Chris Stone

Chris Stone (1935 – September 10, 2016) was an American music industry businessman and writer, and the co-founder with Gary Kellgren of the Record Plant recording studios. Stone founded Filmsonix in 1987, sold the Record Plant in 1989, and was the founder and CEO of World Studio Group. He co-founded the Society of Professional Audio Recording Services (SPARS), and he co-founded the Music Producers Guild of the Americas (MPGA), serving as executive director. The MPGA developed into the Producers & Engineers Wing of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (NARAS).

Stone earned an MBA from the UCLA Anderson School of Management, and he lectured online for the Berklee College of Music as well as in person for the USC Thornton School of Music where he was an associate professor. He and his wife Gloria welcomed their first child in New York City.

Stone was introduced to Gary Kellgren, a recording engineer working at several New York City recording studios on sessions for musicians such as Frank Zappa and Jimi Hendrix. Stone and Kellgren met because Kellgren's wife Marta was seven months pregnant and scared of the upcoming birth. Mutual friends thought that the two couples could talk about being parents and ease Marta's worry.

Stone convinced Kellgren that the two of them, with $100,000 In early 1968 Kellgren and Stone opened a new studio at 321 West 44th Street, creating a living-room-type of environment for the musicians. It opened on March 13, 1968.

In 1969, Kellgren and Stone sold the New York operation to TeleVision Communications (TVC), a cable television company that was broadening its portfolio. The purpose of the sale was to gain cash for expansion into Los Angeles with a second studio.

Record Plant, Los Angeles Opening celebration in Los Angeles, December 4, 1969. Pictured L to R: Attorney Tom Butler, producer Tom Wilson, investors Ben Johnson and Ancky Johnson (cutting cake), founders Chris Stone and Gary Kellgren. Seeing the early success of the New York studio, Kellgren and Stone decided to move to the West Coast and open another one in Los Angeles. One of the first employees of the studio would be Chris' nephew, Mike D. Stone. To design the studio, they contracted with Tom Hidley who had built TTG Studios in 1965, and was becoming known in L.A. for answering the high-decibel needs of rock music. On December 4, 1969, the new studio opened its doors on 8456 West Third Street near La Cienega Boulevard. Sometimes known as "Record Plant West", the new studio held a 16-track recorder, larger than the 12-track system in New York (occasionally called "Record Plant East"), and studio time was 20 to 25 percent less expensive than typical studios in New York. Keith Moon and John Lennon were important enough clients to be given a gold key to the facility. Stone said, "They would come in at three in the morning and help themselves to a beer."

In July 1977, Kellgren drowned in the swimming pool at his Hollywood home. Guitarist Ronnie Wood wrote that Kellgren was probably electrocuted while trying to fix some underwater speakers in his pool, but the cause of death remains uncertain. The loss of his friend and business partner hit Stone hard. Stone was suddenly responsible for keeping all three studios operating, but he concentrated his attention on Los Angeles. He slowly began to lose interest in the Sausalito location.

The L.A. operation expanded further in the early 1980s, equipping two more remote recording trucks. The three trucks held consoles made by Automated Processes, Inc. (API).

In 1982, Stone leased sound stages M and L at the Paramount Pictures studio lot, for film sound recordings. Veteran film scoring engineer Dan Wallin assisted Stone in the redesign of the studios and the selection of equipment, including Solid State Logic (SSL) consoles and Hidley studio monitors based on JBL components. Soundtracks that the Record Plant tracked and mixed there include ones forFlashdance, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Annie, 48 Hrs., and An Officer and a Gentleman. Wallin and Stone gave recording industry talks at the Paramount's Scoring Studio M in September 1982, describing how the recording business should expand into motion pictures to counteract flagging profit margins. Stone said that, in order to be recognized by the film worker unions, he formed a separate business entity called Record Plant Scoring, and hired a separate crew of union engineers. In January 1986 the Record Plant reopened at 1032 North Sycamore Avenue in Hollywood in the former Radio Recorders "Annex", a historic studio where Elvis Presley and Louis Armstrong recorded. Stone said that the Record Plant was not going to abandon its roots in audio-only recordings. By 1986, Jim Pace and Jeff Evans purchased the company from Stone and operated out of the Record Plant facilities unit 1992, continuing currently in West Hollywood.

In 1987, Stone established Filmsonix, a consulting firm for the recording studio industry. Filmsonix provided consulting services to hardware manufacturers, recording studios and record labels. Stone arranged for four remote recording trucks, two for each stage, at Woodstock '94, as a safety backup in case something went wrong. Bearsville Studios would serve as the hub of recording. Bob Clearmountain was chosen as chief audio engineer to tie the four parts together, and to mix the resulting album. Stone arranged to have a tour bus parked between the two stages for as many as 12 audio engineers to sleep. After Peter Gabriel's concluding set ended in the wee hours of Monday, August 15, 1994, Stone's plan was carried out: all of the performances were digitally copied and backed up in the next two days. Not one song was lost.

Stone's WSG also provided audio recording oversight to the Rolling Stones on their 1997–1998 Bridges to Babylon Tour through South America and Europe.

In January 2016, Stone and Kellgren were inducted into the TEC Awards Hall of Fame at the NAMM Show, honoring their co-founding of the Record Plant. Also inducted was Jeff "Skunk" Baxter of Steely Dan and the Doobie Brothers. Stone died at the age of 81 on September 10, 2016, of a heart attack and stroke.