Los Angeles, CA (December 15, 2021)—Louise Goffin, daughter of Carole King, has produced a new Dolby Atmos Music mix of her mother’s first holiday album, A Holiday Carole, to mark the tenth anniversary of its release.
Capitol Studios’ Steve Genewick created the new Atmos mixes at UK speaker manufacturer PMC’s studio in Los Angeles. The original release was produced by Goffin and engineered at The Village in West L.A. by Nathaniel Kunkel and Niko Bolas. It features an eclectic mix of nine classics and three original tracks, co-written by Goffin with George Noriega, Guy Chambers and Jodi Marr, that cover the sacred and the secular.
The idea for a Dolby Atmos mix of the album came after Goffin was introduced to Maurice Patist, PMC USA president, by Canadian record producer Greg Wells. The two were talking about the possibility of re-mixing highlights from Goffin’s last two albums in Atmos when the thought of working on A Holiday Carole to tie in with its anniversary came about.
“I had experienced Atmos at the Blackbird Studio Academy in Nashville when I enrolled in their sound engineering course in 2019,” Goffin explains. “I later heard Steve Genewick presenting on Atmos at the NAMM Show in 2020, and so the chance to be in the studio with Steve, while he mixed my mother’s work in Atmos, was something I wasn’t going to pass up on.”
The Village Adopts Studium 33’s Studio Manager
She adds, “We got everyone from Carole’s team, Sony Music and the engineers on board after the idea was born in September. And, after Nathaniel Kunkel tracked down the original multitracks for me, we entered the studio for an intensive five-day mixing period in October 2021. Our plan with the mixes was to put the listener there, in the room, with the incredible musicians who worked on the album. You’ll get the chance to hear Carole’s legendary voice and exquisite piano playing, alongside such luminaries as Louis Price, Russell Kunkel and George Noriega right next to you. It’s an experience to behold.”
“For me, the key to the successful implementation of Atmos is the use of technology to enhance the music,” Kunkel says. “I really enjoy it when engineers approach immersive mixing with the art in mind — really do what serves the music. In terms of this release, A Holiday Carole, it is the perfect album for Atmos as it is a relatively simple recording that gives you more space to illustrate the orchestration and subtle changes in the musical arrangement. In honesty, if one uses the technology as a means to better express what the artistic intention of the production was, every album can be made better as an immersive experience.”
