Today we’d like to introduce you to Glenn Zekser.
Hi Glenn, so excited to have you on the platform. So, before we get into questions about your work life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today.
I originally went to school for music composition. After I graduated, I spent some time working in an after-school program and was struggling to find direction with my career. It was hard for me to visualize a way forward.
I ended up getting invited to a friend’s senior recital and ran into a colleague from the composition program. He had recently made a post about how he’d gotten his 100th client in the basement studio he was working out of. This was really incredible since he’d only been out of school a year. Most people take a few years to make it. So, I asked him, “How do I do what you do?” My friend pointed me to a few studios around town where I might be able to intern, and a few days later, I emailed all of them. Only one responded.
That winter, I started at Tree Sound Studios. It was a very different world than I was used to working in, as I had been involved in live classical music for most of my life. It took me over a year to do it, but with a ton of hard work and some luck, I was able to work my way up to a session assistant and then recording engineer after that. It was around this time I began to become fascinated and really passionate about mastering. There’s something so mesmerizing about polishing something until it shines. Since then, I’ve done everything I can to make a living out of it.
Everything I’ve said so far makes it seem like most of my path was paved by my own hands, but really, there was a lot of help I got along the way. Without my friends, family, and the amazing people I work with, I wouldn’t have a career.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
There are very few smooth roads in music. The hardest things are often the simplest ones: Be Present, Be Punctual, and Be Prepared. I was lucky in that I got to practice these things, among other important skills, in music school. If you can’t have command over your availability, your skill sets, and your time management, opportunities end up going elsewhere.
We’ve been impressed with Meteor Mastering, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
Mastering is the last post-production process that a song goes through before it gets released. Many people know that mastering can make a song much louder, but its other purpose is to prepare music for its intended release mediums. These days, that’s mostly CD and streaming services.
Mastering is a difficult craft in that you have to take music that’s been molded and refined over a long period of time (often months, but sometimes years) and make it sound better than when you got it. This requires an extremely high-quality monitoring environment, just as high-quality processors, and a great ear.
What really sets my practice apart from others is my relentless commitment to quality and consistency, as well as my price point for the quality of work I do. Everything I work on goes through a minimum of three quality checks before it gets sent back to the client, and I price myself to fit more within a working musician’s budget. I want to give an incredible product without making people stress about my prices.
Can you talk to us a bit about happiness and what makes you happy?
It’s a wonderful feeling when someone brings me a song that they’re proud of and put a lot of work into, and they get excited all over again after I send it back. You know you’ve hit that mark when they ask, “How the f*** did you do that?” Of course, it’s not always that way, but those are great moments.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://meteormastering.com
Image Credits
Tree Sound Studios
