SONNY WHARTON
The in-demand house hitman and Whartone Records boss shares a handful of his personal studio speed-ups
: Are you the kind of producer that spends a long time on one idea/track, or do you like to work fast and get an idea done and dusted? SW:
“I really enjoy the thrill of working fast, and getting my ideas down as quickly as possible. Some of my biggest tracks have pretty much written themselves, in fact! If the ideas aren’t flowing within an hour or so, I’ll either delete the project and start again, or I’ll just leave the session completely and come back later.”
: Do you like to create your own personal sample packs, preset banks, DAW templates, plugin chains and/or sampler instruments? SW:
“Most projects start as one of several premade templates that I’ve built over the years, and then develop and evolve naturally from there. I learnt to do this fairly early on in my career, and it’s increased my workflow dramatically ever since.
“I really enjoy getting things down quickly in that golden moment of inspiration – by having a wide selection of templates and key elements already loaded into my DAW, this allows me to work faster. As well as taking away a lot of the frustration or time-consuming elements when trying to get an initial idea down, this helps build your signature sound that people will recognise through your productions over time.”
: How do you feel about presets? Is it ‘cheating’ to use a synth’s bundled sounds? SW:
“I’ve got nothing against presets or even the use of loops. That’s why they’re there to start with – to give you something to work from and inspire your creative process. For most people on the dancefloor, the end result is far more important!”
: What’s the one piece of software that has assisted your workflow and studio efficiency? SW:
“A real gamechanger for me was Mixed In Key. Obviously it’s aimed at DJs, but I’ve used it as a very handy tool for production as well. Every time I get a new sample pack, record in a new sound or sample from vinyl, I put it through Mixed In Key, and it labels the file with the correct key and BPM. Then, when I’m making a track and I’m looking for something to add, I can filter my search for the same key as the track and find a suitable sound very quickly – saving lots of time without scrolling through my entire sound libraries blindly.”