i piMpEd tHIs pRoPhiLe, BiAtCh!
SVEN MARTIN
‘Balancing time between the stage and studio can be tricky’, says Sven Martin, in-demand performance keyboardist and studio producer. ‘But I love them both, so I do them both’. And Sven does them both very well.
Recently, Sven’s been touring some of the most popular and most remote parts of the globe as musical director and keyboardist for Russia’s No.1 export, ‘t.A.T.u.’. He’s played to 100,000 people in Kazakhstan, shared the stage on Red Square with Shakira and the Black Eyed Peas, and turned a sold-out show in St. Petersburg into a live DVD. Add to that performances with Liz Phair on the ‘Chicks with Attitude’ tour, and television appearances on several shows including ‘The Tonight Show with Jay Leno’, and Sven’s prowess and popularity as a musician become irrefutable.
But performing hasn’t kept Sven from fulfilling a lifelong dream of building a ‘proper’ recording studio, ‘Garage Royale’. This secluded, vibey retreat in a garden setting in North Hollywood includes a massive collection of today’s and yesterday’s keyboards, Virtual Instruments and outboard gear hooked up to a powerful Pro Tools HD3 Accel rig, not to mention the precise technical and deep artistic expertise that Sven brings to the console.
Recent projects at ‘Garage Royale’ include production and keyboards for Natalia Lesz' debut album (on EMI with productions by Glen Ballard and Greg Wells), as well as keyboards on ‘The Veronicas' no.1 hit, ‘Hook me up’, collaborative efforts with composer Jane Fontana, whose tracks can be heard all over TV (from ‘Oprah’ to ‘Punk’d’), and co-writing and producing for an EP by his new project, ‘Core202’.
The new place far exceeds Sven’s former studio, a bedroom in an Apartment on Moorpark Street, the funky ‘Kraproom’ (‘Moorpark’ backwards). But Sven’s talent flourished even in this challenging environment, where he remixed Monster Magnet’s ‘Spacelord’ and recorded in its entirety the CD, ‘202’, for his band, ‘Life, Death and Giants’ (AKA ‘Driven’). Tracks from that CD landed licenses in TV and film, including ‘Summerland’ (WB), and 'Raising Helen' (Touchstone Pictures).
Sven grew up in Duesseldorf, Germany, where he took classical piano lessons for 15 years. At age 12, his tastes broadened when he found a synthesizer under the Christmas tree. Later, Sven studied audio and video engineering at the prestigious Robert Schumann Conservatory, moved to Los Angeles and interned at legendary Ocean Way Studios, and continued his lifelong quest for expertise.
Sven Martin is definitely the go-to guy whether it comes to playing keyboards or to producing music, or, whenever the need arises, both.