YouTube cannot teach you the real job; seek professional training – Appietus to ‘YouTube sound engineers’
Renowned Sound Engineer and Music Producer, Appietus, has expressed his displeasure over what he calls the influx of self-taught sound engineers.
Appietus noted that sound engineers who claim they received tutorials from YouTube and other new media platforms are far from making any meaningful impact in the music industry.
He had advised these persons to seek professional training if they want to make any significant contribution to the industry.
Speaking in an interview with Graphic Showbiz, Appietus, whose real name is Appiah Dankwah, revealed that Ghana’s music industry was facing a serious crisis due to these self-educated sound engineers, who were compromising the quality of sound production.
The seasoned producer emphasized that the low quality of sound production in the music industry is a contributing factor to why Ghana’s music industry is struggling to penetrate the global stage.
He urged the self-educated sound engineers to raise their game and strive for excellence rather than settling for mediocrity.
He said: “You have to understand sound engineering, the frequency range listeners can hear, the decibel range you can go, the dynamics and all the technicalities. You need to understand all these things. It’s only in our industry that you find people saying, ‘Oh, I learnt sound engineering on YouTube”.
“For you to become a medical doctor or a surgeon, you cannot go and learn it on YouTube. Nobody is going to lie down and say, okay, this is my stomach, operate on me because you learnt it on a social platform. But in Ghana, we have people saying Oh I learnt it on YouTube, so I know. Come on, please. These internet communities cannot teach you the real thing,” he disclosed.
According to him, “Works from these amateurs are a contributory factor to why most of our songs are not breaking the global market.
“The international marketplace knows good quality so if it’s low, they will not accept it. There’s something called industry standard in sound, if you do not have it, come on, they will just throw your music away.”
