{"id":27695,"date":"2024-06-26T05:30:03","date_gmt":"2024-06-26T09:30:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=27695"},"modified":"2024-06-27T10:55:33","modified_gmt":"2024-06-27T14:55:33","slug":"welcome-to-girl-island-the-odyssey-of-sandy-stone-part-1-of-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2024\/06\/26\/welcome-to-girl-island-the-odyssey-of-sandy-stone-part-1-of-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Welcome to Girl Island: The Odyssey of Sandy Stone (Part 1 of 3)"},"content":{"rendered":"

An edited version of this feature was first published in<\/em> Good Times Santa Cruz.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

In March, Dr. Allucqu\u00e9re Rosanne \u201cSandy\u201d Stone was inducted into the National Women\u2019s Hall of Fame. The honor recognizes her lifetime of work that has spanned multiple fields: audio engineering, community radio, performance art, academia and more. Dr. Stone\u2019s induction marks the first time that a trans woman has received the award from the nation\u2019s oldest nonprofit organization dedicated to honoring women. And while Dr. Stone has been a prominent figure in her various fields for more than 50 years, a new documentary, Girl Island<\/i> (scheduled for release in 2025) will bring her story to an even wider public.<\/p>\n

Sound and Vision<\/b>
\nBorn a Jewish boy, Sandy Stone began her work as a recording engineer in the 1950s, when she was still a high school student in New Jersey. The whole concept of recording fascinated her. \u201cThere was something magic about the idea that you could transform one medium into another,\u201d she says. \u201cYou could get the sound of someone singing and then make it into a physical object that you could hold in your hand.\u201d She emphasizes that on its own, said handheld object \u2013 a vinyl record or a reel of tape \u2013 didn\u2019t make any sound. \u201cBut you could put it into a machine out of which noise came. I thought, \u2018This is amazing,\u2019 and I wanted to do more.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

So she did. But Sandy would have to be self-taught. \u201cThere wasn\u2019t anybody else I knew that was doing it,\u201d she says, describing herself as a geek, one who found it challenging to communicate her thoughts and feelings to others. \u201cI was interested in how geeks \u2013 who are normally very retiring \u2013 communicated with the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sandy decided that sound and light could be her media, tools with which to communicate those feelings. As far back as the 1950s she put on performances of what are now known as light shows. She also programmed scores to accompany silent films. Her criteria for selecting the music was straightforward enough: \u201cThis is moving,\u201d she would think to herself. \u201cWill it move other people?\u201d The term multimedia wasn\u2019t yet in wide use, but Stone was already pioneering in the field.<\/p>\n

Her recording endeavors continued apace as well. \u201cMy first recording studio was in the basement of my parents\u2019 home,\u201d she recalls. And through a series of connections, she found herself creating audio documents of a legendary musical figure. \u201cA person named Dick Spottswood had just done this somewhat jaw-dropping thing of finding Mississippi John Hurt,\u201d Stone recalls.<\/p>\n

Country blues singer and guitarist Hurt had begun his musical career in the late 1920s, but when a series of 78 r.p.m. record releases failed to jump-start his career, he returned to a life of farming. More than three decades later, musicologist Spottswood tracked him down in Avalon, Mississippi. In 1963 Spottswood convinced the musician to come with him to Washington, D.C. and make new recordings.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut Dick didn\u2019t want to take John to a regular recording studio,\u201d Stone says. \u201cHe wanted something that would be a little less intimidating.\u201d As it happened, Stone had built a studio in her log cabin home near Annapolis, Maryland. Through intermediaries, Spottswood reached out to this recording engineer whom he did not know. \u201cNext thing I knew,\u201d Stone recalls, \u201cI was shaking hands with Mississippi John Hurt.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hurt and Spottswood moved into Stone\u2019s studio, remaining for a week. \u201cI had the recording equipment set up 24 hours a day,\u201d Stone explains. \u201cWhen they felt like recording, I would turn it on.\u201d As a result of the informal setting, there\u2019s a spontaneous, audio verit\u00e9 quality to the recordings. The cuckoo clock in Stone\u2019s kitchen even makes itself known. \u201cWe just let the tape roll,\u201d Stone says. From those monaural master tapes came 1963\u2019s landmark Folk Songs and Blues<\/i>, released mere days after Hurt\u2019s performance at the Newport Folk Festival. The album and concert led to a revival of the bluesman\u2019s career.<\/p>\n

By the late 1960s, Stone would land a job at a new recording studio, the Record Plant. Launched by Gary Kellgren, the studio was an innovative enterprise, one of the first studios to make use of a 12-track recording console. Stone cold-called on the studio doorstep in hope of getting work. Yet while she was quite experienced as an engineer, none of her experience had been inside a major studio. \u201cSomehow I got them to open the door for me,\u201d she recalls. \u201cI told them, \u2018I\u2019m the greatest recording engineer in the world!\u2019\u201d Kellgren was unimpressed, but Stone persisted, claiming that she could fix anything.<\/p>\n

As luck would have it, at the moment the studio\u2019s Scully 12-track console was broken. Kellgren asked Stone if she could fix it. \u201cOh, of course; I fix them all the time,\u201d she lied. \u201cBut I don\u2019t have the instruction manual with me today.\u201d She asked to borrow it; Kellgren said yes. \u201cAnd his fate was sealed,\u201d Stone says with a mischievous chuckle. \u201cI speed-read the manual!\u201d She fixed the machine, and was hired on the spot as an engineer.<\/p>\n

In short order, Stone found herself working in the studio with Jimi Hendrix. \u201cHe was a sweet, warm guy, and a perfectionist,\u201d she says. Stone helped devise technological methods of realizing some of the bold concepts Hendrix had in his head. \u201cSome of those ideas were kind of obscure and psychological,\u201d she says, \u201cand some of them didn\u2019t exist at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stone recalls an amusing anecdote about Hendrix. \u201cJimi had a huge desire to put his hands on the [recording console],\u201d she says, noting that musicians weren\u2019t permitted to touch that equipment. \u201cSo Gary made Jimi a little box with knobs all over it, and a thick umbilical that came out and went into the console,\u201d Stone explains. \u201cIt did nothing, but Jimi didn\u2019t know that. He had a wonderful time with those knobs.\u201d Even though she enjoys sharing that story, Stone makes it clear that she recognized Hendrix as a musical innovator. \u201cWe developed a deep friendship and appreciation of what each [other] was doing,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Stone was instrumental in outfitting a console for Record Plant\u2019s Studio B. At a gala party to celebrate its opening, she found herself in conversation with many big names. \u201cDrugs flowed with incredible free-ness,\u201d she admits. \u201cAt one point, I found myself sitting on the floor with my back to the wall, because I couldn\u2019t stand up.\u201d There she engaged in deep conversation with brothers Edgar and Johnny Winter. \u201cBut I can\u2019t possibly remember what we talked about,\u201d she laughs.<\/p>\n

As a result of Stone\u2019s critical role in studio setup, Kellgren wanted her to do that full time, traveling around the country opening up new Record Plant branches. But Stone wanted to record. Kellgren issued an ultimatum. \u201c I used the IBM Selectric typewriter at the front desk, and typed out a note,\u201d Stone recalls. \u201c\u2019Dear Gary, I hereby resign. Signed, Sandy.\u2019\u201d She left her keys on the desk and never returned.<\/p>\n

Click here to continue<\/a>\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An edited version of this feature was first published in Good Times Santa Cruz. In March, Dr. Allucqu\u00e9re Rosanne \u201cSandy\u201d Stone was inducted into the National Women\u2019s Hall of Fame. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27704,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41,3668],"tags":[5446],"class_list":["post-27695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interview","category-music-business","tag-sandy-stone","cat-41-id","cat-3668-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27695"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27695\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27741,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27695\/revisions\/27741"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27704"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}