Los Angeles, CA (August 2, 2021)—Emmy-nominated composer/playwright, novelist, musician and TV producer Scooter Pietsch (“peach”) has completed a new 350-square-foot studio at his home in collaboration with WSDG.
Pietsch hosted an on-site visit by WSDG partners/project managers Matthew Ballos and Andy Swerdlow and sound designer/engineer Kevin Petersen in early 2019. Ballos and Swerdlow then collaborated remotely from the firm’s Highland, NY office on the studio’s acoustic plan. They specified the installation of six custom ‘split joist’ suspended ceiling clouds and six additional clouds flush-mounted to the sloping ceiling walls.
“This studio is unique from a number of perspectives,” Ballos remarks. “Situated in the hills above LA’s Studio City, it’s graced by large picture windows providing amazing pool and neighboring hillside views and brilliant natural light.”
Pietsch and his three-man construction team went to work on the studio build-out, framing, sheet-rocking the control room/composing room and fully isolating the compact vocal booth. “I wanted to create something very different from my previous studio,” Pietsch says. “Not just in size, but in look and feel. I went with a clean modern all-white look.
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“We also deployed a camera in the main room so singers can maintain eye contact with us on a monitor and vice versa. Music and lyrics are displayed via iPad. In contrast to my previous facility, this new studio is attached to the house, a whole other thing to get used to. But, thanks to WSDG’s meticulous soundproofing and construction design, my near 100 dB [SPL] doesn’t bother anyone,” Pietsch says.
The size of Pietsch’s new ScooterMusic Studio dictated minimal space for outboard gear. He installed ATC SMC25A monitors with Adam Sub10 MkII subwoofers and two Brent Averill vintage Neve 1073 mic preamps. A UAD Apollo X4 serves as the audio interface. A 2019 Mac Pro 3.2GHz 16-core Intel Xeon with 128GB RAM drives the ship.
“In addition to a wide range of film and TV programming underscore and theme composing, I write and produce songs with other artists and also do a considerable amount of theatrical playwriting and musical composing. I needed a truly flexible production environment and that’s exactly what I got,” Pietsch says.
Pietsch’s underscores, themes and original songs have graced thousands of TV series episodes including ABC Family’s Pretty Little Liars, USA Network’s Burn Notice, USA’s All Dogs Go to Heaven and E!’s Keeping Up with the Kardashians.
