Brian Eno described the recording studio as an instrument unto itself. Tom Waits described recording as a form of time travel. Aretha Franklin said it’s something she’d never grow tired of. However you describe the process, to hear a musician’s studio recordings is to hear the entirety of his or her sonic palette in an ephemeral, frozen snapshot — aesthetic choices, style choices, instrumentation choices. We paid visits to some of the people who guide those choices for Arkansas musicians — Capitol View Studio and Ferocious Productions in Little Rock, Blue Chair Recording Studio in Lonoke County, Haxton Road Studios in Bentonville and East Hall Recording in Fayetteville. Our list is by no means exhaustive, but it is a glimpse into the community of local experts devoted to marrying beauty with meticulous technology, and into a handful of the foam-padded, electrified rooms from whence they churn out the sound of The Natural State.

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