Engineer Member of the Grammy Awards - Producers & Engineers Wing  NARAS P&E Wing

Industry Affiliations:
ASCAP registered writer & publisher
BMI registered publisher
NALAC National Association of Latino Arts & Culture
NALIP National Association of Latino Independent Producers
NAMM National Association of Music Merchants
NARAS & LARAS voting member of the Grammy Awards
NARIP National Association of Recording Industry Professionals

Allow me to introduce myself through my work. Send me an uncompresssed, clean final stereo mix and I will reply with a 1-2 minute, free mastering sample for your review. Designed by Iain McNeill of IMP Audio, my calibrated mastering environment and attention to detail are the finishing touches your music deserves.

Tracking and Mixing services are available through my California and Puerto Rico partner studios in Santa Cruz, Oakland and San Juan. We are open to all styles of music.

Mastering Engineer / Audio Consultant / Bassist MICHAEL LAZARUS

Send me mix files using GOBBLER Now integrated into Pro Tools - MAC / WIN / iOS Send any file at lightning speed with Gobbler. No size limits! Sign up for a free 5 GB account today! Envía cualquier archivo rápidamente con Gobbler! No importa el tamaño. Registrate para activar tu cuenta gratis de 5 GB.

Getting your mixes ready - a handy checklist to follow before you send your files.
1) Native audio recording format
I prefer to master .wav / .aif / .aiff files in the native audio format you recorded in. So if you recorded in 24bit - 48kHz then send it like that. If you used 24bit - 96kHz then send that. If you are sending the music and vocals separate, and the music is in a diffferent but higher bit or sample rate, then upsample the vocal tracks. Do not downsample. Always send the highest resolution possible.
2) Check your vocal tracks
Did you solo and check all your vocal tracks for lip noise, breathing and other extraneous sounds? It's easy to fix all that without having to pay me to do it.
3) Leave some headroom
Check that your signals / waveform level isn't jacked up to the rails. It's always a good practice to leave AT LEAST 3dB of headroom for the mastering engineer. So the loudest part in your mix should peak at no more than -3db on your master bus. When you are bouncing your 2 track master in Protools make sure your bouce doesn't have any compression or limitier plugins activated. Just send a clean final mix.
4) Reference tracks are always a good idea
Sending tracks / music from artists that have the sound you are looking for, or have a similar vibe to your music, is a very efficient way to provide me with some direction.
5) Use consistent naming and timing for your stems
If you send the mixes broken out in stems, for example the music and the vocals on separate stereo tracks, then check your filenames so that they match and are clear to understand. Also verify that each stem track is CONSOLIDATED so that they start at exactly the same time when I drop it into my workstation. Make sure that they both start at 0 (zero) and that they line up properly.