MANILA, PHILIPPINES — Mastering studios play a vital role in the music production process as they add the final touches to an artist’s vision. In the US, there’s Sterling Sound, known for mastering the songs of Bob Dylan, Rod Steward, Beyonce, and Katy Perry. In the UK, there’s Abbey Road Studio, which famously brought the sounds of The Beatles and Radiohead to life. In the Philippines, there’s 15D Studios.
Founded in 2017 by Cholo Hermosa, 15D Studios offers audio mastering and mixing and vinyl digitizing and remastering services. It has worked with established and rising artists in the Philippines such as IV of Spades, James Reid, Shanne Dandan, Curtismith, Quest, and Al James. The studio has also received nominations for different categories at the 2019 and 2020 Awit Awards, one of the most prestigious music awards in the country annually organized by the Philippine Association of the Record Industry (PARI).
These achievements and milestones speak to the excellence and credibility of 15D Studios as a mastering studio. But as with any production company in the music industry, 15D Studios had humble beginnings.
Learning from the greats
The genesis of the studio can be traced back to Hermosa’s childhood when he gained a penchant for the music production process, wondering how artists, producers, and sound engineers produced songs and soundtracks that defined the times.
Even the studio’s name is also closely associated with Hermosa’s journey in music production. Back when he studied AB Music Production at De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde Manila from 2008 to 2014, he resided at an apartment named 15D Northwing and turned his unit into a studio where he recorded, produced, and mixed songs, including his debut album “Light of Day” for his band Yolanda Moon.
In 2016, Hermosa’s passion for music production grew bigger and thus wanted to expand his knowledge of his craft by applying for a seminar at Mix With The Masters, an organization renowned for giving selected aspiring sound engineers across the world a chance to learn from Grammy award-winning sound engineers. When the organization accepted his application, which included three songs from “Light of Day”, he attended Al Schmitt and Steve Genewick’s masterclass at Studio La Fabrique in France where he learned about the heritage of recording as an art form and legacy chains and techniques that help achieve sounds, among other things.
Hermosa applied again at Mix with The Masters a year later to attend Tchad Blake’s seminar at Platinum Sound Studios in New York City where he learned more about following his gut and deviating from the rules of mixing.
From a dorm to an actual mastering studio
With all the newfound knowledge he gained from the two Mix With The Masters seminars, Hermosa officially established 15D Studios, adopting the name of his apartment when he moved back to his old family home in Marikina as a nod to the early supporters of his first studio.
As Hermosa recalled, the opportunity to turn his home into an airbnb rehearsal studio presented itself when popular Filipino band Up Dharma Down (UDD) needed a place to write their new album. With the help of acoustics designer and consultant John Brandt, Hermosa later turned another room in his home into a mixing room where he could accommodate small-scale recordings. When 15D Studios’ client base exponentially grew within its first year, Hermosa modified his basement rehearsal space into a recording room that compliments the control room located at the top floor of his house.
Today, 15D Studios has become the go-to mastering studio for many big names in the local music industry. Aside from local artists, 15D Studios has also worked for different indie artists across the world such as Vinsint from Canada, Posie Perkins from Thailand, and Reilly Adonis from Switzerland.
“As their engineer, my job is to try to get what they are hearing in their head to come out of the speakers. At the same time, make it sound larger than life!” Hermosa said. “Another thing I love about working with different genres is you get to learn how the artists think production-wise and I always try to make them excited with the overall sound. I always try to make the technical aspect of the job disappear from the vocabulary of the artist or producer and convert the outcome to feelings (whether it be from the toe taps, to the body groovin’, or even sometimes the tears of joy).”
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit the Philippines, Hermosa was quick to reorganize 15D Studios’ operations. Since the studio’s end dream from the beginning was to work remotely, Hermosa faced minimal challenges reallocating his recording room gear and doubling down on his mixing and mastering work. The pandemic even gave Hermosa the opportunity to study the workings of record players or turntables, combine the techniques to the studio’s mastering deck chain, and offer vinyl digitizing and remastering as services. For him, offering the services also meant helping people immortalize their records in high fidelity digital formats.
Now in 2022, 15D Studios continues to make a mark in the music production industry, helping artists around the world turn their dreams into reality in both local and international stages. Throughout his journey, Hermosa shows that if you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life.
