We were lucky to catch up with Austin Chapline recently and have shared our conversation below.

Austin, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

The biggest factor to learning anything fast is to always be the dumbest person in the room. When it came to learning music production and engineering, I moved to Nashville and surrounded myself with people far ahead of me. This allowed me to observe them and pick up on things that could have taken them years to learn, but now was only taking me months. On top of that I invested in a few good tutorials that sped up my learning curve tremendously. I would not have done anything different to speed up my process. I started making music late in life and was able to support myself doing it in only a few years, which I see as a fast process. The most important skill for music was developing my ear- whether that was learning the notes in a scale, learning how to mix records, or pick out a sample to flip. Music is all about taste, and if you can develop your ear and trust it you can work on just about anything! Obstacles are really just the natural traps of creativity: outside distractions, steering into different business ideas, comparing yourself to other creatives.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

In Fall 2015, I was a sophomore in Philly studying business. I worked at an insurance company and knew I didn’t see this lifestyle fitting what I wanted to do. So I decided to download FL studio and make beats for fun in my free time. Before long, I could tell I really wanted to do something with music, and found out about audio engineering. I decided to take a few lessons at a studio in Philly on audio engineering, and knew I wanted to purse it. So I came home and told my parents my plans, and decided to transfer to Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee into their audio program. I graduated 2 years later with a Degree in Audio Engineering and a Minor in Business. I did some small podcast work on the side and worked on my music business and continued to build it up on the side. I had my first record go viral in 2019/2020, called “Not Real” by Rich P. I have continued to produce and engineer for artists all over the country and have worked on hundreds of songs. I really have developed an ear because of my knowledge of production and engineering that allows me to be a finisher of songs, an executive producer like 40 and Mike Dean. Artists can send me a record at any point in the process and I can hear what needs to be added, whether it needs some musicians to add some parts to it, me to play a few parts or replace a few sounds, or just re record/mix the song down. My services range from producing a song front to finish, recording, mixing and mastering, beat leasing, songwriting, music producer consultation calls, and custom production. I am still based in Nashville, TN, Music City!!

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

The most rewarding part of being a creative, specifically from the producer/engineers perspective, is you get to paint the canvas for the artist to tell their story. If I pick out a certain sample or craft a certain beat with a dark emotion, that might bring out an intense story for the artist to tell. When I am engineering, through effects and shaping of the vocals/instrumentation I can help bring out whatever emotion that artist once the listener to feel. After that, the best feeling is seeing those songs performed live and people reacting/vibing to that piece of art you were apart of. Always gives me a rush!

Have you ever had to pivot?

Currently I am making my first pivot since I started making music- I have worked in banking while still running my music business outside of work. Its been a challenge because I love making music, but needed to pivot in order to meet certain goals for myself, as well as broaden some of my knowledge of finance! It has made making music a lot of fun again because now I don’t have to rely on it solely for all of my income. I am currently figuring out how to pivot back into full time production but do so when my business is alittle bit bigger than it is currently! I would encourage any creative to pivot if they feel burnt out or are dealing with financial stress, it will keep the creative aspect of your life productive and fulfilling.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.austinchaplineproductions.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/austinchaplineproductions
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/austinchapline/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@austinchaplinetv7777/videos

Image Credits
Hunter Rayl