Wellspring Sound Recording Studio

04/11/2022

04/11/2022

07/19/2019

Two old Martin guitars having s*x on the piano at Wellspring. The one on the left is an amazing 1937 Herringbone D-28, brought in for a session by Zack Smith. The one on the right is a 1933 OM-18 recently acquired by the studio. Soon we'll have little ukuleles running around the place...

03/20/2018

I first recorded Seamus Egan in 1987 in my third floor Newton apartment studio for a Robbie O'Connell record. Although he was only 18 at the time, he'd already won All-Ireland awards on four instruments! He's gone on to all sorts of musical adventures ( look him up on wiki), and his latest one is the Seamus Egan Project , who dropped in to Wellspring yesterday to record a couple of songs. It was great to see old friend Moira Smiley, who sings and plays banjo and accordion in the band, along with Evan Marshall on bouzouki and harmonium and Kyle Sanna on guitar. This band has amazing chemistry and virtuosity and it was a real honor to watch them develop the tunes in the studio. I almost felt like I shouldn't charge them!

01/17/2018

The little engine that could! This sweet 1959 Fender Champ just moved into the Wellspring stable. Such a simple circuit- 3 tubes, all made in the USA, just a volume pot, nothing else....It came with a semi-blown speaker, which I thought would be no big deal to replace.... wrong! Three different speakers all were either too deep or too wide or both, Finally fed up, I found an 8"Eminence with a cannabis cone ( really!) and spent about 3 hours with a dremel tool, belt sander and bench grinder , and the speaker now fits without hitting the power tubes or the transformers. For lovers of Stones- style guitar sounds, this little cutie is the bee's knees. It's also amazing on slide guitar. Thanks to Eric Wells for selling it to me...

12/16/2017

I'd say six microphones on a piano are enough, wouldn't you ? The newest pair are a couple of Danish-made DPA 4006's which add a little sparkle that I really like-

06/13/2017

We love the new remixed-for-stereo version of Sgt Pepper, and we've decided to host a listening party on some really nice speakers at the studio in about 2 weeks. We're still working out the date, so please message us if you're interested and we'll let you know! You can also leave a message on the studio's phone at 978-263-9246. Light refreshments will be served....

05/04/2017

Phantom -powered ribbon microphones have been around a little over 10 years, and we've got a few of them, but until recently, we've never had a stereo ribbon mic. This new Royer SF24 sounds amazing on pianos , violins, anything with strings, and we can't wait to try it on horns! The other cool thing about phantom-powered ribbons is that they have as much output as a normal condenser microphone, so there's there's no more having to crank the preamp on quiet instruments to get enough level from them

04/30/2017

The amazing pianist Santon, with his teacher Andrew Goodridge, playing a live version of Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" for two pianos at Wellspring last week. Santon played the piano parts, and Andrew played a piano arrangement of the band parts. Santon memorized the whole thing- 20 minutes of incredibly complex material- whew!

02/15/2017

Matthew Stevens, who played guitar on the same sessions with Teri Lyne Carrington and Esperanza Spaulding last week at Wellspring, blew us away with his tasteful, soulful playing. He ended up using a number of Wellspring guitars on the session, including the National Tricone resonator, our 70's Les Paul, the '68 Tele and the Collings baby,. After trying out a number of our amps, he ended up using our '63 Vox AC30 for most of his electric tracks. Sometimes you just can't beat the old standbys; we've had that amp for over 20 years and it continues to make us smile.

02/15/2017

Matthew Stevens, who played guitar on the Teri Lyne Carrington sessions last week at Wellspring ( that also featured Esperanza Spaulding on bass), blew us away with his tasteful, soulful work on various guitars. In addition to his own instruments, he also ended up using Wellspring's National Tricone resonator guitar, the '68 Tele, the '78 Les Paul, and the Collings Baby guitars. After trying a number of amps, he settled on one we've had for over 20 years, a 1963 Vox Ac30 for most of his electric work. Sometimes there's nothing like an old standby.

02/10/2017

A good time at the studio today, despite the snow. Grammy winners Terri Lyne Carrington and Esperanza Spaulding were in studio A with Matt Hayes laying down tracks for terri's next CD. We are amazed and humbled! Thanks to Esperanza and the other NYC musicians who left the City on at 3 AM Boston train this morning to beat the storm. I managed to get in the act, driving 30 miles through the blizzard to pick up a loaner double bass from Volker Nahrmann at the Nahrmann bass shop in Billerica. Volmer's shop has over 75 double basses- I was in hog heaven, and I don't even play double bass!

04/23/2016

We are shocked and greatly saddened by the death of Timm Keleher, who engineered countless sessions at Wellspring over the last 15 years. Timm was the only engineer J. Geils ever worked with at Wellspring, and he worked with Jay on over a dozen albums by Jay, Gerry Beaudoin, and many others. He had a great ear, a positive, charismatic presence, and abiding sense of when a track was done. We are going to miss you Timm, and our heartfelt condolences go out to your family and friends.

04/04/2016

Our new Retro 176 tube compressor. It's like riding in an old Cadillac....

01/26/2016

Something about old amps.....is it the smell? The smooth vibrato? The pleasing second order harmonic mojo of overdriven vacuum tubes? All of the above? Yes! These two beauties have found their way into Wellspring's amp collection recently- the one on the left is a 1955 or 56 Gibson GA20 ( one of Ry Cooder's favorites), and the other is a 1961 Fender Vibrolux, with added tube reverb by Rob Hamilton, who bought it form the original owner in 1969. Thanks Rob!

01/19/2016

Singer-songwriter Cosy Sheridan tracking guitar and vocals live in Wellspring's A room last week. The steam rising from the cup of tea just beyond her makes her guitar look like it was about to catch fire. If you heard what she was playing, you just might wonder!

12/10/2015

Cliff Chase and Matt Piccone of Fractal Audio with Eric in Studio A in front of some of the 20 odd guitar amps we spent two days getting impulse response samples for. Fractal makes the widely-acclaimed Axxe FxII unit which reproduces the tones of hundreds of guitar amplifiers with incredible accuracy. When groups like U2 and the Rolling Stones are using your gear, you've gotta be doing something right! We spent about 16 hours putting up to 6 microphones in front each speaker of the various guitar amps at Wellspring, and then changing the microphone's position to bring out certain tone qualities. Then, a tone sweep lasting about 2/3 of a second, running from very low frequency to very high, was run through each speaker. This data is then coupled with information about the circuit of each amplifier. Then, in a process I don't completely understand , the combined data is stored as an algorithm in the AxxeFX, and you can plug your guitar into the front of the box, and the box outputs a scary-good reproduction of the amp! The unit has reproductions for all the classic and modern amplifiers,all available at the twist of a k**b. Amazing stuff, and I learned a ton about the subtleties of mic placement from these guys!

09/19/2015

Boston Bluesman Peter Ward in Studio A trying out our "new" 50 year old Sears Silvertone Guitar/Amp combination . For three years in the mid 60's , Sears had Danelectro build them guitars that came with an amplifier ( basically a Fender Vibro-Champ) mounted in the guitar case. Who'd a thunk it?! The amp actually sounds pretty good , especially since Rob Hamilton, our awesome amp guru, replaced the trashed 8" speaker with a new Jensen.

05/26/2015

Fingers were flying last week at Wellspring when some of the finest pickers in the Boston bluegrass scene joined Hot Day At The Zoo's singer/songwriter /guitarist John Cummings for a scorching workout on the strings. Kathleen Parks on fiddle, Dan Bui on mandolin, John Cummings on guitar, Chris Sartori on bass, the always photogenic Ricky Mier on banjo, and Rob Flax on fiddle. A very inspired time for engineer Eric Kilburn, who will be taking the tracks home at half speed to learn how to play them!

04/09/2015

Lately I've been impressed and often annoyed at the wide variety of bass response in the speakers and headphones of the world. Sometimes we'll do a mix of a song, and go out and play it in someone's car where it might sound good, or maybe too bass-heavy. Then we'll play the same mix in another car and it will sound just fine. The same thing happens with headphones versus earbuds.... What's an engineer to do? Well, today, after much angst and trepidation, I bought a pair of ATC SCM25 speakers, which have been raved about by the best in the audio industry for how well they "translate" over various formats. I feel a little like i just got a new pair of glasses for my ears. Here's one, sitting above the little bronze Buddha in the B room.

11/04/2014

Wellspring did sound tonight for actor/director/ all-around cool guy George Takei ( Sulu on Star Trek) at the Somerville Theater. He took questions and talked about his life following the premiere of "To Be Takei", a new film about his life. His family was one of the 100,000 Japanese-Americans who were incarcerated during WW2; in spite of this, his outlook on life was and is very optimistic and inspiring. Go see the film !

10/23/2014

On October 22, Wellspring hosted the legendary doo-wop group The Platters for combination recording session, concert, and video shoot. Over 40 people in the crowd, 7 singers and musicians, 4 cameras, lots microphones everywhere. Grammy- winning engineer Paul Kolderie was on the console. Everything went great, and we slept really well that night!

10/14/2014

Peter Ward, who once played guitar in blues legend Pinetop Perkins' band, came in last week to start a new CD. I snapped this shot of Peter's amazing 1959 Stratocaster alongside Wellspring's 1966 Gibson ES330. I call it "single coil heaven". Peter ended up using the Gibson through an old Fender Deluxe Reverb on most of the tracks; it just had a certain thing we liked ...

09/17/2014

Class of '49 - it dawned on me recently that Wellspring has 4 guitars that were all made in 1949. These hard working members of our staff have been used on dozens of albums, and even though they're turning 65 this year, retirement is out of the question.
From L-R, there's a Martin 0-18T tenor guitar, a Gibson J45, a Martin D18, and a Gibson LG2.

01/21/2014

Some candid shots from last Wednesday night, when Christo Tsiaras shot 5 of the most sharp-dressed men around...

01/13/2014

Dueling Mando's! Two players from separate sessions (Dan Bui from Hot Day at the Zoo, and Neil Pearlman from Soulsha) crossed paths in the halls of Wellspring and decided to have an impromptu jam.

01/05/2014

This weekend we've been hosting Vermont's own Dissipated 8, a talented a capella group from Middlebury College. Here's a quick shot from between takes!

12/16/2013

Some photos of The Riverhawk Party Band's second tracking session on 12/1 courtesy of Megalomandee!

Seth Bailin invited me to tag along at The Party Band's studio session this past Thanksgiving weekend. Nothing is louder than a room full of rowdy brass.

11/27/2013

Here's Fishkin and Groves doing something we've never done before- tracking both guitars and vocals with just one microphone! After a little bit of fussing with getting the mic positioned right, it came out great!

11/26/2013

11/26/2013

One of our favorite instrumentalists of all time, Kevin Barry, was in recently. Here he is, playing entr'actes for David Gleason, Kevin Burgess and Meredith Silagy.

11/18/2013

Between takes with Alchemilla, a five-piece tracking in the A room today.

11/06/2013

Thanks to Bindy for sharing the pictures!

10/22/2013

Congratulations to Lexi Weege, who released her debut album "Virgin" last week, recorded and mixed here at Wellspring!