GC Pro Appointed Panasonic Professional Products Dealer

Shown L-R: Stephen Milley, National Sales Manager, Panasonic Professional Video Sales Channel; Derek Snyder, GC Pro Regional Manager; Rick Plushner, GC Pro Vice President; and Bill Brennan, Director of Category Sales, Panasonic System Networks Company of America.

— Partnership with Panasonic System Communications Company of North America will enhance GC Pro’s installation services with expanded multi-media offerings, while providing Panasonic with penetration into additional market sectors —

WESTLAKE VILLAGE, CA, July 16, 2012 — Guitar Center Professional (GC Pro), the outside sales division of Guitar Center that focuses on the needs of professional users, is pleased to announce that it has been appointed as an authorized dealer for Panasonic professional products. The announcement was made by Rick Plushner, GC Pro Vice President, and reflects GC Pro’s ongoing expansion and dedication to providing turnkey solutions. As dealers, GC Pro locations will offer Panasonic professional projectors, cameras, recorders and display products.

Plushner stated, “As GC Pro has grown in scope, particularly with our Affiliate program, the installations projects have become more multimedia in nature, leading us to offer comprehensive turnkey solutions. By partnering with Panasonic, GC Pro is now offering a more complete approach to servicing our clients. We are not getting into the retail video business; rather, the application for these professional products is meant to enhance our installations business for many of our customers in the house-of-worship marketplace, recording and post-production communities, and general business-to-business applications. GC Pro has always offered high-end professional audio products, and now we’re excited to represent the most sought-after brand in the professional video business, rounding out our ability to provide complete cutting-edge installations.”

Bill Brennan, Senior Director, Category Sales, stated, “Panasonic is extremely excited about partnering with GC Pro, and supporting their go-to-market strategy. This relationship offers Panasonic the opportunity to expand our presence in markets that reach beyond our conventional customer base, and to approach clients from a unique perspective. I am extremely impressed with the passion and creativeness of the Senior Management Team and look forward to working and growing business together with GC Pro.”

Stephen Milley, National Sales Manager, Panasonic Professional Video Sales Channel, stated, “As part of Panasonic’s B2B initiative – the Panasonic System Communications Company North America – we are always looking for strategic partners that can integrate all of our various technologies seamlessly and have a client base to whom they can promote this portfolio on a national level. As a key partner, GC Pro is not only closely familiar with these technologies, but they are also able to penetrate market sectors that we are not strongly addressing at this point. This is a win-win situation, as GC Pro can now offer its clientele Panasonic professional broadcast cameras, video displays, projection etc., and Panasonic will grow its presence in new burgeoning markets, like house-of-worship, post-production and the musical entertainment industry, which GC Pro emphasizes as part of their core competency. Many of GC Pro’s customers have expanded their own areas of focus outside of simply audio, and we are proud to be able to partner with GC Pro to offer products to that end.”

Milley added, “Another thing that made GC Pro attractive to us as a strategic partner is that their parent company Guitar Center has a reputable, strong name that has clout in the industry, is financially sound and is a national company. This provides the foundation for GC Pro to grow, and the fact that they have 43 offices nationwide means further support of the Panasonic brand across the nation.”

For more information, please visit www.gcpro.com.

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About Guitar Center Professional/Guitar Center
Founded in 2001, Guitar Center Professional is the outside sales division of Guitar Center that focuses on the needs of professional users. Its clientele includes recording studios, audio engineers, producers, recording and touring musicians, live sound venues, post production facilities and more. Emphasizing extraordinary individualized service via local account managers, GC Pro offers expert consultation and a comprehensive selection of the world’s finest equipment for music and audio professionals. More information on GC Pro can be found by visiting www.gcpro.com.

Mark Isham Turns to GC Pro to Outfit His Studio

Composer Mark Isham, pictured in his home workspace, outfitted with the help of GC Pro.

— As he creates scores for programs like ABC’s Once Upon a Time, Isham looks to
GC Pro for products, service and support —

WESTLAKE VILLAGE, CA, July 12, 2012 — Award-winning composer Mark Isham has an impressive list of credits: scores for such films as Crash, A River Runs Through It, The Black Dahlia, Blade and dozens more, as well as TV shows such as Chicago Hope; a number of GRAMMY®-winning solo albums; and a number of other highly regarded collaborative projects. Recently, his focus has been on composing the music for the hit ABC television series Once Upon a Time, a unique recasting of fairy tale conventions in a semi-modern setting. As he composes at his home studio for this project and others, he again and again turns to Guitar Center Professional (GC Pro), the outside sales division of Guitar Center that focuses on the needs of professional users, to source gear and provide ongoing service and support.

“I have had a long relationship with GC Pro,” Isham says. “A lot of my equipment has come through there. The GC Pro branch in Hollywood has been our go-to shop for years. I love working with them, because if I want to try something out, they just get it to us. They have a great department there.”

The home workspace of composer Mark Isham, outfitted with the help of GC Pro.

For each episode of Once Upon a Time, Isham composes in Apple Logic, adapting his established character themes and creating new ones when necessary, and records in Avid Pro Tools. A demo then gets sent to his producer and the show’s creators, who send their comments. Once the material has been approved, the show goes into production, and an orchestrator generates the full scores from Isham’s themes.

As one might expect, the layout and components of Isham’s main writing room have been fine-tuned over the years to be perfectly conducive to creativity and productivity. A Logic/Pro Tools setup faces one wall, and a mixing console faces the opposite wall. He has multiple sets of monitors for a TV-type setup as well as a fuller theater setting. The mixing room features an Avid-Euphonix console, accompanied by a 10-way speaker system with Class A amps. He uses M-Audio digital audio and MIDI solutions, plug-ins from Universal Audio and Tannoy monitors, among other gear.

Southern California-based GC Pro Account Manager Bill Learned has been one of Isham’s main contacts. He states, “Mark is a pleasure to work with. As an artist, musician and composer he stands apart from the herd. He continues to push himself to explore new territory musically and in doing so stays on the cusp of what modern day recording has to offer. We are proud that he chooses to rely on GC Pro for his various needs.”

For more information, please visit www.gcpro.com.

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About Guitar Center Professional/Guitar Center
Founded in 2001, Guitar Center Professional is the outside sales division of Guitar Center that focuses on the needs of professional users. Its clientele includes recording studios, audio engineers, producers, recording and touring musicians, live sound venues, post production facilities and more. Emphasizing extraordinary individualized service via local account managers, GC Pro offers expert consultation and a comprehensive selection of the world’s finest equipment for music and audio professionals. More information on GC Pro can be found by visiting www.gcpro.com.

GC Pro Helps Outfit the “Hay Bale Studio” at Bonnaroo

The Hay Bale Studio backstage at Bonnaroo, outfitted by GC Pro. Photo Credit: TJ Hitt/Hitt Team Entertainment.

WESTLAKE VILLAGE, CA, July 2, 2012 — For the eleventh year in a row, tens of thousands of excited music fans descended upon Manchester, Tennessee, for the Bonnaroo Music and Arts festival, held June 7-10, 2012. Bonnaroo 2012 was filled with memorable moments from its dozens of performing acts, including Radiohead, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Phish, Skrillex, Dispatch, The Roots and many more. Backstage, several of the festival’s acts were asked to lay down tracks in a purpose-built recording studio, outfitted with the help of Guitar Center Professional (GC Pro), the outside sales division of Guitar Center that focuses on the needs of professional users. The recorded tracks were mixed and mastered immediately and transferred to the radio tent next door for broadcast on radio stations nationwide.

The studio, appropriately dubbed “Hay Bale Studio” after the dozens of hay bales positioned on the exterior for sound rejection, was again operated by Nashville’s The Toy Box Studio, and Toy Box’s producer/recording engineer Lij was at the helm for the sessions. The whole backstage studio/radio area was overseen by Asheville, North Carolina-based Music Allies. In the weeks leading up to the festival, the studio’s gear equipment list was compiled by Lij, his assistant engineers, and GC Pro’s Nashville-based Senior Account Manager Chad Evans, who was also on site along with other GC Pro personnel.

Among the gear supplied by GC Pro were Burl converters, Slate Pro Audio Dragon compressors and Fox Mic Pre's, an Avid HD Native system and microphones from Royer, Mojave and Shure, among other equipment. All in all, 40 of the festival’s artists recorded nearly 100 tracks in the studio, including The Alabama Shakes, Feist, Young the Giant, Umphrey's McGee, Two Door Cinema Club and many more. The schedule for each session was fast-paced, leaving room for a quick setup and soundcheck leading up to first-take recordings of three songs, before each act was guided to the interview booth, also in the “Hay Bale Studio” trailer, to make room for the next act in the tracking room. Within an hour, the performances had been mixed down to two tracks and prepped for broadcast from the radio tent next door. Approximately 45 radio stations nationwide featured these “Bonnaroo sessions” over the weekend. The multi-tracked sessions were also preserved and archived, as in past years.

“We had a fantastic session this year!” notes Lij. “40 bands and 94 songs recorded, mixed, mastered, and already aired on the radio thanks to GC Pro. We had such great support from Chad, and are eternally grateful!”

Evans stated, “This is our fourth year helping sponsor the studio at Bonnaroo. The festivals just keep getting better. We have developed a great partnership with Lij and crew, and we’re proud to contribute. We are eager for next year and beyond, because Bonnaroo is so vital for the music industry and emerging acts.”

For more information, please visit www.gcpro.com.

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About Guitar Center Professional/Guitar Center
Founded in 2001, Guitar Center Professional is the outside sales division of Guitar Center that focuses on the needs of professional users. Its clientele includes recording studios, audio engineers, producers, recording and touring musicians, live sound venues, post production facilities and more. Emphasizing extraordinary individualized service via local account managers, GC Pro offers expert consultation and a comprehensive selection of the world’s finest equipment for music and audio professionals. More information on GC Pro can be found by visiting www.gcpro.com.

The Alley Recording Company and GC Pro

Co-partner and chief engineer Marc Nelson in the control room of The Alley Recording Company, Valparaiso, Indiana. The studio has an impressive arsenal of gear, much of which was sourced through GC Pro.

— Chief engineer and co-partner Marc Nelson keeps the overhead low in small-city Indiana, offering great value to acts from nearby Chicago and elsewhere —

WESTLAKE VILLAGE, CA, May 3, 2012 — The Alley Recording Company, located in the arts-friendly city of Valparaiso, Indiana, is the brainchild of co-partner and chief engineer Marc Nelson. After a stint at the Chicago Recording Company and time spent as a protégée of producer legend Bill Schnee (Carly Simon, Whitney Houston, Steely Dan), Nelson decided to open his own studio in 2008 in his hometown of Valparaiso, despite a shaky economy and an even shakier studio industry, an atmosphere in which far more studios were shutting down than opening successfully. Nelson and co-partner Chad Clifford saw the opportunity to keep the overhead low in the small yet arts-rich Valparaiso, and offer a friendly, thrifty alternative to the studios in nearby Chicago. “We initially thought about opening a facility in Chicago, but competition kept me out – there are about 425 studios there alone,” Nelson recalls. “And out here there is zero overhead. Our rent is very low and I would say we are the nicest studio between here and Indianapolis.” The business model is paying off so far, with The Alley bringing a new level of studio professionalism to the area. The studio has an impressive arsenal of gear, much of which was sourced through Guitar Center Professional (GC Pro), the outside sales division of Guitar Center that focuses on the needs of professional users, and with whom Nelson has a longstanding relationship. “If I ever need something, GC Pro is always there,” notes Nelson. “I can’t stress enough how important they have been to my studio, simply because they always deliver.”

The two-suite facility certainly does not disappoint in terms of size, aesthetics and gear. The large live room measures 28 feet by 20 feet with 14-foot ceilings, with two isolation booths adjacent. Instruments include a Yamaha C3 grand piano, a Wurlitzer spinet, a vintage set of Ludwig drums, a Hammond A100 organ, various mallet percussion instruments, and guitars from such manufacturers as Gibson, Taylor and Rickenbacker, among other instruments. Nelson selected Focal Twin6 Be three-way monitors with matching subwoofer for his control room. “These are the only monitors I use and for my size, they are perfect. The top end is never shrill and they have plenty of power,” he states. His main console is a 36-channel MCI-Sony MXP-3000, which he runs with his Avid Pro Tools|HD2 system. The console also features eight integrated preamplifiers customized by Greg Norman from Electrical Audio. Outboard amplifiers include models from Daking, Great River, Chandler, Universal Audio, Vintech, Avalon and others. Other gear includes limiters and compressors from Summit, API, Empirical Labs and Chandler. And of course the microphone closet is fully stocked, with units from Audio-Technica, Blue, AKG, Flea (Flea 47 and Flea C12), Royer, Shure, Schoeps and others, which Nelson has mostly bought in pairs.

Valparaiso is known for its great music community, and Nelson spearheaded a 13-episode PBS series, “Live at the Alley,” filmed entirely at the studio. PBS has since asked the studio to do a second season. Nelson notes, “The main thing for the PBS series was for us to host high quality live performances – it wasn’t about money or even advertising the studio.” But the show has indeed raised the studio’s profile, and more and more acts from the Chicago area are turning to The Alley. “We got many of the large Chicago groups and a handful of others from Boston to Los Angeles involved with what we’re doing here. Let’s hope our good luck continues!”

For more information, please visit www.gcpro.com.

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About Guitar Center Professional/Guitar Center
Founded in 2001, Guitar Center Professional is the outside sales division of Guitar Center that focuses on the needs of professional users. Its clientele includes recording studios, audio engineers, producers, recording and touring musicians, live sound venues, post production facilities and more. Emphasizing extraordinary individualized service via local account managers, GC Pro offers expert consultation and a comprehensive selection of the world’s finest equipment for music and audio professionals. More information on GC Pro can be found by visiting www.gcpro.com.

Culture Club Opens New Location

The first floor of Culture Club, a hip 1980s-themed New York City dance club, featuring state-of-the-art lighting and P.A. systems sourced through GC Pro.

— Located in the heart of Midtown Manhattan, the new Culture Club location features 16,000 square feet and four floors of powerful dance club sound and lighting, all sourced through GC Pro —

WESTLAKE VILLAGE, CA, April 9, 2012 — Guitar Center Professional (GC Pro), the outside sales division of Guitar Center that focuses on the needs of professional users, recently worked closely with Culture Club, a hip 1980s-themed New York City dance club, to supply state-of-the-art lighting and P.A. systems (as well as other gear), as it moved from its original location downtown to its new club in Midtown Manhattan. Culture Club owners Robert Watman and Najib Succar turned to GC Pro for loudspeakers from JBL; amplifiers from Crown; mixing consoles from Soundcraft; lighting from Antari and Elation Professional; DJ products from Denon, Rane and Pioneer; and a full host of equipment from several other manufacturers.

The new location, on 20 West 39th Street between 5th and 6th Avenues, opened late in 2011, and features four stories and 16,000 square feet of floor space. “It’s a very, very large dance club,” noted Co-Owner Robert Watman. “Each of the club’s four floors hosts a separate DJ with a distinct playlist. Each system is on its own floor and there’s no bleed, so if you’re on the second floor, you don’t hear what’s happening on the other floors. So you can imagine that a lot had to go into consideration. This is a brand new space that needed tons of gear, and we wanted to do it right. We wanted to make sure the P.A. was a killer system, and that it would be able to handle the amount and volume of music that it would be pumping out every night. So we turned to GC Pro, who became our one-stop vendor for the amplifiers, speakers, DJ mixers and turntables, lighting – everything, really.”

Among the hundreds of items sourced through GC Pro were several dozen JBL loudspeakers, including PRX612M, Control 29AV, ASB6125 and AM51212/95 modules; lighting equipment from Elation Professional, including EES487 spotlights and Design Wash LED 60 units; acoustic treatment from Auralex; Crown XLS2500 and XLS1500 Amplifiers; and much more. DJ equipment included Serato Rane SL 2 for Scratch Live, Pioneer CDJ-850 Performance Multi Players, and Denon DJ DNX500 Professional Rack DJ Mixers.

Watman is longtime personal friends with Guitar Center Manhattan store manager Judd Goldrich, who was happy to connect them the GC Pro staff as well as work closely with GC Pro personnel to augment the sound system with ancillary DJ and M.I. products and accessories. Watman recalls, “They came over, and for what they were offering in terms of a turnkey solution, they definitely came in at the right price. It was a good fit. We ended up acquiring a massive number of JBL P.A. products. It was that and lighting – intelligent lighting, LEDs, spotlights and washes. It was the right gear at the right price.”

Co-owner Najib Succar adds, “We’ve been in the club business for a long time, and had a distinct division when we were planning the new Culture Club. Working with GC Pro and Guitar Center, our vision became a reality. But the bottom line is, Culture Club has become a destination. Our patrons are from not only the tri-state area, but from around the country and abroad. They continue to come back, week after week, for the Culture Club experience.”

“It was great working with Robert and Najib to help make their concept of Culture Club a reality,” stated Judd Goldrich. “I have known Robert for most of my life, so on a personal level, Culture Club has a very special meaning to me. We want all of our customers to be happy and succeed, and this is probably one of the best examples of helping out a friend, and now we have a customer for life.”

For more information, please visit www.gcpro.com.

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About Guitar Center Professional/Guitar Center
Founded in 2001, Guitar Center Professional is the outside sales division of Guitar Center that focuses on the needs of professional users. Its clientele includes recording studios, audio engineers, producers, recording and touring musicians, live sound venues, post production facilities and more. Emphasizing extraordinary individualized service via local account managers, GC Pro offers expert consultation and a comprehensive selection of the world’s finest equipment for music and audio professionals. More information on GC Pro can be found by visiting www.gcpro.com.