1. How are you and what are you up to?
I'm doing very well, thanks for asking. I've been running an audio post production company called Rhythm Division with my partner Jim Longo for the past twelve years. We divide our talents between audio post and music composition for television and film.

2. How did you start playing music? How old were you? What instrument did you play?
Funny question or rather a funny answer. My first instrument was the sitar. Obviously a Beatle era aberration. My parents got sick of listening to it so they bought me a guitar. I was seventeen years old at the time.

3. Were you an artistic kid? Could you sketch?
Yes I was but I came by it easy as both of my parents are artists. What's interesting is that the appreciation of art both line and form gave my a good foundation years later for music composition. That and an appreciation of all forms of dance as my father was a dancer as well. You should interview him as he's much more interesting than I am.

4. So did you play in bands when you were in high school?
No I didn't start playing until I left school. I was much more interested in theatre.

5. How heavily did you get involved in Theatre? Did you ever play any notable roles?
When I was 10 years old I got a part in a summer theatre production of "The Most Happy Fella" which was a popular Broadway musical at the time. It was definitely here that I got the theatre bug. To this day I feel most at home in the darkness of a theatre and it's a dream to be involved in anything in the theatre. Funny that I haven't pursued that love other than playing in a band which isn't quite the same or rather the dressing rooms aren't as nice.

6. Who are some of your musical heroes? Who really blew you away as a musician coming up?
I loved Jimi Hendrix and Sly and the Family Stone. I was always into funk, gospel and R+B as well. As a guitar player I was in awe of Lenny Breau and to this day when I listen to his playing I'm still in awe. For film composition it was John Barry that most influenced me as the first album I ever bought, when I was 15 years old, was the sound track to "The Ipcress File". Today I love Thomas Newman as he's the most interesting of the current crop of film composers in my opinion. After that it's got to be, in no particular order, Cole Porter, Stephen Sondheim, Harry Warren, Ennio Morricone, Duke Ellington, Miles Davis and Randy Newman. Need I go on.

7. When and where did you meet Carole Pope?
I met Carole in 1968 when she was auditioning for a band I and a couple of other hippy freaks were trying to form. Nothing happened with the band but Carole and I became attached at the hip. She was writing her own tunes and I fell in love with her and what she had to say. We started writing together immediately and spent the next six years enjoying our talents rather privately.

8. How and when did Rough Trade get started?
I believe it was 1973 that Carole and I started to realize that we had to perform in public so we started playing at a theatre space called Global Village along with a slew of other interested artists. It was run by Marcus O'Hara who also happens to be Catherine O'Hara's brother. Some of the other performers included Danny Ackroyd, Valri Bromfield, Gilda Radner and a very interesting transvestite performer named Pascal. We performed as a duo then added a percussionist and then a bass and pretty soon we were a band in search of bars to play in.

9. Did you guys get to play all over the world? What were some of your favourite locations to play?
We didn't travel all that much but we did play at the Roskild festival in Denmark as well as some concert venues in Holland. Carole did some track dates in Japan and Australia. Other that that it was all Canada and a few major cities in the US.

10. Did you enjoy the road and performing live?
I loved performing but I didn't care for the road all that much. There's a lot of fun to be had but also a tremendous amount of tedium involved in traveling and waiting to perform. Some people thrive on the lifestyle. I much preferred writing in the comfort of my own studio.

11. When did you start your studio Rhythm Division?
In 1995, after spending nine years working for other people writing music for TV and film, I felt it was time to find a partner and start up my own business.

12. How did you end up using Cubase?
My first sequencer was on an Atari and it was made by a company called Hybrid Arts. Once I graduated to a mac computer I had to find something to work with. Most people were using Performer but I never really like it all that much. When I saw some of the first German made sequencers I thought they looked interesting. I always loved the simplicity of Cubase and as I remember it was you (Ray Williams) that recommended it to me.

13. How long have you been a beta tester?
I think it's coming up to fifteen years.

14. Do you also use any of the Steinberg Virtual instruments? Which ones?
I've tried all of them and currently my faves are Halion, Hypersonic and Groove Agent. With those three I can write pretty much anything.

15. What do you think of Cubase 4? Have you spent any time playing with it?
Sadly I haven't spent much time with it as I'm still using Nuendo. The main reason being that Nuendo supports the new HD format frame rate which Cubase 4 doesn't for some unknown reason. Given that it is the new TV standard for North America I think it's an oversite on Steinberg's part.

16. Is Nuendo your tool?
Yes and I can't wait until version 4 is released as it has all the new features that Cubase 4 has. Many of those are going to be quite nice to work with.

17. Tell me about how you approach scoring for film and TV? Where do you start?
Wow.. that's going to take four more pages but in a nutshell I just improvise. It's much like the piano player in the silent film era. I watch picture a few times then I just start playing. I use retrospect record about 99% of the time to capture sketches and then I spend the rest of the time weeding out the good from the dull. The main thing is to not think about it but simply respond to what you're seeing.

18. Do you do everything in Nuendo?
Yes I work completely within Nuendo unless there's a call for live recording. We don't have recording facilities at Rhythm Division so we go outside to record live players. Unless it's just me wanking on the guitar in which case I record directly to Nuendo.

19. How do you integrate ProTools into your workflow?
We use Protools for all the final mixes if we're doing the post audio as well as the music. I provide Jim with the stems for the cues and he mixes it and chops up it up if need be. I use Protools as my video deck. Very old fashioned but I much prefer working that way than having picture in Nuendo. Essentially I have the whole picture and sync tracks in Protools and Nuendo slaves to it. When I'm done with a cue I'll bounce it and lay it into the Protools session. When the project is finished I give Jim that session.

On the other hand if I'm simply doing some sound effects work I may work with picture in Nuendo but more likely I'd do it in Protools as it's easier to move the sessions around between our workstations. I would never use Protools for any scoring as that would be far to limiting.

20. How can Steinberg improve your workflow?
By writing all the cues and letting me stay home would be good. Truth is Steinberg has done so much to improve my workflow and being a tester has helped as I've been able to have direct contact with the developers. In fact retrospect record is one of my ideas which took five years of nagging to get them to add it to the program. I'm a midi guy and anything that helps when editing midi is what I'm most interested in. I spend most of my time in the Key Editor and that's where Steinberg can help me. Most of my desires have been answered in Cubase 4 so I'm looking forward to Nuendo 4.

21. What are some of the latest projects you have worked on?
We just completed 24 episodes of a fantastic animated series called Skyland which was a blast to work on. I've recently done a few docs. One on Mary Magdelene which was very interesting and one on a family of stunt drivers called Hell Drivers. So you can see the work is never dull.

22. What’s on your wish list for Nuendo 4?
All you ever really want is stability. Nuendo has been very good in that regard or at least it has for me. As I said most of my wishes have been answered in Cubase 4 so there isn't anything major that I can think of. I'm much more interested in what's going to happen with Halion. As it's my main instrument I really want to see it expand and grow. I love the way it works.

23. What do you think of IMSTA and the whole anti-piracy effort by the music software companies?
Piracy is an unfortunate sign of the times in that people seem to have no regard for intellectual property at all. Even the most intelligent of people are still downloading software and music with little regard for the consequences of their actions. The software companies have every right to protect their property but sadly this affects the honest user in ways that are not very good. The copy protection used by Steinberg is one of the worst in my opinion as it directly affects the performance of the software which affects the end user. Personally I don't like copy protection and would gladly pay extra to have it removed but I'm quite aware that this isn't a reasonable solution.

I mentioned earlier that I used a program on my Atari made by Hybrid Arts. That program was called SMPTETrack and with the software you got an interface box that provided SMPTE sync and extra midi input/outputs. Without this hardware the program wouldn't run. I always thought that this was good copy protection as it doubled as a usable bit of hardware. The old versions of Protools were much the same in that they wouldn't run unless you had their hardware connected. Those little Steinberg dongles do nothing other than provide you with a small amount of illumination that wouldn't even be useful as a night light. Of all the dongle systems currently being used, I think iLok is the best as it allows you to handle your assets on line and should you loose or damage your dongle iLok allows you to be up and running in minutes with temporary licenses. With Syncrosoft you're out of luck unless you're willing to buy the software again. This isn't a good form of protection.

In any event, there are many other viable solutions to protecting intellectual property but the real solution is for people to realize how this affects all of us. Those are high hopes but one must be optimistic and understand that humanity has proven throughout history that things get better with time. Until such enlightenment we must simply endure the inconvenience of what clever schemes the software companies choose to hobble us with.

24. I hear you might be giving a film scoring course at the Steinberg Training Center. Can you tell me a bit more about that?
This is a very distinct possibility. You (Ray Williams) have been bugging me or should I say encouraging me to teach a course and as soon as I figure out what to teach I'll let you know. It's not as easy as it sounds only due to my own thoughts on what's important to teach. I'm much more interested in the process of creating rather than the technology. The thing is most students are likely more interested in the latter. I simply take those for granted having done it for so long.