About HawksView Studio

 

The story of the studio is also my story, so perhaps a little introduction is appropriate here (I can't hide in the studio forever!). I'm Trevor Thorpe. I grew up in the sprawling suburbs of D.C. and spent my childhood in the woods behind my family home, building forts with my older brother and friends from the neighborhood, fishing in the pond, splashing in the creek, and climbing the towering trees. When I wasn't outdoors I was passionately honing my skills as a visual artist. My love for music wasn't kindled until high school when there was a demand for Hip Hop instrumentals at parties, for freestyling and being silly. I started on my brothers computer using crude software to chop the instrumental endings of popular songs by Outkast, Biggie, Nas, whatever, and looping them out. Everything changed when my parents and grandmother gifted me an iMac for college. I discovered Garageband and began spending all of my free time making beats and recording myself and neighborhood friends. For years I averaged a beat a day, and have long since passed the 10,000 hour mark of music making. 

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After a year at WVU studying fine art I went to Detroit for automotive design, but quickly learned I was not cut out for that sort of work. It felt very corporate and was extremely competitive, and if I managed to land a job I'd be designing door handles and tempering my creativity to meet the demands of safety, economy, marketing, etc. I always struggled with the balance/ compromise between making money and having creative freedom. Next stop, Los Angeles Recording School to become an audio engineer. It was my first step towards being a professional musician. I was again confronted with the compromise between money and creative freedom, fortunately I landed a job at a laid back studio that did music and sound design for commercials. There I was introduced to professional recording software and gear, and had the opportunity to learn composing, sound reinforcement and studio design, and web design, videography, and photography. I also had my own room/ studio in the building and had the run of the studio after hours. That was a prolific period for me musically. 

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Things were going well in the music world, but LA was a soul suck for me. I made some fantastic life long friends there, which is partly how I managed to last 5 years, but it was a constant identity crisis since I didn't fit in. The vanity and superficial social dynamics with constant underlying selfish motives left me confused and dissatisfied with my lifestyle. I also lasted as long as I did in LA because I slowly dialed things in. I started in North Hollywood; hot and sprawling suburbs, then to Van Nuys; Hot, sprawling ghetto with loud planes zooming overhead, then a step up, to coastal Santa Monica, then to the artsy and vibrant Venice beach, and finally to Marina Del Rey; peaceful and beautiful. I got rid of my car and commuted on a bicycle and took advantage of the close proximity of the beach. But still, the music industry scene beat the creative aspirations right out of me and I traded the studio life for the sailing life. I became a professional sailor and worked for the captain of a race program, maintaining a 70' racing sailboat. I eventually bought my own boat and lived on it in Marina Del Rey. 

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At some point I was out of work and looking for a new start so I sold my boat to buy a nice touring bicycle, gear, and to fund my ride across the country, starting at the famous Santa Monica pier, and ending in the southernmost point in Key West, FL. It was a life changing trip. While I was out west, my parents retired, sold our house in Maryland, and moved to UpState NY. I moved into one of the rooms of their old farm house, surrounded by 40 beautiful acres, and found a steady flow of creative energy inspired by the serenity and peace all around me. After a couple of short "moves" to Hawai'i, I was back home trying to decide what to do with myself. I remember journaling about it. I thought, what if I could do anything my heart desired. What would I do? Well, I would write an album! Plain and simple. With my savings I bought the bare necessities of quality gear to make a complete album and through friends, found HawksView cabin just miles from my folks house. I got to name my price for rent and moved in in the winter. 

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In two months of soul quenching solitude, I wrote, recorded, arranged, mixed, and mastered my first album, and thanks to my mom's suggestion, honored the place it was created in by titling the album "HawksView". In the process of writing for the album, I created some reggae songs which didn't seem appropriate for the album, but got me thinking about creating a reggae album. That train of thought led me to consider using real musicians to play the parts instead of sequencing things in my computer and attempting to play guitar and bass, etc. myself. I figured, if musicians are going to learn and record these parts, it might as well just be a band, so I put up a Craiglslist ad and formed Big UpState! Big UpState became my central focus and over the course of three years we played scores of shows all over Ithaca, Trumansburg, the Finger Lakes wine trail, and even into PA. I learned a great deal from the band experience and really grew as a musician. Seeing how people react to songs, and hearing recordings of us play was instrumental in my musical growth. 

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Big UpState led me to Howl Studios, where our band rented a rehearsal space. It didn't take long for me to have my whole studio setup moved in and up and running. Howl was like college dorms for creatives. There was always someone willing to talk music or jam or offer critique. We collaboratively put on 10 shows on a stage we built, with equipment offered for the cause by the Howl community. 

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At some point I made a leap of faith to "full time musician" as I call it. A job was taking time away from music so I saved enough and pared down my expenses to make it possible. Because of Howl and Big UpState, and awesome friends, I developed a network of musicians. There were always lots of projects going on in the studio and never enough time. I began putting in 10 or 12 hour days and not leaving my room for days. Because I've had chronic Lyme disease since I was a child, inactivity, bad diet, social anxiety, disturbed sleep, and lack of nature all took their toll and caused me to decide to move back to the HawksView cabin and ultimately back home. But all of the diversity in settings and lifestyles inspired me to again go all in on a dream: to build my very own cabin! My parents, generous and supportive as they've always been were happy to have me build on their land.

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After many woods walks and much imagination I found a wonderful spot, above the wild apple orchard on a slope affording a view of the whole valley. It was an overwhelming and intimidating prospect, but I knew it had to happen step by step. By and by it would become a habitable and cozy cabin and vibey recording studio. My brother Branden has a brilliant mind and capable hands, and built his own saw mill from scratch so that he could build his own cabin with his, now wife, Nikki. My father gifted me a sizable load of logs from local loggers, supplemented by some volunteers from our woods to supply all the lumber needed for the structure. I found building materials like windows and rigid insulation cheap or free on Craigslist and at a reuse center and friends and family have donated furniture and a woodstove. I anticipated the hard work and long days, but not the pure satisfaction and pride I gained from seeing the progress happening before my eyes and by my own hands.

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In the midst of this big project and dream, I slipped away to my second home on the island of Kaua'i, where I built a shack, then built a 5'x8' recording...umm...closet within. It was the birth of HawksView Mini, a place to make music while away from home. From the Howl era came my second "solo" album, HipHoptical, which has become an album featuring 18 (and counting!) incredibly talented musicians, singers, rappers, and poets. It's a Hip Hop album but the featured artists bring unique flavors and ideas with their contributions from a mosaic of musical backgrounds: Jazz, Rock, Metal, Hip Hop, Blues, Country, Folk, R&B, Soul, Funk, Classical, Spoken Word, etc. I continued working on the album on Kaua'i and someday, maybe in another 3 years the album will be finished and released! 

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HawksView Studio, as you may now see, is a moving, shifting, morphing thing, which, in it's ever-evolving nature has become more of an idea than a place or a thing, but out of this floating idea radiates a wealth of creative energy in the form of music. It's linked to a vibrant, deep, conscientious community of ambitious and talented people and is an outlet for passion and a refuge for the creative soul, seeking support and solitude. Someday HawksView will hopefully materialize into a gorgeous cabin tucked into the hills of Spencer New York, where it will be engulfed in the serenity of nature and love of a family and community. Thank you so much for being a part of the journey!

 

 

 

Audio Resume

 

• Audio Engineer training and certificate from L A Recording School- Hollywood, CA.

• Assistant Engineer @ Daawg House Studios- Burbank, CA. 

• Studio Manager, Tech, Composer @ Machine Head Sound Design & Music- Santa Monica, CA.

• Mix & Mastering Engineer @ Barefoot Boy Productions- Placentia, CA. 

• Independent Producing, Mixing, and Mastering for over 30 artists in genres ranging from Acoustic Singer/ Songwriter to EDM to Hip Hop to Country & Bluegrass to Reggae.

 

 

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