BRIAN MARATEA: SOUND GENIUS
- Michael Thervil
- 2 hours ago
- 3 min read
Written by Michael Thervil
When it comes to sound in terms of major motion picture productions in Hollywood and television series, there is one man that you need to know, and his name is Brian Maratea. Although you may have never seen him on the big screen you can most definitely hear a lot of his work within his 20 plus years of experience working sound in the major motion picture and entertainment industry. Working on television shows such as “Dallas”, “The New Detective: Case Studies In Forensic Science”, to major films such as “Dark Places” and everyone favorite marvel movie “Logan”, there’s more than meets the eye with it comes to not only sound and sound production but when it comes to man himself: Brian Maratea.
Currently teaches Sound Production at Houston Community College in Houston Texas, Brian Maratea takes his students into both the often-harsh realities and highly technical aspects of sound production. We at VEDA Communications had the opportunity to take notes in one of his classes being offered off site at the Houston Media Source, which is located at 7305 Navigation Blvd, Houston, TX 77011. This 5 plus hour class was one in which students from a multitude of backgrounds in the entertainment and media industries were presented to not only learn the technical aspects of sound production, but to learn it from the perspective of veteran pro Sound Engineer Brian Maratea.
There were several key things that we learned from Brian Maratea when it came to the real-world application of sound production. The first thing to understand is sound and sound production, you must first think like a “Sound Guy”. What this means is that one should only think of sound in its more rudimentary form. Instead, one should seek to understand the audio biomechanics of how sound is made, transmitted, received, and interpreted by the listeners’ ears and brain. Adding on to that, one must also understand how the environment affects both sound and sound quality and even more than that how sounds and sound quality affect the perception of sound to the observer.
Another thing that students learned in Brian Maratea at the Houston Media Source without giving too much away was how sound mediums like the various types of microphone conduct and transmit sound. During Brian Maratea course, not only did the students in attendance get the opportunity to learn from a “hands-on” approach on how to utilize various type of microphones, but they were also able to actively listen to the characteristics of each microphone and get an in-depth understanding of how each of these microphones captured and amplified sound.
Beyond that, what we like the most about Brian Maratea was how efficient he was at delivering his vast knowledge of sound and sound production in terms that the average person would understand the subject matter he was teaching at Houston Media Source. In saying that we highly suspect that the students at Houston community college perceive Brian Maratea in the same way as well. We also like the fact that Brian Maratea was “comfortable” in rattling off the technical aspects of sound production off the cuff while at the same time taking questions on the fly and injecting real world applications and examples from his time in Hollywood to help students understand the subject matter better.
We know that’s a mouthful, but it’s not every day that you get the opportunity to meet and become a student of a genius like Brian Maratea. If you’re wondering when the Houston Media Source will host another sound production class taught by Brian Maratea’s, we don’t know, but its currently in the works. But if another one of his classes becomes available to Houston Media Source in the future, we’ll be sure to let you know.
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