This year, the winners are:

GRAND PRIZE WINNER: Purchase College
Student Team Members: Trevor Fedele, Patrick Linehan, Joshua Pleeter, Brendan Williams, and Joseph Yonkers
Faculty Advisor: Silas Brown
Song Title: “Soviet Union”
Composer: Sean McVerry
View the Project Log (PDF)

RUNNER-UP: University of North Alabama
Student Team Members: Luke Hunter, Donnie Pitts, Ryan Speakman, Pace Collette,and Leo Taylor
Faculty Advisor: Walt Aldridge
Song Title: “Jaded”
Composer: Ashton Mabe
View the Project Log (PDF)

HONORABLE MENTION: Belmont University
Student Team Members: Dan Almond, Brien Pafford, Sean Davidson, Ian Zorbaugh, Tim Reitnouer
Faculty Advisor: Jim Kaiser
Song Title: “Hesitate”
Composer: Judah Akers
View the Project Log (PDF)

We congratulate you on your ingenuity and your skilled execution. (And your Shure gear prizes!)

Grand Prize Winners seated left to right: Joe Yonkers, Brendan Williams, Pat Linehan. Standing left to right: Peter Denenberg (Chair, Studio Production & Studio Composition Depts), Trevor Fedele, Josh Pleeter, Silas Brown (Faculty Advisor)

The seven other competing schools submitted excellent tracks. A high-five goes out to them for their hard work, as well as the pics and video updates that kept me smiling all year long.

• Anderson University
• Appalachian State University (Hayes School of Music)
• Berklee College of Music
• Ex’pression College for Digital Arts
• Peabody Institute of the John Hopkins University
• University of Miami (Frost School of Music)
• University of South Carolina

A huge thank-you to the following recording industry luminaries who judged this year’s competition:

Carlos Alvarez has worked with recording artists including Marc Anthony, Alejandro Sanz, Ricky Martin, Jose Feliciano, Mika, Luis Enrique, and Julio Iglesias.

Steve Churchyard has worked with recording artists including Sheryl Crow, Rascal Flatts, Shakira, Jason Mraz, and Herbie Hancock.

Billy Perez has received credit as an engineer for projects with The Rolling Stones, Wynton Marsalis, John Batiste, Ron Carter, and Alan St. Jon, among others.

Mark Rubel runs the Pogo Studio in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, where he has worked with artists including Alison Krauss, Luther Allison, Adrian Belew, and Captain Rat and the Blind Rivets.

Zoe Thrall runs Studio at the Palms in Las Vegas, where she has worked with artists including Rihanna, The Killers, Katy Perry, Alicia Keys, LMFAO, Maroon 5, and Lady Gaga.

Visit the Contests page on shure.com next fall to learn more about the annual competition, which challenges college students in audio education programs to make the best recording they can using only Shure gear.

Since last fall, they’ve had the opportunity to experiment with different Shure mics in an effort to record the best track they can using only Shure gear. In this final installment of the competition video series, the teams recap what they learned in the process, and tell us what they thought of the mics they used.

Stay tuned: at the end of April, we’ll announce the winning schools as determined by our panel of recording industry luminaries.

Good luck to all, and thanks so much for sharing your creativity and ingenuity with us at Shure. It keeps us inspired (and maybe even young).

View videos from the planning and tracking phases of the competition:

Planning phase videos

Tracking phase videos

Learn more about the Fantastic Scholastic Recording Competition on our website.

Check out the teams’ miking techniques and processes as they navigate the tracking phase of the competition in this second installment of this year’s video series. Stay tuned: next time, the teams will share their post-production videos and reflect on their overall competition experiences with 20/20 hindsight and a whole lot more experience under their belts.

View the planning phase videos from earlier in this year’s competition.

Learn more about the Fantastic Scholastic Recording Competition on our website.

Last fall, ten colleges were randomly selected from the pool of applicants to compete in our annual Fantastic Scholastic Recording Competition, in which audio education students seek the top nod from music industry giants by recording the best track they can using only Shure gear.

Throughout the school year, the competing teams will keep video diaries that give us a sneak peek into their process, beginning with the planning and pre-production phase of the competition. Check out the first installment! And best of luck to all competing schools!

Learn more about the Fantastic Scholastic Recording Competition on our website.

Without further ado, the winners are…

Grand Prize Winners Taylor Bray, Jeff Braun & Grant Hartford (L to R) of Middle Tennessee State University with Shure associate Ryan Smith. Faculty advisors Michael Fleming & Bill Crabtree not pictured.

GRAND PRIZE WINNER: Middle Tennessee State University
Student team members: Taylor Bray, Jeff Braun, and Grant Hartford
Faculty Advisors: Michael Fleming and Bill Crabtree
Song Title: “Falliday”
Composer: Rebecca Roubion
View the Project Log (PDF)

RUNNER UP: New York University Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music
Student team members: Jacob Blumberg, Spencer Doren, Phoebe Ryan, Vaughn Sulit, and Damian Wiseman
Faculty Advisor: Jim Anderson
Song Title: “You Won’t Be Alone”
Composer: Phoebe Holiday Ryan
View the Project Log (PDF)

HONORABLE MENTION: Delta State University
Student team members: Laeitta Wade, Travis Calvin, Mathew Coleman, Horace Willis, and Curtis Nunnery
Faculty Advisor: Mike Iacopelli
Song Title: “Now What Do We Do”
Composer: Tricia Walker
View the Project Log (PDF)

We were so lucky to have the following recording industry veterans serve as judges of this year’s competition:

• Ken Caillat
• Leslie Ann Jones
• Dave O’Donnell
• Keith Olsen
• John Paterno

A huge thanks to them! Thanks also to the seven other competing schools, who submitted admirable work:

• Clemson University
• DePaul University
• University of the Pacific
• New England School of Communications
• Tribeca Flashpoint Media Arts Academy
• University of Miami Frost School of Music
• William Paterson University

Visit shure.com next fall to learn more about the annual competition, which challenges college students in audio education programs to make the best recording they can using only Shure gear.

What’s that, you say? It’s when 10 teams of college students in audio engineering and sound recording programs lay down the best track they can using only Shure microphones. A panel of recording industry icons picks the winners.

Listening to the student recordings reminds me why we do what we do at Shure: so people can make and share music. It’s especially gratifying to hear the next generation of artists and engineers discover the qualities that make Shure mics great.

Stay tuned: next month, we’ll announce the winners of this year’s competition. You’ll be able to hear their tracks then.

For now, check out these short videos of the teams’ experiences in the pre-production, tracking, and post-production phases of the competition.