From left: Webster U faculty advisor/assistant professor Gary Gottlieb, AES president Nikisha Bailey, Alan Parsons and past AES VP Matt Allen
Engineer/producer/artist Alan Parsons stopped by Webster University as part of the school’s AES guest speaker/clinician list. Parsons began his visit by speaking to a packed Winnie Moore Auditorium on the school’s main campus, entertaining the audience with tales about his start in the recording industry. The visit then opened up to a Q&A session, where Parsons fielded a wide range of questions on such topics as the lack of noise on Dark Side of the Moon (attributed to the Kepex expanders), the use of synthesizers (no, that’s not a hi-hat in On the Run) and his role in The Alan Parsons Project.
According to Garry Gottlieb, assistant professor of audio production at the school, he was most impressed by the manner Parsons used to evade the seemingly inevitable question regarding the Pink Floyd album and The Wizard of Oz, which Parsons later answered, “It wasn’t a soundtrack for The Wizard of Oz; it was a soundtrack for Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang.”
