Dolby Atmos commissioned studio launched in Trinidad and Tobago

Imagine being so immersed in a sound, that it feels as if you are in the moment as opposed to being a mere observer.

For years, Dolby Atmos has been providing that kind of immersion through its audio technology. Now there is a Dolby Certified music studio in TT, due to the efforts of sound engineer/producer Rishi Mahato.

Maha Productions and Mahato are well known in soca and chutney music. He is a musician, producer and sound engineer with more than 17 awards to his name and is the owner of Maha Productions.

Mahato and Anthony “Chinese Laundry” Chow Lin On believe this is a major step for the local music industry as the global growth in immersive and digital technologies continue.

Mahato announced that his Maha Productions studio was now a Dolby Atmos commissioned studio at a media conference on October 11 at Caroni Savannah Road, Charlieville, Chaguanas.

Chinese Laundry and Mahato will also release a Caribbean music album mixed in Dolby Atmos Audio. The album will be titled Precious Angel featuring Trinidadian artistes Machel Montano, Ravi B and Azaryah. It will include nine songs such as Kes’ Savannah Grass, Jah Melody’s first soca called Soca We Love and Ravi B’s and Jahllano’s Rum in Meh Veins, among others.

Mahato’s journey to constructing a Dolby Atmos commissioned studio started with Montano. Montano became Mahato’s inspiration – without him knowing – when he was at his studio six months ago.

He said Montano told them a story saying that he felt like he was sometimes trapped in a little box or room and like he had outgrown the space and needed to come out.

Mahato said that was exactly how he was feeling; like he had reached his potential and needed to expand.

“All of a sudden, I don’t know where it came from but I got the link to Dolby…”

Around that time, he had also got some calls to do some music for a TV series and a couple documentaries.

“These things just came up there and I said, ‘You know what...this looks like the path I have to go because it would take me into the TV and movies I want to do.’ Plus, it would bring the music I love doing to another level.’”

He sent an e-mail to Dolby and waited for a couple weeks, taking the approach that if the company did not reply he was okay and, at least, he tried.

“Over a couple weeks after I got an e-mail from them and I was like jumping for joy because they sent a whole handbook on how to set up the studio, what I needed to do from A-Z, how to register with them and go through the whole process.”

Mahato said he then left everything up to God and everything fell into place.

For Chinese Laundry, this is the step needed to take TT and Caribbean music to the next level.

There were a couple of positives coming out of the pandemic like “little seedlings growing in the asphalt, the hot pitch” and one of them was use of the down time, he said.

“We had the valuable luxury of time, for a change, and Rishi Mahato took advantage of that. He spent months dialoguing with Dolby Atmos. Did the courses. Did the training. Did the commissioning. Re-tooled his studio because it would take some investment.

“Had all the boxes checked to get to this point…”

He said the pandemic also gave Chinese Laundry Music the time to create music that was not “shackled to festival; fete.”

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Usually, in a month like October, his team would have been in camp trying to make music, scrambling to get ready for the impending Carnival, he added.

Chinese Laundry said recently he started to look at the roll-out from Apple music and the discussion surrounding spatial audio. BBC.com says spatial audio, “is a way of creating sound in 360 degrees around a listener.”

The BBC’s article added that spatial audio is similar to what people hear in real life and it has the potential to immerse the listener more fully than standard audio.

“I realised that many of the new releases – Drake, Kanye, Burna Boy, etc, etc – all come in Dolby Atmos.”

Chinese Laundry said this was the way the world was going and this was also the way TT and the Caribbean had to go as well, referencing tech company Apple.

He said Mahato was the door opener and facilitator and called on the “army of creatives” to follow in Mahato’s lead.

He said the Caribbean releases hundreds of songs every week and one studio could not mix all of that.

“It would need every hand,” he said.

Chinese Laundry said that educators were also aware that to remain competitive in the global music space, the country and region would have to “churn out proper engineers like rabbits” and “other studios needed to figure out how they can get involve.”

TT has to get ready for the next period in the music industry, he said.

He also saw this development as an opportunity for pan.

“I want us to think about the possibilities for the steelpan. For a lot of people who experience Panorama as limers, you really hear a reverberated sound in harsh stereo from a distance when you are in the North Stand.

“But if you are a connoisseur of pan music and you can just imagine yourself in the belly of Renegades centre spot and your tenors and bass is up front and your double seconds on the side. The percussion kit is up at the back, I need not tell you that is a different experience.”

University of Trinidad and Tobago (UTT)’s Asst Professor of audio recording and music production Martin “Mice” Raymond congratulated Mahato on his achievement in a video.

He said this was a major step forward in the music industry being the “first commissioned Dolby Atmos Studio in the West Indies.”

Raymond said this moves things forward for both audio production and post-production within the Caribbean region and will help the region make its mark internationally.