by Michelle Guadalupe Felix Garcia
From the Editor: Here is a piece that shows the value of perseverance and dedication to follow a dream. Many of us love audio, but the industry is becoming digital not only in its recording but in the way it displays settings that can be adjusted. It is not at all blind-friendly in its testing to become credentialed, but this is just another jump for someone determined to succeed.
Monitor readers have heard from Michelle before. You will not be disappointed in her second appearance.
In his book "Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us," New York Times' bestselling author Daniel H. Pink offers a strategy for finding our purpose. Ask yourself two questions, he says. What gets you up in the morning? And what keeps you up at night?
The answers for each human being will be as diverse and unique as there are species of wild flowers on this earth. To make our lives rewarding and meaningful, we often have more than one answer to these questions. I am here to share what sparks the energy in my brain and lights the fire within me: Audio.
My alarm rang at 3:15 a.m., and I was not bothered in the slightest. I was about to embark on the exhilarating journey of taking a virtual course offered in England and available to me all the way in Mexico. I had won a scholarship to learn what was necessary to get a certification on Pro Tools, the gold standard in the music industry. This software is the norm in recording studios, film post-production facilities, and on-location sound all over the world. It was taught by Leslie Gaston-Bird, now president of the Audio Engineering Society, and Febe Adedamola, an audio mixer from Nigeria, in a two-week intensive format. The sessions were five hours long, with some breaks in between, Monday through Friday. Then on Saturdays each student would take a test on our knowledge. If we passed, we would go on to the next week's round. Upon successful completion of both exams, we would earn the Pro-Tools-Certified official badge from Avid.
The digital audio workstation is accessible with the built-in screen reader for MacOS, VoiceOver. But the tests are highly visual in nature because they rely on screenshots of windows, the shapes of tools and buttons, as well as questions on zooming capabilities and mouse functions. I had wished to get certified for a long time, but five years ago a fellow blind audio engineer told me to forget it. He said it was going to be too difficult because the materials are not adapted for test takers without eyesight.
But how did the goal of doing sound for a living start? I found my dream at a Coldplay concert. After sleepless nights of meticulous strategy-crafting, and fifty-two emails aimed at getting a chance to play “Clocks” with my favorite band at the piano, Coldplay invited me in for the adventure of a lifetime. Their legendary status, complemented by their endless humility, shined through. I appreciated everything that they did, from their efforts to speak Spanish to the incredible amount of trust they granted to a stranger and her family to watch rehearsal a few feet from the stage, hug the members, and play their official A Head Full of Dreams Tour piano, decorated with flowers and a multitude of vibrant colors. I had been into sound for a very long time, since I was thirteen and made my head ache playing with unhealthy amounts of reverb. But this moment marked a before and after. Listening to the pristine, transparent signal of their in-ear monitors; watching the team united as a great big family, working quickly to achieve spectacular results for the audience's enjoyment; and passing by the machine room, feeling the heat emanating from the lighting boards and mixing desks: all of these were reasons that truly consolidated my desire to dedicate my life to sound, and I wouldn't like to envision myself doing anything else.
The road wouldn't be all petals and roses, though. On my first week at San Diego State University, pursuing a bachelor's degree in music recording technology and audio design, my live sound reinforcement professor called my parents aside to have a conversation without me. Later he called me as well to declare, “You should change your major." What was he talking about? The sentence fell like a bomb upon my family and me. We had traveled over three hundred miles to relocate our lives to a country whose language and culture are not our own. My mom had embraced her fears to learn to drive on US freeways, which are different from the highways in Mexico, to support my education. My dad was willing to spend four years living alone, working from Mexico and making six-hour trips to visit us every two weeks. I bet everything on the dream of getting accepted as an international student, trying to get my application noticed among the ninety-three thousand that made up the pile. Now this professor was saying that the career I had chosen is extremely difficult for someone who can see, let alone someone who is blind. "It's impossible," he stated, not having given me the chance to speak. I had been judged before my first class period, before I turned in any assignments. "Perhaps you should enroll in composition instead," he opined. Interestingly, this would mean I'd take all the other classes but his.
In that moment I had two choices. I could drop out of college, forget my purpose, and go back to my country. Certainly, my soul couldn’t stand listening to the bells of the carillon that marked every hour in the student union building, while knowing that I had failed. Alternatively, I could press on, gather courage, and keep going in spite of all odds, ignoring all the voices urging me to recede from the challenge and run away. What did I decide to do? I decided not to listen.
Smith Recital Hall is the birthplace of an annual jazz, classical, and world music concert series. The two hundred-seat capacity venue hosts hundreds of events and serves as the training ground for students who need to practice their front of house mixing and recording skills. A Soundcraft Vi4 mixing console was the first learning tool and the first great obstacle for me. A sixteen-channel surface with tactile faders is not accessible enough when you're confronted with a touch screen to patch your signal flow and access all menus. But I'm not used to taking no for an answer, and it was our turn to put the designer hats on. When engineers don't have a solution, we create it from the ground up. We invented a sixteen-by-six system to be pasted on a cardboard frame surrounding the screen of the console. Horizontally it told me where each channel began, and vertically it showed me the margins of each menu page such as inputs, outputs, sends A and B, EQ and dynamics. The method wasn't perfect, but by touching perpendicularly the dots of the function I wanted to carry out, then drawing a mental square and calculating where the touch screen button laid, I was able to run sound as my peers did, and the audience liked it! My friends helped me learn the board's layout, and soon I was fluent on its operation.
Towards the closing of the semester, we had to take a final. If we passed, we had the chance to earn a pair of headphones. My instructor tried to force me to take the console test orally instead of hands-on because "it would be too visual." I sat down in front of the desk and let him know that I wasn't moving until I was given the same exam my classmates took. He had no choice! He administered the interactive questionnaire, and I succeeded with flying colors. I don't think I ever changed my professor's mind, but long story short, he resigned before I did! That pair of headphones not only signifies that I learned the material well; it also serves as a reminder that I am strong. Experiences like these build up my character and make me find within me the spirit of a warrior who isn't afraid to stand up for what she believes in and who fights for her rights if she must.
But I wasn't always so confident in myself. Other people contributed to my perseverance in this critical period through their unbreakable belief in me.
When we were interns at the studio which we lovingly called "the crows' nest," we set up for big bands, ensembles, and orchestras. One of the required items was securing tripping hazards such as cables and snakes to the ground with gaffing tape. Weekly, we were divided into teams to perform the live sound duties, and often my instructor wanted to leave me as a floater member, "to be called only when needed." This was only a way of avoiding telling me a decision not to take my help was already in place. My white cane, for almost any crew I encountered, was a symbol of not being able to do anything. Though I looked forward to every future event with real anticipation, practically every time I asked if I could help with something, I was politely told staff was complete for the evening, so not that day! It feels just as disheartening as when a group of friends asks for help in moving from one house to another, I show up, and they tell me to sit down because it is crowded, and everything is already done.
I had begun internalizing the doubts my professor held about me. Fortunately, I had a really good relationship with our internship supervisor, Kevin, who thought about my abilities differently. I asked him, "Who is gaffing today?" To which he replied "You, Michelle, you are!" Surprised and a little shocked, I asked how I could do that. I could see myself setting up mic stands or plugging in monitors, but I hadn't imagined a way to make straight, organized lines of cable without eyesight.
"Feel the ground," he said. Words can hurt or heal, strengthen or create doubt, edify or destroy. Words are an immensely powerful medium. These three words taught me an unforgettable lesson. They taught me that I can overcome my own mental limits and tear them down, that I mustn’t judge my efficacy to pursue something if I haven't tried to do it and that I must give myself ample practice with the discipline beforehand. I must function with the belief that there's an immense wealth of approaches and ways to do things that I do not yet comprehend.
That wasn't the only time that someone opened my eyes to new possibilities and methods to achieve results. Jon Kull, prolific composer and orchestrator for films such as Black Panther, Avatar, and Harry Potter, and The Fantastic Beasts had the task of teaching me music for audiovisual media. Personally, I was certain that film scoring was reserved for people whose eyes could follow and observe the action playing out on-screen. I was in for a delightful surprise. For the entire semester, my professor carefully crafted time notes that described each scene and facial expression, landscapes and animation effects, and the slightest changes, not to the second, but to the frame. Armed with this level of equality, I composed for different genres of film and reached the summit of learning with the same amount of constructive feedback given to my classmates.
Toward the end of the semester, we had to turn in a final project: We'd choose a film clip to write music to, and Jon enlisted the help of renowned music editor Joe E. Rand, whose credits span from Titanic to Westside Story, and whose clients include John Williams (Star Wars) and Randy Newman (Toy Story). He delivered the time notes of a scene from How To Train Your Dragon for me to score. For countless decades, time notes were the norm, until they somehow fell out of fashion. The clip I picked was completely silent. I can't tell you what a liberating experience it was to be able to write for a medium without any sound to guide me. It gave rise to new forms of expression that could only use my mind as their compass. Logic Pro, with its intuitive nature and accessibility built into every corner, was also my ally. I've found treasures in the people life has blessed me with. Thanks to their trust, I wrote compositions whose quality my teachers praised and that I feel remarkably proud of myself for persisting and proud of them for believing in me.
The blind help the blind, too. During my last year of university, Cory Wilkins, an audio engineer, drummer, and composer gave me a chance to acquire skills in his studio. He let me use his collection of microphones, guitar amps, and the best of all, an Alesis HD24 machine that operates almost exactly like an analogue tape recorder from back in the day. He never treated me like a coffee-making intern who is cautioned to stay away from equipment and keep to herself. On the contrary, he gave me the freedom to shadow his sessions, make mistakes, and become an assistant for some of his projects, where he could finally focus on being a musician and forget about the technical side, since I was running it. He patiently explained how to position the mics and how we can tell by ear if they will record with our desired acoustic flavor. He told me how helpful it is to get to the venue early and explore it with your white cane if you are doing live sound so that you may familiarize yourself with the facility before showtime. It makes an extraordinary difference if you feel comfortable with your surroundings because you can participate in load-in and load-out using both hands like any member of a team would. He had answers for each of my doubts.
God has given me the privilege to live a life filled with opportunities that I've diligently managed to take. While I lived in Denver to receive training at the Colorado Center for the Blind, I shadowed audio engineers nine times. I got to experience Broadway’s Aladdin and DCPA’s The Color Purple from behind the board. Theaters, a tango festival, and a recording studio were fertile ground for exploration. A young A1 in particular, Meagan Holdeman, stands out in my list of adventures. Not only did she enthusiastically open her doors and show me the DiGiCo SD9 she was using, she also looked for more places in the city where they'd welcome my whole self, to ask questions and learn as an equal. The invaluable mentorship of the people who have stood beside me demonstrates that each of us, through our lived experience, can look out for each other, and by marching together, we have the ability to make this world a better place.
It is easy to get discouraged on the path when I receive yet another email from a console manufacturer saying that screen reader accessibility is not in their future development plans, when a software update breaks the scripts that made it possible to navigate a DAW; or when in a theater an A1 asks me, incredulously, "How will you be able to mix if you can't see?" But there are gleams of hope on the horizon. For the longest time, access to the production of immersive audio through Dolby Atmos had been denied to blind engineers, but we're no longer left behind. Through Logic Pro's renderer, we can now draw mixes through all dimensions of the sphere. Slowly but steadily, now that we are making progress through our advocacy, we must not quiet down our voices. We must not give up. Our fighting for justice and freedom must continue.
After two weeks of boundless dedication to learning and a little bit of mental insanity, the Pro Tools exam was now in front of me. "Congratulations, you passed!" Leslie said. Her grin was audible. My relief came out in screams. I could stop holding my breath. I'd just become the first blind woman to be Pro Tools certified, and I still wish for hundreds more to follow, because we have the capability to achieve this and much more.
My orchestral literature professor taught us about the continuous struggle and eventual triumph present in the theme of Beethoven's third symphony, The Eroica, and in many of his compositions. The free-spirited triad dives forward but then lingers on the accidental of uncertainty several times, before rising in victory. But what moved him to highlight the grueling effort of the journey, the frustration, the fear, the pain—before allowing us to reach our destination?
I believe there is beauty to be found in our battles. Whether you choose to be a lawyer, an architect, a professor, a scientist, a baseball player, or a sculptor, there are inevitably going to be challenges in your way. There will be times when you feel like quitting, moments when your determination is struggling for breath. But challenge is where our faith and spirit grow strong and it is in struggle where we find the richest, most exquisite rewards. If life is in one way or another going to throw at us degrees of difficulty to conquer, we may as well choose an activity that provides us great amounts of joy in its pursuit, a purpose that transcends our sense of time, and goes beyond the ordinary. Choose, with patience and wisdom, what you would like to struggle at. I will take the liberty to end with a passage from Coldplay's song Us Against the World: "So whatever you do... Don't let go!"