Garden Street Academy, a K-12 private school, announces the opening of its new student Recording Studio.

An invitation-only opening event on Tuesday will bring together student musicians, teaching staff, guests and luminaries in the music business.

The new recording studio was developed by Ian Putnam and Bryan Kerr, the music and technology directors of the school, in association with student musicians from the Songwriting and Recording program at the school. Performing arts has been a strong focus of the school for many years, and recent course development has incorporated entrepreneurship and aspects of the music industry into the curriculum. The studio grew out of a need for students to learn hands-on aspects of the recording industry.

In spring 2014, the school’s Business of Music class visited two local recording studios, Playback and SB Sound Design. The interest and excitement generated by these visits led to a visit to the school by Dom Camardella from Sound Design, who generously gave his advice and input on the fledgling project. This ultimately influenced the layout of the studio, which uses isolation booths by the internationally renowned “Whisper Room” company. Engineering and recording gear was recently installed to create a professional grade environment in what is a former library.

Kerr used his expertise to install latest version of ProTools and clones of legendary microphone pre-amps such as those from Neve and API. The studio is outfitted with the Fender Deluxe Reverb classic tube amp, the Yamaha MOX8 composing and recording keyboard featuring the Motiv soundbank, a Fender Stratocaster and Precision bass, an Epiphone Les Paul Standard and new DW acoustic drums to help create the most amazing recording experience for young artists.

Further support was provided by the DW drum factory in Oxnard, a site that students in the class have visited twice. DW donated the new acoustic drums that are front and center in the new space. Bob Terry, pro drummer and consultant for Yamaha electronic drums supported the space with a new Yamaha DTX 532K electronic kit that will be used to give students knowledge and practice in MIDI recording.

Garden Street Academy is a K-12 college preparatory school serving the Santa Barbara community.

— John Dewey is the head of school for Garden Street Academy.