35TH STREET STUDIOS

35th Street Studios is the premier rehearsal/soundstage/showcase room in Chicago. 35th Street is known for its first class gear, great live room, and its professional but not sterile atmosphere.  Along with our world class recording studio, 35th Street Studios has a 22 year history at the center of Chicago’s music scene.

Five minutes from downtown Chicago, 35th Street is tailored to the professional with hourly, weekly, and monthly 24 hour access rehearsal spaces. We have a full array of gear and services, as well as recording and midi/video production suites.

Thousands of bands and musicians have used 35th Street over the years including Smokey Norful, Yolanda Adams, Blues Traveller, Keanu Reeves, Brenda Russell, Steve Cole, Lucy Lawless, R. Kelly, Hall & Oates.

GEREY JOHNSON – GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER – 35th STREET STUDIOS
RECORDING CONNECTION MENTOR

The Recording Connection program will get definitely give you the tactical knowledge and the practical application knowledge.  You’ll learn how to make money in music which I don’t think you are going to get at any other college program. The Recording Connection course not only teaches you how to apply this knowledge but since it puts you in the environment, you get to network with people who earn their living making music.

Our client base at 35th Street is diverse: from people just starting out to a number of clients that have record deals, like Consul Records. So, you get the full spectrum which you won’t get in a classroom environment. You’re into actually working with real artists with real deadlines, with real budgets as you do in this kind of scenario.

We have actually hired three of the people we trained under the Recording Connection program. One guy who became our studio manager did so because not only did he learn the ropes to be an engineer, he also learned how we do business. You get to become part of “forum club” of actual, real working organization. That’s invaluable, there’s not enough money to pay for that.

What makes this, the Recording Connection program, most effective is you interact day to day with real people that are doing it, who’re actually in a hands-on working environment with real people who are in the music business for a living.

BRIAN HAMMERMEISTER – AUDIO ENGINEER – 35th STREET STUDIOS
RECORDING CONNECTION GRADUATE 

I found the Recording Connection program when I was in high school. I was 17 years old looking for colleges and I found it on the internet. I thought it was a great alternative to going to a full time school like Full Sail or otherwise. I came for my interview when I was 17 years old and saw the studio I was going to be working in and I loved the idea. So, I started the program and I thought it was great.

Through all my day-to-day life as an intern at 35th Street in the Recording Connection program, I come in and worked one-on-one with my mentor and with professional engineers and actually learned on the actual gear.

Make no mistake. There is a difference between an intern and an externship.  I mean this program is definitely more than making coffee and running errands for engineers. We’re actually working on the gear and we’re actually learning hands-on which you need to know to be an engineer. So, there’s definitely a difference.

I would recommend the Recording Connection to anyone who wants to be an engineer because this is stuff you can’t learn in the classroom. This is stuff you have to learn in a real recording studio.

I came into this program with a little education about engineering and what’s cool is, a year later I’m doing what I love for a living working at the very studio that I externd at.

JUSTIN ZERZA – AUDIO ENGINEER – 35th STREET STUDIOS
RECORDING CONNECTION GRADUATE

What got me interested in the Recording Connection?  Well, the first thing that was a factor for me, and pretty much with everyone, is the price difference. If you go to the Conservatory or Full Sail, that’s forty, fifty, sixty grand for those schools and you never once meet with a client.

Based on the price, I thought well let’s just see. Let’s see, let’s interview with the people at the studios. See what the vibe is like. You know, see how the studio is you know, is it a real deal studio? Is it something somebody has in their basement (which it wasn’t)? And I went through the motions, got in and you know the rest is history. Really, I finished up in a year and I have just been moving forward ever since.

If you’re in classroom, you’re not interacting with clients for one. Engineering’s more of a service industry.  So you have to deal with clients. You don’t learn that type of skill in any kind of classroom environment. You’re just learning from a teacher.

So far, I’ve worked with over a hundred professionals ranging from anywhere in any genre from gospel to jazz to rap to rock to blues through whatever you can think of. It’s all there.

I’m not an actor. I’m a real person. I have gone through the program. It’s a wonderful program. I would wholeheartedly recommend it as an alternative to going to the Conservatory or to the Full Sail or to any other of those studios, even online schools. I would recommend real world experience over anything that you can get in a classroom.