Summer 2014 - I'll be honest. Each day the temperature outside fails to reach 90 degrees, I am grateful we're one day closer to fall. Summer is my favorite time to hole up in the (air conditioned) studio and work. And that's what I've been doing: restoring and remastering from cassette a blistering recording from the 1990s of Senegalese singer Aby Ngana Diop, Liital, due this September on the aptly named Awesome Tapes From Africa label. I mastered the debut album for End of Love, mixed by Ted Young and featuring members of Wilco and Big Star. And a perfect summer jam of an EP (as well as forthcoming full length album), also recorded and mixed by Ted Young, Ellen Sundberg's Headlights.

Watch and listen for bluegrass singer Jen Larson's upcoming EP, featuring some of the best pickers in the NYC area, produced by the super talented guitarist, singer and music teacher Michael Daves, and mastered by me with Jen and Michael in attendance. We had such a good time mastering, I immediately signed up for their excellent Bluegrass Harmony Singing class and had a blast singing Stanley Brothers and Louvin Brothers tunes all through June and early July.