Randmness

So here we are at Part 3. This entire post will be dedicated to tips on how to survive as a recording studio intern. It is important to remember that an intern is part janitor and part concierge service. While both jobs may seem mundane or stupid the both can teach you a lot and give you plenty of contacts for the future. The one thing to remember is that being an intern is a stepping stone to the job in audio that you really want. You may not care for the clientele that comes in to do work or the type of recording (live sound, ADR, scoring, ect.) that is done in one particular studio and decide to go to another studio to work. The thing is that regardless of where you end up working the skills that you learn along the way as an intern can do nothing that help you deal with whatever may come up in the future.

There are a lot of rules for what you can not do as an intern. Unfortunately being the ‘low man on the totem pole’ leaves little, if any, actual work that has to do with recording. For the most part an intern is the faceless and nameless person behind the scenes that helps get the session up and running, and is around to help keep the session running smoothly. I’ve come up with a list of rules and explanations below to try and help out anyone wanting to be an intern. If these rules seem stupid or obvious that’s ok - a lot of interns that I had were young kids that didn’t have a chance to work out in the ‘real world’ before going to school or deciding to get into the recording industry. My hope is that this list of rules covers as much as possible but if I’ve left anything out please let me know!

A week or two ago a friend of mine graduated from a recording school and told me that he was going to be interning at a studio and asked if I had any words of advise or any pointers that I could give him.

Recording studios are more than a place that someone rents to lay out some tracks; they’re sanctuaries. Recording studios are around to make sure the client feels relaxed enough to let loose and be creative so they can do their job. This means that the people working for the studio do their jobs, along with acting like a concierge service to ensure the client has everything they need to do their job.