JPF Home Page Forums General Messages Musician Message Forum Quality Music Production At No Risk To You

Hello all...,

It's been awhile. Many of you may know that I had been the full-time caregiver for my mom. She passed away peacefully in 2013, and since then I have been letting the roller-coaster ride of emotions from that journey run its course, while working on transitioning my life-long passion of music into a career as a music producer/writer/arranger.

Most of the older JPF members know me; I have done many collabs here over the years with talented folks such as Joice Marie, Wendy DuMond, Kristi McKeever, and Calvin Stewart, and I hope to find time to do more collabs in the future. Now, however, I want to take the next step, using the experience I've gained to help other artists and songwriters sound their best, while earning a steady income for myself as well.

And so I am offering my services for making professional sounding arrangements of your songs. Cost will range from $20 for an overnight Band-In-The-Box style arrangement utilizing your pre-existing vocals or your guitar/vocals with a click track ($60 without), $40 for the same but with my lead vocals and one harmony vocal, $60 for a meticulously crafted arrangement (using everything in my studio) with your (guitar and) vocals, and finally $80 for the same time consuming detailed work but with my lead vocals and 2-3 harmony tracks, including contrapuntal 'Beach Boys" style work, if the song needs that.

You needn't worry about working to a click track as I have worked with several artists over the years who didn't believe in such a thing. Check out http://joannerand.bandcamp.com/track/chain-of-ships for an example. Also, I can turn an average sounding vocal into a great one, with absolutely no hint of any autotune-like adjustments.

If you comparison shop, you will know that I'm very reasonable. Plus, your satisfaction is very important to me, so I'll ask for no payment until your are absolutely satisfied. Paypal is welcome. You can hear examples of my work at http://soundcloud.com/michael-zaneski

Contact me here or at mchzanes2@aol.com for the full list of my services and other examples of my work, or to talk about what you would like to do!

Thanks for your time,

Mike Zaneski

Mike,

Good to see you back again and much respect from me on your care-taker efforts. Good luck on your projects, that is very inexpensive and I know you will do high quality work!

Hi Mike,

Welcome back. Sounds like a tough journey but now you are ready to roll. I know you will do a good job.

Hey Michael,

I've listened to your work before, and what you are doing now ?

I'm sorry bud, it doesn't cut it with me.

JPF is a sharing kind of place. Of course there are different transactions which may take place, but bud...... honestly..... *shrugs* .....

cheers, niteshift

Welcome back, Mike:

Best of luck with this service. Plenty of people here who can utilize additional "musication" as Beth says.

Regards,

Dave

Good prices. I'll check out your examples when I get more time.

Dave

Thanks Dave W, Dave R,Kevin, and Colin for dropping by and the encouraging words; I appreciate that.

Niteshift, I understand how you feel. JPF IS indeed a sharing place, and over the years I have done plenty of sharing here. Co-writing one of my favorite things to do, and like I said I intend to do more of that when I can, and I will never accept one penny from a co-write partner, and never have.

But I deserve to earn a living like everyone else, no? Not everyone here is a self-sufficient recording artist like yourself. I am offering my services to those who might benefit, and there are many here who would, and those who know me know I will work hard to make their music shine, and those who don't will quickly see the passion I put into their project.

What am I doing now? I work in my home studio 50-60 hours a week, writing music for libraries like Audiosparx, and arrange/produce on a freelance basis, while trying to find part time work of some kind--while worrying that if it involves standing for any length of time, I probably won't cut it, because of the chronic problems that I have with my lower back.

But the back pain is a blessing really, cuz I realize that I need to follow my heart and do what I'm passionate about doing..so here I am..

Maybe one day we'll collaborate on something. The future is full of hope and possibilities, so shrug no more, my friend!

Mike Z

Hey Mike! Good to see you back on JPF. Wish you much success.

Best, John

I checked out some of your samples and I liked what I heard, which is strange for me because I am not into pop very much but I actually liked it. But I am into real country and gospel, do you do those genres, didn't see any there to check your sound. I would want your voice on the songs, I like it, not my voice, please.

You can answer me on this thread or pm me.

In troubled times, nothing makes more sense than making music, Mike. Best of luck with the projects!

You are an extremely talented musician, writer, arranger and producer. I've heard a lot of your music though the years, so I know your clients will be in for a real treat, getting access to your genius for highly competitive quotes like that!

Production won't be standing in their way, for sure.

I am the lo-fi kid. But if you listen to what Mike did for my first and only solo EP, you would never know it. He took my crappy guitar/vox tunes and made them sound lovely. He is fun to work with and just an all around brilliant producer. If/when I take another shot at another solo effort, Mike will be my choice.

http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/wendydumond

Go there and sample the tracks! The above is a great deal!

Thanks, John. It makes me very happy to know a fellow composer whom I deeply admire wishes me success in this!

Cheers,
Mike

Hi Everett,

Listen to https://soundcloud.com/michael-zaneski/husbands-and-wives-roger for an example of something a bit on the old-timey country side. I grew up with Chet Atkins and Owen Bradley productions swirling around the house (Jim Reeves, Patsy Cline)and this particular project was a gift to my mother whose favorite artist was Reeves, and loved this Roger Miller tune. The vocal holds up, I think. The music was done quickly. Reeves in particular showed me how to coax some warm tones out of my voice. This would be a good example of a forty dollar type project.

I don't have any other examples to share that resemble anything in the Country or Gospel genres, but if you gave me an artist name and a song title (an example) of how you might like your song to sound, I could tell you quickly if that is something I could do. You listened to the songs on my site, so you know I can make my voice sound like just about anything. I would just need a kind of aural template to guide me in my production choices!

I look forward to hearing from you. Please PM me, or email me at mchzanes2@aol.com

Thanks, Everett, for considering me.

Best wishes,
Mike

Michael, lovely to see you again. I'm so pleased you're now able to work full-time on your lifelong passion.

Your production services sound excellent.

Donna

Hi Magne,

Well gosh..

I still listen to your JJ Cale tribute all the time, and have learned a lot from listening closely to your productions, over the years. That's the beauty of a community like this, we feed off of each other in a good way.

Thank you so much for the kind words and positive vibes!

Best wishes,
Mike

Hey there lo-fi kid,

Your work always speaks to me..moves me..and does so in a way unlike any others'.

The brilliance is with the artist. My job is simply to make sure I don't tarnish it, when I reflect it back.

Even Mick Jagger put out a few solo records, so I live with hope.

Donna, good to see you too! Thanks for the kind words. You're good people and an amazing songwriter who always finds some unique slant on a subject. I've read you closely over the years and learned so much from you! I'm glad we can still connect through here..I'll be looking in!

Mike

Thanks, Calvin! It's no secret how much fun I had arranging you & Joice's brilliant song. I had an epiphany while making that, and it's that there's always a way to make any "work" more like "play," and often the way "in" to a piece is to find that playtime way..and I have a feeling you've known this for a while! But me..after Good Girls & Bad Boys, I got up every morning looking forward to whatever time I could find to do studio work. So I owe you a "thank you" to you and Joice for that!

Mike

I suppose there are worse things than a highly ethical, super talented, genuinely nice guy hanging out his shingle.

Best of luck, Mike!

Scott

Kevin took the good to see you again and much respect for your care-taking right out of my mouth.

Wishing you the very best, creatively and financially!

Midnite

Hi Scott,

Well thanks for these warm and encouraging thoughts. It's funny you mention ethics, cuz I just started reading a book called "101 Ethical Dilemmas" but not for the wisdom, per se, but because I thought there would be a lot of great song lyric ideas in there--at least maybe some unique ones..not the most ethical approach a book on ethics..

My virtual shingle continues to hang. Now to spruce it up with some bold fancy lettering..maybe a little neon..

Talk to you later..thanks again..

Mike

Hi Bob,

Yeah it hasn't been easy transitioning, but I'm starting to see daylight. Thanks for the good wishes and encouraging words. :)_

Mike

Mike, welcome back. Your prices are quite low for what you are offering; hope you get lots of work.

I do have a concern with those who don’t use click tracks and how you’re able to put music to it with BIAB. Not sure how you can really tighten songs/vocals up to a beat without one, though. Honestly from Sub to studios in Nashville, the first order of business was a click track. Guess that shouldn’t be my concern, though, that’s your problem.

Good luck!

Hi Iggy,

Thanks.

Yeah, I wasn't thinking about BIAB when I mentioned arranging music for musicians who worked without a click; I've never tried sinking BIAB audio with a musician's audio in that clickless manner. When they've been clickless, I've used their audio as a kind of surrogate timeline, and entered (midi reference) notes which cue various virtual instruments, and I enter those "notes' manually into the scroll of my software, lining them up with said audio.

If the musician in question keeps good time to him or herself, it should theoretically work with BIAB audio, though, since it would just be a case of lining the two up together, and maybe fudging a little with the clients audio--making it a tad more consistent to tempo, so that there weren't BIAB audio tracks that were noticeably warping, timewise.

I just wouldn't want to work like that, if at all possible. It would be a most tedious and un-musical way to work, and time consuming to boot, to achieve any kind of workable result. Sinking up software made tracks to a clients audio should sound spontaneous and "right" and I doubt the aforementioned thought experiment would ever do that--unless the client, of course, kept almost robotic like time.

Pasting midi notes that refer to various virtual instruments does work to give that "Astral Weeks" kind of live band sound though, but because it would be the time consuming method of meticulously pasting notes onto the timeline, it would fall into the $80 dollar category. I should probably go up top and make that clearer in my original post.

Thanks for bringing that to my attention and for the good wishes and all.

Mike