The vibe
Imagine a songwriters’ circle, but for music producers, makers and creators. The Producers' Circle is not about expertise or competition, but about community and collaboration. Each session features guests, knowledge exchanges and critical listening sessions, as well as beat and track share, where attendees share various pieces that they have worked on, explore how they made it and receive a wide range of feedback from peers. It's all love.
Sometimes the hardest part is sharing something that isn't finished. The more opportunities we have to develop our collaborative muscle, the easier it becomes.
You don't have to be a maker/producer to hang out. Listeners are more than welcome, too. No pressure 😊.
Overview
This initiative seeks to support Hart House’s Hip Hop Education by bringing together beatmakers, producers and music creators in an informal and open space to share beats, tracks, techniques, questions and ideas.
The aim of these sessions is to create a supportive music production community of practice, dedicated to creative expression and artistic development. Whether you're just getting started or have been a producer for many years, this session is meant to be an inclusive environment for music producers of all levels and anyone interested in music production.
All genres of music are welcome!
Sample Challenge events are strictly for educational and community-building purposes. No copies of the sampled track will be created for the explicit purpose of distribution or monetization.
Event formats:
We have a range of different events. You’ll find the dates and times below, as well as which event format we’re hosting.
Sample Challenge: We provide a track and you chop it, sample it, flip it and create something new. We all share in a non-judgmental space.
Drop-in beat / track share: Bring any music you’re working on, or something you made ages ago! The point is to share music, learn from each other and maybe get a few collaborations off the ground. All genres are welcome!
Workshops: We’ll bring in a guest to share their knowledge, wisdom and approaches to various elements of music production and the industry. These are informal discussions, and not so much presentations. Guests will also hang out and listen to tracks from the group, and provide feedback on pieces.
Live Creation Session: Bring anything you need to make a new composition (laptop, audio interface, midi, headphones, etc.). We'll provide everyone with a prompt and a sample pack. You have 60 minutes to create something new! We'll workshop everyone's pieces at the end. These session are intended to connect you to the process of creation, without any judgment or preconceived idea of the end product. We invite you to challenge yourself to just create!
Schedule
Workshop: Building your own Bass Sound
with Bill Xu
Location: Music Room, 2nd Floor
Workshop: Critical Listening and Track Share
with Marco Adamovic
Location: Committees Room, 2nd Floor
Workshop: Mixing (101, buses, and groups)
with Nick Lloyd-Kuzik
Location: Virtual only
Workshop: My Creative Approach
with Lloyd McArton
Location: UTSC AA304; Virtual
The Art of Mixing
with Calvin Hartwick
Location: Burwash Room, 2nd Floor; Virtual
Live Creation Session
In collaboration with Soundwaves UTSC (@soundwaves_utsc)
Location: Debates Room, 2nd Floor; UTSC Leigha Lee Browne Theatre; Virtual
Workshop: Approaches to EQ
with Marco Adamovic
Location: Debates Room, 2nd Floor
Live Creation Session
Location: Burwash Room, 2nd Floor
Workshop: Outreach and Promotion
with Marco Adamovic
Location: Burwash Room, 2nd Floor
Live Creation Session
Location: Burwash Room, 2nd Floor
Workshop: Interpreting 'The Creative Act: A Way of Being" by Rick Rubin
with Marco Adamovic
Location: Burwash Room, 2nd Floor
Live Creation Session
Location: Bickersteth Room, 3rd Floor
Guests
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Lloyd McArton
Lloyd is a musician, teacher, and researcher living in Toronto, Ontario. He is working towards completing his PhD dissertation at the Faculty of Music, conducting research on independent music scenes and how people learn to organize musical lives within them. Other areas of research and contributions to publications have included exploring the inequitable variance in opportunities for musical learning, and devising ways to address those discrepancies through more widespread access. Outside of academia, Lloyd works, creates, and facilitates others’ learning as a DIY-focused musician and educator. For the past several years, he has been spending most of his musical time composing, recording, producing, and performing as a guitarist and saxophonist in the band Lost Cousins, as well as teaching music in Montessori schools and at University of Toronto.
He is currently a sessional instructor teaching courses the Amplified/Digital sections of the Small Ensemble course at University of Toronto Scarborough and Arts in Education for Masters of Teaching students at OISE.
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Calvin Hartwick
Recording Engineer, Producer
Calvin Hartwick is a recording engineer and producer based out of Toronto, Canada. Upon graduating the Ontario Institute of Audio Recording Technology (OIART) in 2012 he went on to receive the Couvillion Memorial Award a year later recognizing his success and hard work post-graduation. Since then he has become the head engineer and manager at Dream House Studios located downtown Toronto.
A few notable works he’s been apart of include the Grammy nominated album ‘Freudian’ by Daniel Caesar (2018), four Juno nominated/winning albums such as ‘Dawn Chorus’ by Jacques Greene (2020), ‘Touch’ by July Talk (2017), ‘Can’t Fly Without Gravity’ by k-os (2016), and ‘Freudian’ by Daniel Caesar (2018) as well as the self titled album by Cadence Weapon (2018) which was nominated for the Polaris Prize.
Calvin continues to passionately engineer and produce at Dream House Studios with the many artists that he fortunately crosses paths with every year.
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Nicholas Lloyd-Kuzik
Artist, Producer, Engineer
Superphenix (Nick Lloyd-Kuzik) is an artist, producer, singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, based in Toronto, ON. His sound draws energy from 80s and 90s synth-pop, new wave, rock, and electro, with layers of contemporary indie and alternative production. His recently released debut singles ('TV' and 'Beyond the Frame') have been featured on notable retrowave and pop playlists on Spotify and have received radio play in Toronto (CIUT 89.5 FM) and Ottawa (CHUO 89.1 FM).
His arrangements are rich with nostalgic textures, punchy transitions, and feature lush synth layers under vocals ranging from fierce and longing 80’s rock to upbeat electro-pop.
Superphenix has gained momentum quickly since his first release in 2022, most recently being selected for the 2023 RBC Launchpad Music Entrepreneurship Program out of Artscape Daniels Launchpad in Toronto.
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Bill Xu
UTSC Student, Online Community Lead
Bill Xu (He/Him) is a seasoned musician with years of experience working with a diverse pool of genres. He is in his third year, studying neurosciences. He helped to shape the music production community, leading and culturing a comfortable space at the Hart House Producers’ Circle. He also teaches and fosters a passion for musical development. With his experience and dedication to the community, Bill is committed to pushing new ideas in the creative industry.
What does Hart House mean to you? Or alternatively, what is your favourite thing about Hart House?
The Hart House community is unique and acts like a hub for creativity. I felt comfortable sharing and learning from others, I remember when I first got involved, I was very surprised by how welcoming the atmosphere was, that has to be my favourite part of Hart House. I had heard how monotonous university life could be but Hart House wasn’t like that at all, after leading some events myself I’ve heard the same comments from newcomers. There were plenty of opportunities and events you could get involved in and I’m really grateful to the people that maintain the space.
Facilitators
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Marco Adamovic a.k.a. Vic Adamo
Program Coordinator
Marco is an educator and cultural producer. As an educator, Marco strives to facilitate positive and healthy environments for creativity, connection, and collaboration to thrive. As a cultural producer, he is a multi-instrumentalist, beatmaker, songwriter, and organizer of the things. He works with people, machines, and (mostly) good ideas. His family emigrated to Turtle Island in the 1970s from the former Yugoslavia. Marco is a graduate of the Mille Rotman Shime Academic Bridging Program, an alumnus of Katimavik, and holds an M.Ed in Leadership, Adult, and Higher Education from the University of Toronto. In closing, Ball is Life.
Other things to know
- This is a Hybrid Event that will be both in-person and held on the Zoom videoconferencing platform. Download the Zoom desktop app here(Link opens in a new tab)
- The session will not be active until shortly before 7:00pm.
- You'll want to have your DAW and track ready to go before we start.
In collaboration with:
