Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Adam Mobarek. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Adam, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What was the most important lesson/experience you had in a job that has helped you in your professional career?

This is a fantastic question because there’s an image I have seared into my mind of when I learned one of the biggest lessons of my adult life – no one truly knows what they’re doing out here and you have to take action toward at least attempting to achieve the life you want. Many people might help you, but it’s on you to make it happen.

About 10 years ago, I started this job as an office manager to help a non-profit get its office in shape. Both the condition of the building and the groups that rented out its rooms were without supervision, regulation, or assistance of any kind.

The image in my mind is one of the person that hired me. It was day 1 of the job, I was given a tour of the building and was seated in my swanky new office. A luxury for someone who just finished college and got his first salaried job after delivering sandwiches for years. I inquired with my new boss – “what do I need to get done first?” He looked at me for a moment before picking up a pencil and slowly tapped it against the desk. He responded “I have no idea”

His response shook me as a young adult – I thought at least someone out there had the answers about what to do at all times. I had learned that clearly wasn’t the case as most of us eventually do. This helped me as a business owner in really what are some of the first ingredients of owning a business – identifying what is needed, creating a plan, and charging ahead. From that point forward, I took immense responsibility over almost everything I do and perpetrated those things with intention.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Getting into the music industry – it can look absolutely impossible when you’re first starting. For me, it started as a hobby. Turned into a passion, then a side hustle, now a full-time profession. Making each one of those jumps took years individually. The entire journey so far has been driven by a search for connection and community with people who share a love with music. Music and its industry almost requires you to connect with other people – and through the art, in a way that cannot be done through just words. It’s become a cornerstone of my life and a part of my identity.

I started my journey with music at around age 20, buying a Yamaha acoustic guitar and learning some strange hodge-podge of video game and Jimi Hendrix songs in addition to some easy jazz standards on it during my free time. That hobby turned into a curiosity for collaborating with other musicians and learning as much as I can from them. I started a band with some friends in one of their parents’ attics. Fast forward some years and we put out a full-length record, played a bunch of shows – leading me to join other bands and play even more shows. Once you start down the road and networking, there’s an inevitable snowball effect.

My relationship with music has evolved in many ways over the years but I can now say I have very comfortably landed as a producer and engineer. I solicit my services from my home studio, helping elevate the sound and heart of every artist that walks through my front door. There is a beauty and joy to performing in front of an audience with some of your closest friends, but there is a fulfillment from working in the studio with artists that is unmatched from anything else I’ve chased in my life.

My role in my work is to provide a space that is comfortable, patient, and accepting to artists so they can create and achieve their best possible work. I also am a full production studio – meaning I eliminate the need for artists having to go to multiple locations to get produced, recorded, and mixed. I am a one-stop shop and offer a high level of professionalism and quality in my work.

What even further sets me apart is that I offer a perspective on music that artists have called refreshing. I approach the craft with a complete divorce of ego – a dedicated service mindset toward achieving the ultimate authenticity and integrity of a song. The song is very much a separate entity from myself where my mission is to make sure its message is as clearly communicated as it possibly can be. I look at the craft with as much subjectivity as I can muster, recognizing that the entire artform is simply expression. As long as the expression is achieved to its maximum and most clear level – there’s little else that matters nearly as much.

What’s worked well for you in terms of a source for new clients?

The absolute best source of new clients for me is simply networking at large. My two best approaches are either engaging with my social media audience and going to shows, especially of the artists I produce. Just the other night, an artist I produce for shouted me out during their performance and I made at least a dozen new connects for possible new work because of it. Keep working and keep meeting people!

Can you talk to us about how your funded your business?

Being a music engineer, really just being interested in making music in general, comes with a heavy financial price. It sucks you in, demanding more and more money in exchange for slightly fancier sounding and looking equipment. If you’re tight on funds to begin with, this is not a profession that I would quickly recommend to you unless you have an intense passion for it!

This being a side hustle for years, I used the capital from my 9-5 to fund my night-time job of being a producer and engineer. Over the course of about 5 years, I acquired more and more gear. Each piece adding to a well-rounded arsenal of different sounding microphones, preamps, instruments, and other fancy pieces of gear. I still have a very high-up ceiling I have yet to begin to reach but frankly, getting exceptionally nice gear is not as important as you might think. It always helps, but I have not structured my business and brand around enticing artists to come in to my studio because of high-dollar gear. It’s my ear, personality, attention to detail, vision and passion that people hire me for – how the results are achieved are not as important as simply getting to the results to begin with.

Contact Info:

• Website: adammobarek.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mo.adammobarek/

Image Credits
Mizghund Productions – https://www.mizghund.com/ Cameron Bumgarner Photography – https://www.flickr.com/photos/cameronbumgarnerphoto/