A Conversation with Alan Adelson & Kate Taverna

“We gave people quite a long time because everyone was at home and we were unsure how long it would take for people to actually see it,” Harris says. Submissions came, all of varying genres and quality, from simple phone recordings to produced tracks. The Homeward brain trust winnowed that batch to seven. The goal: diversity in sound and representation. 

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"We didn’t want an album that was one specific genre,” Harris says. “We wanted a very balanced mix of the types of songs that would be on the album, which I think we did achieve. We also didn’t want people who already produced stuff very well and were efficient at what they were doing. We were trying to take people who maybe didn’t have equipment at home because we wanted to play off taking phone recordings and very unconventional ways of taking audio and trying to make it all sound good.” 

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Producers were paired with material according to their own tastes and abilities. Ibrahim Syed and Isaac Smith oversaw two apiece: Jana King’s “Meant to Be in Each Other’s Space” and Buddy Anderson’s “In Time,” with Smith handling Ace Calcagno’s “Run Away with Me” and Jay Mitchell’s “Be the Man.” Jasmine Lumpkin took on Kjerstyn Jordheim’s “Coloring Book.” Lana Carey steered Logan Gianella’s gloriously titled “This Page Left Intentionally Blank.” Harris — who would otherwise be tasked with mastering the entire release — also took charge of a single track: Anastasya Hoffman’s “Vivid Dreams.” 

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Hoffman, a sociology and criminal justice major with a minor in music performance, sings with the university’s Powerchord a cappella ensemble. (Harris and Hoffman had known of each other prior to Homeward but were otherwise unacquainted.) She arrived in Oregon by way of Michigan and Alaska, graduating in 2017 from Service High School in Anchorage.

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Hoffman’s lived and breathed music since her youth, beginning with musical theater in childhood. Around the time she entered Oregon State University, a school to which she applied on “a whim; there was no planning,” she began writing songs as she learned piano chords, experimenting and evolving as she discovered more progressions.  

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"I think I wrote my first song in the summer of 2017,” she says. “It wasn’t very good, but that’s when I started writing. I took a break, then I really got into it in the summer of 2018. It was just a lot of practice of finding different sounds and different melodies. My music is pretty spontaneous. Theme-wise, most of the songs are pretty downtrodden, expressing emotions I go through.” 

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Hoffman learned of Homeward through the three emailed fliers she received from friends. At first, she says, she wrestled reservations about participating. “Truthfully, I didn’t think I would make it,” she says. “Then once I decided to submit, I got excited about the idea of being able to not only work with a student producer and see that side of things but also to represent the school if I were to be selected.” 

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So she combed through her backlog and emerged with “Vivid Dreams,” a song she’d written in the summer of 2019. (“I don’t know if you have falling dreams,” she says, “but they feel really weird and real.”) Accompanying herself on piano, she recorded a demo with an earbud microphone, sent it off, and waited with anticipation for a response. “I knew my song needed some extra love, too, so I was curious to see how they perceived it,” she says. “Which is the coolest part of getting the feedback from the project that I can take with me as I continue to write and sing.” 

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Although assigned to the track, Harris saw the raw phone recording’s potential, later hailing its singer/songwriter vibe and likening it to a Taylor Swift ballad, “just a little more sad.” “I thought the central idea was really good and that I could take it further in the direction that Anastasya wanted it to go,” he says. 

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The two began communicating via email to trade ideas and coordinate schedules. Because they lived relatively close to one another, Harris and Hoffman met once to record "Vivid Dreams”’ lead lines in a pair of takes — observing COVID-19 protocols, of course. Harris used these to assemble the final track; vocal harmonies were delivered in phone memos (Harris added his own baritone for depth), and the producer used strings to bolster the chorus. Otherwise, the song differs little stylistically or lyrically from Hoffman’s voice/piano demo. 

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“It started with figuring out the basic idea that Anastasya had and how we could make it sound better for what would be a studio-produced version,” Harris says. “That meant moving a bridge or something to a different part of the song or changing maybe how the chords at the end may sound.” 

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“Vivid Dreams” joined the other completed tracks for mastering, a somewhat Herculean task considering that none of the songs were recorded in a single space. They came via different mics and setups (although producers worked with their charges on equipment and placement), from different rooms and atmospheres, and Harris had to transform these contrasting blends into a smooth, complete document.  

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“Mixing is making the music, recording it and balancing,” he says. “Mastering is making it sound ready for radio. I’m not even done mastering yet. Hardware and real studio equipment are a lot better to use in mastering. Being at home, my studio soundproofing isn’t as good as a normal studio’s. I’m trying to make sure I can make the album sound as cohesive as possible, so one sound’s not so drastically different from the other.” 

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He’s also designing the cover, a hand-designed piece he hopes catches the eye as it’s meant to represent the school’s Music Technology & Production program on social media “so we can do more stuff like this in the future and have a way to promote local artists.” 

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And there are plans for future Homewards as the program, currently based at 101 Community Hall, continues to grow. Harris has seen interest increase exponentially since his first year, from less than 30 students to more than 60. A new building to accommodate this influx, the $70 million Arts and Education Complex, is slated for construction near Snell Hall with a tentative 2023 completion date. Interior plans include a concert hall, theater, art gallery, and classrooms. The intention is to place many of university's arts programs in one building. 

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“I’ll still have a studio in Snell Hall, but there’ll be some other cooler things we’ll be able to use in the technology space,” Fick says. “The Snell facility is right above the VR center, where do they motion-capture and virtual reality. We’ve formed collaborations just sitting around the hallway. So I’m looking forward to that in the new space.” 

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Meanwhile, however, Fick awaits the release of Homeward. But he loves what he’s heard so far and what it means for the future, technologically and beyond the pandemic. 

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“I was concerned with the lack of studio for this project because that was a selling piece for the first album,” he says. “So I was apprehensive, initially. But we’ve gotten so savvy in the past year about what we can do. It sounds amazing. It was really cool for me to listen to these drafts and then hear the final mixes the producers sent in two weeks ago. I can hear how their styles evolved and influenced each other, their decisions, and how they process. It gives me hope. It’s not just Billie Eilish, FINNEAS, and Lil Nas X who can produce albums in their homes and win Grammys. This is the kind of forward-thinking I need to have, that I need to impart upon students in the next decade. 

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“There are a lot of things I don’t initially like about online concerts,” he adds, “but there are some interesting things, too, like the live chat feature that adds a whole new level of engagement. We need to capitalize on these things when we go back to in-person. How can we hybridize events? I think about that with the studio-recording platform too: how can we utilize these things where people can work more remotely but also have access to good, quality gear?” 

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Hoffman remains awed of the project in general. 

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“As an aspiring artist who has limited technology access and knowledge, the OSU MTP album is providing a very community-based and amazing opportunity for artists like myself that we may never get access to,” she says. 

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“Homeward is an album to show the OSU community and what its people make,” Harris says. “Even though our OSU community isn’t always at the OSU-Corvallis campus, we can make music wherever we are and still produce good art.” Therefore, everywhere is home. 

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“The goal is to give students the experience of working in a creative capacity, collaborating, and finishing something that has a high-quality standard,” Fick says. “Could these songs be played? Would people buy them? The goal is to get them closer and closer to whatever their industry ambitions are, whether they’re to learn more about the business side, the creative side, and the start-to-finish process of making an album.”