OUT EAST END
A Star-Studded Recording Studio
Cynthia Daniels expands on work with celebrities
BY ANGELA LAGRECA
It’s barely April, and Cynthia
Daniels’ busy season
is “really kicking in.” The
Grammy and Emmy-winning
recording engineer, record
producer, and studio owner says
her desire to live and work out
east “has come together like a fi eld
of dreams.”
Alec Baldwin, Julie Andrews,
Sir Paul McCartney, Steve Martin,
Blythe Danner, Jimmy Fallon,
Christie Brinkley, Nile Rogers, Rufus
Wainwright, John Leguizamo,
Mercedes Ruehl, Chris Martin, GE
Smith, Taylor Barton, Matthew
Broderick, Sarah Jessica Parker,
Julianne Moore, Jennifer Lopez,
Beyoncé, and Jay Z are just some
of the over 400 celebrity and local
clients who have recorded at Daniel’s
state-of-the-art recording studio,
MonkMusic Studios, in East
Hampton.
“Everything I’ve done has prepared
me for the next job without
knowing it,” said Daniels, who
worked and trained with some
great producers like Phil Ramone.
“I was exposed to live concerts,
jingles, and cast albums… during
the golden age of recording in the
’80s.”
It all started with her fi rst great
love — music.
“I’m an artist, and I had always
wanted to be in the service of music
somehow,” Daniels said. “I enjoy
electronics and science, and I
thought, ‘I can express myself and
make a living’ in this profession.”
Her fi rst studio engineering
gigs were for Phoebe Snow and Dr.
John. She soon fell into recording
major jazz artists “because of the
piano I had — a nine-foot Steinway
in a small Upper East Side studio.”
Jazz work led to work in TV
and fi lm. “We did all the music
for 20/20 and ‘World News Tonight,'”
Daniels said. “We remade
the theme music to ‘Wide World
of Sports’… at one point we did
every game show and soap opera
(incidental music). Then came opportunities
to do large orchestras,
the Great American Songbook, pop
Alec Baldwin with Cynthia Daniels.
vocals, and Broadway.”
“The fi rst Broadway show I ever
recorded was ‘Black n Blue,'” she
said. “It was a revelation because
I was presented with some of the
greatest singers: Linda Hopkins,
Carrie Smith, and Ruth Brown
— and some of the greatest music
that spawned jazz blues and ultimately
rock and roll.”
After buying a house in East
Hampton in 1998, she began splitting
her time and was constantly
commuting.
“I’ve been in love with the East
End of Long Island since I was 30,
when I was fi rst introduced to it,”
said Daniels, who explained that
the weekend getaway house quickly
became a question of “How can I
be here all the time?”
“I had a small studio in my
house, and because of digital editing,
I realized I could do some of
my work out here,” she said.
She saw “a need for fi lm and voiceover
work, fi lm post for sound,
mixing of fi lms, and mostly ADR,
which is looping (re-recording
sound for TV and fi lm).” She developed
a celebrity clientele, but the
same time, she developed a strong
local clientele.
“Nancy Atlas heard of me
and came to work on some of
her music,” Daniels said. “I met
other local artists (Inda Eaton,
Mama Lee Rose, the Hoo Doo
Loungers, Cliff Black, and many
others). I had no idea that would
happen.”
Daniels worked from home, but
it was when they moved to another
studio out east — World Cottage,
which became 91 East — that she
“basically took over that part of the
business.”
“Every room in my house was
a recording studio,” she said with
amusement. ‘It was a dream
home…until I met my partner,” she
said, referring to Cori Krane.
“We met in late 2006, at East
Hampton Indoor Tennis — just one
of many romances that have come
from the club,” she joked. They
married in 2011. ”Within a couple
of years Cori said, ‘We’ve got to do
something about your loud career
and parade of clients.’”
The plan to bump out fi ve feet
from the house turned into a
2,000-square-foot addition. Daniels
enlisted renowned architect
John Storyk to help create her
dream studio.
“John had designed many of the
studios I’d worked in in Manhattan,”
Daniels recalled. “He has an
affection for the East End, and had
designed the Ross School auditorium.”
“I thought, ‘If I build it and they
don’t come, that’s okay — this is
what I do, and this where I belong:
on the East End with my own recording
studio.” They came.
The studio was completed in
2011, the same year she won a
Grammy for ‘The Julie Andrews
Collection’ CD. Last August, Jimmy
Fallon recorded a duet with Dolly
Parton at MonkMusic (Parton did
her tracks in Nashville). During
the height of the pandemic, Scarlett
Johanssen recorded a duet
with Bono for the animated movie
“Sing 2.”
Today, she is recording with Alec
Baldwin (“Boss Baby 2”). She’s excited
about fi nishing up an album
by local musician Fred Raimondo
called ‘Cinema’, and working with
“midnight at the Oasis” composer
David Nichtern, on an album called
‘Pandemoonea’.
She describes her career path
as “a confl uence of 16 hour days,
a whole lot of luck, and hopefully
some talent.”
“When I won a Grammy as engineer
and mixer for ‘The Producers’,
it reminded me that ‘every overnight
sensation takes about 20
years,’” Daniels said with a smile.
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