My father has the greatest work ethic of anyone I know. In the field, his job is to capture whatever occurs onstage to tape, and there are no excuses allowed, no room for ego and no time for flailing about. He shows up, gets the job done and goes home, often after an 18-hour day. My father takes great pride in what he does, and rightly so because there are few engineers out there who can handle the pressure of a live recording gig with such aplomb.
I started working for my dad when I was 13, polishing the wheels on the truck and taking out the garbage. Gradually, as I displayed a sense of responsibility, he taught me how to solder, understand signal flow, get a mix together. When I went off to work in non-wheeled studios, I got to return the favor a bit by teaching him the inner workings of Flying Faders and the latest studio trickery. We are better friends now than we have ever been, and I could not have asked for a better teacher or mentor.
— Ryan Hewitt, engineer/mixer
