Francesco Carrozzo Gives Us The Recipe To Becoming Musically Gifted
January 10, 2018 Recording Engineer Francesco Carrozzo Gives Us The Recipe To being Musically Gifted. From Italy to The United States he is a force to be reckoned with in the music industry and has taken the American Music Culture by Storm. He has worked with Acts like: Max Gazzé, Benji e Fede, The Game, ASAP Ferg and Blueface. As a miraculous music and sound editor for movie as well, he worked tirelessly on a fox soccer project called “Phenom” — an Italian project called “The Black Ghiandola” starring Johnny Depp and David Lynch.
We have had the pleasure of interviewing him and here’s what he had to say…
Hi, Frank & Welcome to Medium!
1. How do you approach the sensitive task of discussing changes and rearrangements with artists?
Artists are artists. They are going to put out a song or a project, their artistic vision and professional persona depends on it. It’s not anyone’s work of changing their artist vision; it’s theirs. I think our task as any figure we are executing in the music industry must be limited to the artist’s artistic vision and their being artists. They went through years and possibly countless nights of performing and crafting their sounds, their mindset, their lyrics, their being artists with stories to tell, and songs written upon this experience and vision of theirs. You can’t try to re-arrange much of what their ideas are. You can help in making this vision comes to life. Our job in being in contact with artists should be just between the lines of making them happy and secure with your services but also being in charge of eventual conflicts that come within the project. It comes handy also to be efficient in risk management, and not only in the music industry. The risk an artist put out on every single song, statement, sound, and even note are worth considering. As an individual working in the music industry, it’s essential to understand those risks and try to limit your projects to be risk first of all known, and dangers that rarely cause any problem. Metaphorically this is what an obstetrician does; you are helping, technically, morally, and professionally someone giving birth (to a music project in this case); it’s not our job of delivering it. We have the duty to be aware of the dangers and the importance of taking each decision and step in accordance with the operation’s only good. Artists and their projects are just like mothers and their children. We are just helping the birth of these records, making sure the process is as least dramatic and least painful, but instead joyful and triumphant as we can.
2. What is the one thing every song must have for it to be solid?
“Is the song great enough?”. Songs are art-pieces, made out of many factors and people, to mention a few: engineers, composers, musicians, producers, artists, but I believe the most important thing is the audience. Someone at some point will relate to it, depends on how many people will eventually link to this artwork, you can see how successful a song will be.
Records and songs are reliable when all combined of the many factors involved in the creation and even selling of a song, created a “recipe” that is unique and hard to recreate. Story-telling is one of the essential factors of it. I can tell you the many rules involved in the making of a Hit Single, it will be hard to replicate it, and second of all, it won’t mean you will have a hit single in your hands. Too many songs sound the same, but something is different: story-telling, topics, songwriting, and the “unicity” of the artist performing it are the secret ingredients of a successful song. As soon as you listen to a song, even in the process of being made, you will tell by the way people react to it, including yourself if it’s going to be a great song. It’s more of a gut feeling.
3. Who is the best music producer working in the industry today?
Max Martin. He is an impeccable professional in every song and project, from genre to genre, his songs and works go beyond time and imagination. Pure genius.
4. What is the first thing you listen for when listening to a new recording?
First of all, I look at the performance. It has to communicate emotions. A lot of songs back in the days, are incredible pieces of art recorded with way less quality and way less technology than we have today. It’s merely about the artist and music professional’s performances and their abilities to do the best out of their instruments. It’s all about talent. A song could have been recorded in an expensive microphone and in a recording studio that costs $1500 per day with a skilled vocal producer, and a great sound engineer. Your song will possibly still be not right if there is a lack of the artist’s or musician’s performance.
What is next for you?
Being in the time we are living, where everyone is able to make music from their bedroom and so many songs are released every second is really counterproductive, it makes you believe everything has been written produced and released. Thanks to this, It feels the world is in constantly need of something new and “next”. I’m more than happy to say in my future there is music and more music. There are few records I’m thrilled to be working within the near future with artists such as Blueface, Luca Mancini, Jeane Marie and many more. I’m also collaborating with incredible songwriters and producers to build a solid team in order to have several songs and records in our hands.
Thing for sure is that I will be around, these fast changing times for music industry are way too interesting and exciting to be waiting too long to release an idea before someone come out with it.
