Featuring Chip Hardy productions!

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Welcome to The 515 recording studio located in the heart of Berry Hill in Nashville, TN! We are a full service recording studio and put our emphasis on creating the best sounding recordings as well as harboring your creativity with our large control room and tracking rooms. Step inside once and you'll know exactly what we mean! So we invite you to look around... and then when you're ready, let's make some music together!

WHO WE ARE... WHAT WE DO... ETC!

The 515 is much more than a recording studio. With a producer who has over 35 years of music industry experience as well as musicians who have well over 100 combined years perfecting their craft, The 515 is set up to provide you with the best Nashville has to offer at a price you can afford! Whether you are an independent artist, songwriter, or music hobbyist, The 515 will provide you the GREAT recording your music deserves! Be sure to see our rate page for some of our recording packages. If you do not see a package that properly suits your needs and/or budget, please contact us!

MUSIC AT THE 515 - "A WELL OILED MACHINE"!
a note from Chip Hardy, producer/music arranger

There's nothing like music being played by 6 or 7 musicians--all playing at the same time!!!  Well--not "all playing at the same time" as in a cacophony of noise but like a well tuned automobile with the engine parts, wheels, etc., all working as one machine to move you down the road!!!  

That's how it is here at THE 515 when we are entrusted with your music.  The musicians are all here and the track is recorded with all of them---"LIVE"!!!  After listening to your work demo, with instructions relayed to them of what you are wanting your song(s) to be, they know where and what to play--and, just as importantly, they know where and when NOT to play.  If you, the songwriter, cannot be present to actually sing a scratch vocal, the musicians "take notes" as your song is playing so they know not to play "fills" or busy parts where you or your singer will be singing.  The steel guitar player may have, as his part of the "well oiled machine", the Choruses to shine.  While the piano or keyboard player may have a verse where he/she will put the "ear candy" to make your song(s) shine.  

Many studios offering "budget prices" are "home studios".  Most don't have the capability of recording more than a couple of musicians at one time.  Most also do not have their rooms "tuned" for optimum sonic quality either.  Which is why in cheaper demos or recordings the drums sometimes sound like Quaker Oat Meal boxes!!!  And the acoustic guitar sounds like it was recorded in a bathroom--which, in fact, it may have been!!!  

The home studios or smaller studios wind up recording most all the instruments separately--and sometimes that process is through file sharing where the musicians never even know who the other musicians are.  Or, the "studio owner" is a "guitar player" so he/she overdubs all the guitars--again, one by one.  In the end your demo or recording may have all the instruments on it that you paid for but you'll just be able to feel and know that "it's lacking something".  That SOMETHING is the most important part of making music come to life--all the musicians recording the song(s) at the same time!!!!!  

The core band we have here at THE 515 has been playing together for 5 to 7 years!!!  By core band I'm talking about the rhythm section--drums, bass, acoustic guitar and keyboards.  This part of the band MUST BE "tight"--that is playing in time and accenting together.  The "sweetener" instruments such as electric guitar, steel guitar, dobro, slide guitar, fiddle, etc., are hand picked for each particular session and chosen for the type of music scheduled.  We take great pride in the musicians we select to record and make your music come to life!!!  Just as a side note here--I have been working with studio musicians here in Nashville for over 30 years and the musicians we have here at THE 515 will compete with any of the "A string" players I have ever had the pleasure of recording!!!

At THE 515 your music or song(s) is not just a number or "something that has to be done".  We take great pride in making your music the best it can be!!!  Every song we record here at THE 515 has had a pre-production meeting and has been discussed by you, the songwriter, the band leader and producer of the session your song(s) will be recorded on.  If you have chosen a singer to sing your song their keys have been checked and double checked by the producer assuring that your song(s) are recorded in the proper key(s) for your singer(s).  Sometimes a singer will give us a key and it will "just look suspicious".  Singers can be very busy and sometimes will try and key future songs they'll be singing while they are in their cars or trucks--away from their guitar or keyboard.  That can, if not "red flagged" by your session producer, be a mistake big enough to make your track unsuitable for your singer.  We take every precaution we can to assure that doesn't happen to your song(s)!!!

So--the decision is up to you.  Do you want your music to be GREAT or just "pieced together" with all the instruments?  The only way for your music, or any other kind of music, to be GREAT is for the musicians to "play it together as one band"!!!

Just sayin'--

Chip


       

 
             
Nashville recording studio, song demos, and albu m projects! Nashville's finest recording studio in Berry Hill. Featuring Chip Hardy... an experienced producer in his own right. Watch your worktapes or rough demosed msterpieces before your eyes. Nashville Recording Studio The 515 is a Nashville demo studio and fully running functioning recording studio! From preproduction to tracking with the finest musicians to the production of credited Chip Hardy, The 515 is the ultimate in Nashville recording studio experiences. EP  LP  song demo  song demos   Music Row   Music Row professionals   songwriter mentoring   songwriter services   cd quality music   recording artists   Music Row contacts