We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Em Baker a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Em, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Let’s jump right into the heart of things. Outsiders often think businesses or industries have much larger profit margins than they actually do – the reason is that outsiders are often unaware of the biggest challenges to profitability in various industries – what’s the biggest challenge to profitability in your industry?

Right now, I believe that AI poses the biggest challenge to audio professionals, but especially to composers. It’s an awesome new tool that is really exciting to use, I’ve used it myself and I can share firsthand what a slippery slope it is. I’m reminded of when autotune became a huge thing back in the late 90’s, and how many music producers and industry professionals balked at it, and now as we’ve all seen it has become the norm. I see a big shift coming in the music industry, with AI being put at the helm of a massive amount of music production, mixing, mastering, and everything in between. I think the goal is to realize that AI generated music is here, and hopefully audio professionals will be able to use it as a tool, rather than a crutch. As someone who misses practical effects in combination with CGI in films, I believe there will always be a desire for art that feels a bit visceral and imperfect. I hope that all of us creatives, no matter what medium, continue to forge ahead with our craft realizing that perfection is an entirely unattainable goal. Embrace the imperfect.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I’m a composer and audio designer for films and games, and currently I’m the music producer for five different projects. In my childhood and teens I took piano and guitar lessons and learned to play the bass guitar, but it wasn’t until 2005 that I got really hooked on songwriting and composing my own songs. I loved being in bands, but I found it incredibly freeing to be able to write songs from start to finish. I’ve always had a deep love for films and video games, and ever since I was very young I’ve always tuned into soundtracks and the audio connected to moving pictures. The first film I ever remember seeing was Return of the Jedi, and the main thing I remember was how blown away I was by the music score. I’m the co-owner of Alpha Wave Audio Labs, and we provide everything audio related from mixing and mastering to production, sound design, voice over casting and original music composition. I love problem solving! If a client needs post-production work on dialogue that was recorded for a film for example that contains a lot of room noise, I love going in and engineering the audio to remove those types of problematic issues, pops and plosives and audio artifacts. I also love a challenge, and it’s always exciting when a client reaches out to me for original music composition in a genre I’ve not worked with before. Recently I had the opportunity to work on a viking themed game, and it was a joy to deep dive into that world of sound. I believe that communication is key when it comes to working with clients to bring their vision to fruition, and I am always inspired by the concepts that my clients have for their projects. It’s important to me to meet their audio goals. I think I’m most proud of winning Best Original Song at the Venice Film Festival in 2020 for a song that I co-wrote and produced, that was an amazing win. Every day is a new learning experience. I feel like audio, just like much of the tech industry, is an ever-evolving field, with new technology coming out every day to make audio engineering and music production better and more powerful. It’s an exciting field to work in, and I’m grateful every day for the opportunity to work on audio in any form, it’s exhilarating. When I’m not working on audio for my clients, I love working on my own creative music projects and collaborating with amazing musicians from all around the world.

Have you ever had to pivot?

When I was a kid, I was an avid reader and I had always envisioned myself finding a career as a writer in some capacity. I’ve loved films and video games ever since I was a kid, and I always had a magnetic attraction towards storytelling, I dreamed about being a narrative designer for games or a screenwriter for films. I worked in the AAA video game industry for five years, and I actually managed to hit this goal at Sony Online Entertainment working as a Junior Game Designer – I even got to write dialogue for Mark Hamill’s Joker character, a character I’ve loved since I was a teenager! But while all of this was happening, I was finding myself more and more drawn to audio and music, and spending little to no time writing for the creative joy of it. That’s when I realized that it was time to pivot and pursue audio design and music composition. And I have to say, not one day has passed after working on so many different audio and music projects over the years that I haven’t loved every moment of. I really do believe that it’s important to trust your gut!

We’d love to hear about how you met your business partner.

I met my business partner in 2003, working at Sam Ash Music. He was running the pro audio department, and I worked in the guitar department. We became really good friends and started a band together, and that was pretty much the end of that – we’ve been together ever since. When covid hit in 2020, we started our own LLC audio business together, and it has been an amazing ride – we’ve had the opportunity to work with so many wonderful clients on so many different projects. It’s truly an awesome gift to get to call your life partner your work partner as well!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.alphawaveaudiolabs.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mothermolotov247/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/em-baker-822743118/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@embakeraudio
• Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/sinenomineproject