jonathan_wyner_article_image_2026.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Pat Healy","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@berkleeonline","twitter_site":"@berkleeonline","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Pat Healy","Est. reading time":"26 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/"},"author":{"name":"Pat Healy","@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/#\/schema\/person\/2ff5be49c1e0e9c9d92848f38e40fb9d"},"headline":"Jonathan Wyner on Mastering David Bowie, Nirvana, and Music Education in the Age of AI","datePublished":"2026-08-06T19:44:27+00:00","dateModified":"2026-08-06T21:16:39+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/"},"wordCount":5761,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/#org"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jonathan_wyner_article_image_2026.jpg","keywords":["Adam Ayan","Aerosmith","ARP 2600","BEATL","Berklee College of Music","Berklee Online","Bob Ludwig","Boston","Bruce Fowler","Club Passim","Danny Kaye","David Bowie","Doug Sax","Frank Beard","Frank Zappa","Gail Zappa","iZotope","James Brown","Jen Trynin","Jett Galindo","jonathan wyner","Josh Sebek","Ken Scott","Kool &amp; the Gang","Kurt Cobain","Mark Lanegan","MIDI","Mike Denneen","MIT","mozart","Music Production","New England Conservatory","Nirvana","Ohio Players","Oscar Zambrano","Q Division Studios","RCA Records","Recording Workshop","Richard Wagner","Rykodisc","Screaming Trees","Sergei Prokofiev","Sub Pop","The Temptations","Tom Scholz"],"articleSection":["Articles","Instructor Profiles","Music Production","Spotlight"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/","url":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/","name":"Jonathan Wyner on Mastering David Bowie, Nirvana, and Music Education in the Age of AI - Berklee Online Take Note","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jonathan_wyner_article_image_2026.jpg","datePublished":"2026-08-06T19:44:27+00:00","dateModified":"2026-08-06T21:16:39+00:00","description":"Mastering engineer Jonathan Wyner discusses David Bowie, Nirvana, Zappa, AI, mastering, and four decades of music production and teaching.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jonathan_wyner_article_image_2026.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jonathan_wyner_article_image_2026.jpg","width":1920,"height":1200,"caption":"In this portrait, Jonathan Wyner sits against a gray background, wearing a black T-shirt and blue blazer. His gray hair is pushed back and his hands are clasped."},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/jonathan-wyner-on-mastering-bowie-nirvana-and-more\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Jonathan Wyner on Mastering David Bowie, Nirvana, and Music Education in the Age of AI"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/#website","url":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/","name":"Berklee Online Take Note","description":"Inspiration for Music Makers","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/#org"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"EducationalOrganization","@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/#org","name":"Berklee Online","url":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/Berklee_Logo_Square_Avatar_Linkedin.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/Berklee_Logo_Square_Avatar_Linkedin.png","width":500,"height":500,"caption":"Berklee Online"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/berkleeonline","https:\/\/x.com\/berkleeonline","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/berkleeonline\/","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@Berklee_Online","https:\/\/www.tiktok.com\/@berkleeonline"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/#\/schema\/person\/2ff5be49c1e0e9c9d92848f38e40fb9d","name":"Pat Healy","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/patHealy-portraitsmaller-1.jpg","url":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/patHealy-portraitsmaller-1.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/patHealy-portraitsmaller-1.jpg","caption":"Pat Healy"},"description":"Pat Healy is the editor-in-chief of Take Note and the associate director of content creation for Berklee Online. He hosts the Music Is My Life podcast and served as a writer and copy editor for the Disgraceland podcast during its first nine seasons. His work has appeared on Pitchfork, Spin, Paste, and numerous other music sites.","url":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/author\/pat-healy\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27868","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27868"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27868\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27868"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27868"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27868"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}