About

"James Creer is a formally trained pianist and has been playing keyboards now for over 30 years. Starting with basic piano in the 70’s, it wasn’t until seeing a KISS concert that he realized being a musician was what he wanted to do. Playing with his dad’s Micro-Moog synthesizer was just the spark to needed to start a long history in the music industry. His first professional gig, as a teenager, was playing keyboards at the local college basketball games, where a touring cover band found and recruited him to work full time as a musician. James has since toured with several groups including 40 Stories, The Detours, Gondwanaland, The Genitorturers, Saturnine, Kevens, and WISH. During this time, he has shared the stage with such groups as Greenday, the B-52s, Hootie and the Blowfish, Drivin’ ‘N’ Cryin’, Joan Jett, Live, Laibach, GWAR, Rabbit in the Moon, Daft Punk, and Duran Duran, to name a few. 

     James’ education started early with piano lessons, saxophone, and eventually majoring in Music Education from Augusta College, followed by an Associates from Full Sail University, where he learned audio engineering. It was a natural progression to migrate into a technological field where gear is patched and tweaked to manipulate sound, just like early synthesizers. Working in recording studios under such producers as Brendan O’Brien, Eddie Kramer, Mark Hudson, Ed Seay, Roger Nichols, Bill Kennedy, etc. the engineering and producing education continued, and it still does. James is also a current AVID Certified Expert Instructor in Pro Tools for Music and Post Production dating back to Pro Tools 5, and has 20 years experience teaching audio engineering.

     The balance of musicianship, engineering, and teaching is what makes James such a valuable asset in any music environment, on stage, in the studio, or in a classroom. With a 30+ year track record of constant advancement in a rapidly changing field of audio technology, watch out for what is to come, as history typically repeats itself…" ~M.Smith 

 Education:

For the past 21 years, I've refined my teaching techniques to a point beyond second nature. 11 years teaching at Full Sail University (over 10,000 students taught) and 10 years running teaching Pro Tools Certification, I've seen just about every type of student, and figured ways of delivering to all. If one way doesn't click, try again until it does, much like engineering or producing.

"If you can't explain it simply, you don't know it well enough" ~Einstein

 Consultation:

Coming up in the industry during the peak of analog and the beginnings of digital was the perfect time! I learned from the best from the "old school", while pioneering the new. Being able to relate to 20-30 year veterans and relate the way computers do the same has been one of my biggest assets. Short list of consultees:

HBO,VH1, MTV, PBS, Dolby Labs, Cirque Du Soleil,Telemundo, Univision, Full Sail, US Marine Corps, etc….

Production:

For me, production started with a reel to reel 4-track, which led to sequencing on computers almost 35 years ago. This proved extremely beneficial working under the wings of  legendary producers such as Brendan O'Brien, Eddie Kramer, Mark Hudson, Roger Nichols, Dave Ogilvie, etc. Most importantly, I learned from them all that music isn't about technical stuff nearly as much as emotion and feelings. Learn or hire technicians so that the songs can be the focus.