Dayton Burr "Bones" Howe (born March 18, 1933) is an American

record producer A record producer or music producer is a music creating project's overall supervisor whose responsibilities can involve a range of creative and technical leadership roles. Typically the job involves hands-on oversight of recording sessions; ensu ...

and

recording engineer An audio engineer (also known as a sound engineer or recording engineer) helps to produce a recording or a live performance, balancing and adjusting sound sources using equalization, dynamics processing and audio effects, mixing, reproducti ...

who scored a string of hits in the 1960s and 1970s, often of the

sunshine pop Sunshine pop, originally called soft pop and soft rock, is a loosely defined form of pop music that was first associated with early soft rock producers and songwriters based in Los Angeles, California, during the mid-to late 1960s. Its recording ...

genre, starting in 1965 with

the Turtles The Turtles are an America, American Band (rock and pop), rock band formed in Los Angeles, California in 1965. The band achieved several Top 40 hits throughout the latter half of the 1960s, including "It Ain't Me Babe" (1965), "You Baby (song), ...

cover of Bob Dylan's "

It Ain't Me Babe "It Ain't Me Babe" is a song by Bob Dylan that originally appeared on his fourth album '' Another Side of Bob Dylan'', which was released in 1964 by Columbia Records. According to music critic Oliver Trager, this song, along with others on the al ...

," and continuing with most of the hits of

The 5th Dimension The 5th Dimension is an American vocal group. Their music encompasses sunshine pop, pop soul, and psychedelic soul. They were an important crossover music act of the 1960s and 1970s, although both praised and derided for their particular music ...

and

The Association The Association is an American sunshine pop band from Los Angeles, California. During the late 1960s, the band had numerous hits at or near the top of the Billboard charts, ''Billboard'' charts (including "Windy (The Association song), Windy" ...

. With the exception of '' Closing Time'', he produced and engineered all of

Tom Waits Thomas Alan Waits (born December 7, 1949) is an American musician, composer, songwriter, and actor. His lyrics often focus on society's underworld and are delivered in his trademark deep, gravelly voice. He began in the American folk music, fo ...

' releases with

Asylum Records Asylum Records is an American record label, founded in 1971 by David Geffen and partner Elliot Roberts. It was taken over by Warner Communications (now the Warner Music Group) in 1972, and later merged with Elektra Records to become Elektra/As ...

, some of which are considered among the artist's best recordings. Their almost decade-long collaboration has been described as "one of the great artist-producer partnerships". Howe performed music supervision on several feature films, and was one of the first industry members to serve as both producer and engineer of the hit records on which he worked. In addition, he was occasionally credited as a musician on recordings as "Dayton Howe".

Biography

Early life and education

Howe was born in

Minneapolis, Minnesota Minneapolis is a city in Hennepin County, Minnesota, United States, and its county seat. With a population of 429,954 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the state's List of cities in Minnesota, most populous city. Locat ...

and moved to

Sarasota, Florida Sarasota () is a city in and the county seat of Sarasota County, Florida, United States. It is located in Southwest Florida, the southern end of the Tampa Bay area, and north of Fort Myers, Florida, Fort Myers and Punta Gorda, Florida, Punta Gord ...

in 1941. He graduated from Sarasota High School in 1951, becoming a drummer with a dance band and a jazz quintet. He received a bachelor's degree in Electronics and Communications in 1956 from

Georgia Tech The Georgia Institute of Technology (commonly referred to as Georgia Tech, GT, and simply Tech or the Institute) is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. Established in 1885, it has the lar ...

Career

After graduation Howe decided to combine his love of music and his electronics degree by moving to Hollywood and starting a career in 1956 as an apprentice recording engineer at

Radio Recorders Radio Recorders, Inc. was an American recording studio located in Los Angeles, California. During the 1940s and 1950s, Radio Recorders was one of the largest independent recording studios in the world. Notable musicians recorded at Radio Recorde ...

and advancing to mixing engineer the following year, recording

Elvis Presley Elvis Aaron Presley (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977) was an American singer and actor. Referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Elvis Presley, one of the most significant cultural figures of the ...

and

Jerry Lee Lewis Jerry Lee Lewis (September 29, 1935October 28, 2022) was an American pianist, singer, and songwriter. Nicknamed "The Killer", he was described as "rock 'n' roll's first great wild man". A pioneer of rock and roll and rockabilly music, Lewis m ...

. In 1961 Bill Putnam hired Howe to work at United Recording, where he engineered Frank Sinatra's '' Sinatra Swings'', Jan and Dean's '' Surf City'' and ''Drag City'', Johnny Rivers' '' At the Whisky à Go Go'', and the Mamas & the Papas' first three albums, including the hits "

California Dreamin' "California Dreamin" is a song written by John and Michelle Phillips in 1963 and first recorded by Barry McGuire. The best-known version is by the Mamas & the Papas, who sang backup on the original version and released it as a single in Dec ...

" and " Monday, Monday". After working with

Juice Newton Juice Newton (born Judith Kay Newton; February 18, 1952) is an American pop and country singer, songwriter, and musician. Newton has received five Grammy Award nominations in the Pop and Country Best Female Vocalist categorieswinning once in 198 ...

and

, gaining 20 Gold and Platinum awards from the

RIAA The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...

, Howe became interested in promoting the use of rock and pop in films. He worked as the music supervisor for several high grossing films such as ''

Back to the Future ''Back to the Future'' is a 1985 American science fiction film directed by Robert Zemeckis and written by Zemeckis and Bob Gale. It stars Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Crispin Glover, and Thomas F. Wilson. Set in 1985 ...

'' and ''

Serial Mom ''Serial Mom'' is a 1994 American satirical black comedy crime film directed and written by John Waters and starring Kathleen Turner as the title character along with Sam Waterston, Ricki Lake, and Suzanne Somers. It tells the story of a housew ...

''. Howe was the chief engineer for the 1967

Monterey Pop Festival The Monterey International Pop Festival was a three-day music festival held June 16-18, 1967, at the Monterey County Fairgrounds in Monterey, California. The festival is remembered for the first major American appearances by the Jimi Hendrix Ex ...

concert feature film and the 1968 NBC Elvis Christmas Special. In 1986 Howe was offered the position of Vice President (and head of the Music Department) at

Columbia Pictures Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc., Trade name, doing business as Columbia Pictures, is an American film Production company, production and Film distributor, distribution company that is the flagship unit of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group ...

and was promoted to Executive Vice President in 1989 when the studio was bought by the

Sony is a Japanese multinational conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered at Sony City in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. The Sony Group encompasses various businesses, including Sony Corporation (electronics), Sony Semiconductor Solutions (i ...

Corporation. Howe left in 1992 and returned to recording independent music and film scores.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Howe, Bones 1933 births Living people Grammy Award winners Musicians from Minneapolis People from Sarasota, Florida Sarasota High School alumni Georgia Tech alumni Record producers from California Musicians from Los Angeles American audio engineers Engineers from California