JArthur Grubbs, known as JayG, became an audio engineer in 2011 for the love of music, stepping into a technical world that has proven both challenging and satisfying for the Orlando-based creative.
Since starting, he has held recording sessions with local well-known musicians such as Apopka rapper and singer Dreci last month, and he plans to work with other Florida notables soon. “My man [rapper] Moe hit me up and said, [singer] ‘Sevyn Streeter needs an engineer for the day.’ So I worked with her down at Starke Lake Studios,” Grubbs told Orlando Inno.
Grubbs, who doesn't own his own studio, books time at other establishments such as Asylum Studios in south Orlando.
Aaron Hernandez is head engineer and studio manager at Asylum Studios' Orlando location, where he has worked since 2020. "Our Miami location opened in 2016. This one opened in 2019. With all the advancements in tech, an artist can record at home, but there are advantages to working with an engineer. Having an engineer, artists don't have to worry about doing all the technical things. It allows them to be more creative and get polished, professional quality sound. A good analogy is that you're going to have better performance, generally speaking, when you go to your mechanic to take care of your car instead of doing it yourself."
Grubbs, Hernandez and many other technologists are not the first industry professionals who come to mind when many think about top jobs in music. The performers may grab the spotlight, but, in reality, audio engineers have the brighter jobs outlook.
Right now, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Florida has the third-highest number of audio engineering jobs in the nation (850), behind only California (5,080) and New York (1,520), with metro Orlando (260) and metro Miami (260) leading the state in job numbers in the profession. Metro Orlando is tied for sixth in the U.S. for employment levels, meaning a high percentage of professional audio engineers living in the region is employed.
Nationally, BLS predicts a 10% increase in audio engineering jobs by 2031, compared to 4% for singers and musicians.
Also, the latest “Best Jobs” list by U.S. News and World Report ranked audio engineering in the top five "Best Creative and Media Jobs." The ranking is based on salaries, ample open positions and opportunities for promotion.
The demand is growing for technical experts who can engineer audio for streaming, video games, film, television, podcasts, sporting events and other productions. The annual mean wage for an audio engineering job in metro Orlando is $49,100, compared with $67,760 statewide.
Most music artists record songs and add them to streaming catalogs like Apple Music and Spotify directly or through a distribution service — popular ones are DistroKid and CD Baby. Artists pay their audio technicians — some pay as much as $45 per song for digital distribution services — and, at this point in the process, the artists haven't earned a penny yet. Sites like Spotify pay artists between $0.003-$0.005 per stream after the fact — there is no up-front payment. The other streaming services pay similar rates.
For that pay to amount to something substantive, an artist must become famous. That means technical creators like Grubbs and Hernandez are often the only people on the creative side getting paid living wages.
Meanwhile, their expertise has grown in importance.
The U.S. music industry, which grew by 6% in 2022 to a record high of $15.9 billion, attributes a vast majority of its revenue — about 84% — to streaming, according to the Recording Industry Association of America. Because streaming is tech-fueled, the technologists at the intersection of music and tech like Grubbs play a pivotal role. Without audio engineers, the streaming revolution wouldn't have happened, as all streaming songs are digitally mixed and mastered.
Sign up here for The Beat, Orlando Inno’s free newsletter. And be sure to follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.
