“As a media professional running my own business myself, I have high standards and work with a lot of different production companies. SCN productions is one of the best and what really sets them apart is the wealth of experience they have working in the business. SCN Productions is one of the companies that not only demonstrates professional capability but also how your project can be taken to a higher level through innovative and creative design of sound production and video production. I would highly recommend Stuart Neale.”
Audio Services
Recording
Music production – the beginning
With any recording project, large of small, the first step remains the same – to establish the foundation for the piece. This “pre-production” stage will incorporate assessment of the song/composition in terms of instruments and arrangement. Through a musical knowledge covering classical, rock, pop and jazz genres, we can bring a lifetime of experience to this (and many other) parts of the recording process.
Audio recording is one of our specialities, focussing on creative design with original composition. This service opens up a myriad of opportunities, whether it be for commercially driven projects within the mainstream music industry, or any other artistic initiative. Having had commercial success within mainstream pop, knowledge of certain recording/arrangement styling can be applied (either for retro or modern progressive), which whilst not being the panacea for guaranteeing global popularity, it will certainly ensure creative paralleling thus opening up the potential; simply said you need to be as better and louder than the rest!
Mixing
Our music production service will fully embrace the mixing process, being able to offer alternative mixes of the same recordings for different broadcast formats. During the
discovery process, detailed consideration is given to specific ambitions and objectives for how the finished work should sound and where it is to be distributed. These goals are very
important for us to understand and align with, so that relevant judgements are made within the mixing process throughout. Transparent objectivity and re-mix capability is
provided to you as part of this service.
We operate a global service in this area for remote mixing of any pre-recorded project, either to work on entirely separate audio files, or stem files as needed. Working with a number of DAW’s (the legendary Harrison Mixbus is our DAW of preference for mixing projects) we offer a mixing service independently of recording, allowing flexibility and creative control.
Mastering
All recording and mixing engagements are treated with the same high-quality Mastering standards and processes in order to deliver broadcast quality audio representation. The level of detail will vary according to each project – for example a commercial digital distribution release will dictate certain broadcast standards to be adhered to, maintaining current LUFS (Loudness Units Full Scale) requirements, whilst other projects may simply require standard output or even due to a resurgence in analogue media, the relevant production houses will need an alternative file master delivered for their production of vinyl which can be accommodated should this be part of your project requirements.
The mastering suite of tools here at SCN Productions are underpinned by the excellent Wavelab Pro.
Composition
Music arrangement and production
With creative art, beauty lies very much in the eye of the beholder. It is a subjective medium where likes and dislikes do not mandate the widest popular appeal and success commercially. In other words, the song or stylistic arrangement chosen by one person (or record company or management consortium) doesn’t guarantee the populous will also like it, and consequently make it a commercial success.
So having the ability to manipulate and mould creative ideas musically is a great strength and asset when it comes to song writing. Music arrangement is the spear-heard of such ability and can help transform what maybe a basic kernel of an idea or concept, culminating in the most lavish and dynamic song or musical production. Some of the greatest successes in the popular music industry have been created through writing teams using specialised arrangement skills.
We offer a service to collaborate on your creative content, applying expertise through musical knowledge, both classical understanding and technique, plus ‘real life experience’ having worked professionally in many musical genres. Though arrangement and production services we can further enhance your creative ideas, when they are at any stage of the writing process:
- establish the song or piece’s content for downstream use
- create a demo for gaining sponsorship – management/agent/record label
- provide collaborative approach for arrangement and stylistic options
- work with artists in pre-production for album/EP/single project recordings
Song Writing
As the global community of artists and creatives move into a new landscape of post-COVID expressionism, it bears some merit to consider what a life sustaining force music proved to be during those testing times. Nothing new perhaps in terms of other times on world history where all the ‘normal’ existing gets turning upside down….and a person struggle requires extraordinary solutions.
What better time to initiate meaningful collaborations and increase the creative outputs - calling all producers, publishers, and artists! For ‘roster-based’ individuals that have reached a point of looking for additional inspiration; for individual artists with a backlog of existing material but lacking that cohesive identity for the album or project, for bands needed an objective production view together with musical input to take to another level – SCN Productions has all this and more.
All musical instrument performance components available as part of the writing process included:
- piano
- keyboards (digital programming)
- drum programming
- acoustic guitar
- electric guitar (lead and rhythm)
- bass guitar
- vocals
SCN Productions. Your creativity empowered.
Soundtrack Composition
The audio landscape is vast, touching many areas of our lives through TV, film, theatre, and live performance. As creative people we understand the power that audio brings to all of these platforms but don’t always have the capacity, time or indeed the means to deliver.
At grass roots level, an engagement can result in arranging some carefully selected chordal ‘pads’ to accompany a short story, eBook, or video. Simple yet effective. Alternatively, pieces requiring more in-depth sonic layers such as works for film and TV are embraced, plus soundtracks for live work.
Our portfolio of soundscape tools is extensive. Analogue audio performances form an integral part of our soundtrack creations, and whilst digital orchestral and choral libraries are our creative audio palette, original composition is key.
It’s time to create, it’s time to unlock your dream.
Mentoring & Consultancy
SCN Productions has a range of training programs available for in-depth training for recording and production skills. These typically will be constructed specifically to meet bespoke requirements, whether at basic, intermediate, or advance levels.
Reviews
“Stuart has been producing my music and videos for a number of years now and I am always thrilled with the finished results. His wealth of experience in the music industry coupled with his above and beyond attitude is what makes his work special. He never fails to catch the vision of a project and his gift for production and arranging always takes my work to another level. Every song and video I’ve put into Stuarts hands has undoubtedly come back to me a hundred times better. He has a fantastic attention to detail and never hands a project back until it is perfect. Overall, an incredibly talented producer!”
Vicki Holden, Business Owner
“I had the pleasure of being introduced to Stuart to explore an innovative project I was creating which required some bespoke music for an animation. Stuart walked me through the process with ease and created an end product which pulled together the entire production, elevating it to a higher level than I could have ever imagined! I am so thankful to have had this opportunity and highly recommend Stuart’s work.”