Martin Russell is an English recording engineer, record producer, composer, and musician. He has been a core member of the music group
Afro Celt Sound System
Afro Celt Sound System is a British musical group who fuse electronic music with traditional Gaelic and West African music. Afro Celt Sound System was formed in 1995 by producer-guitarist Simon Emmerson, and feature a wide range of guest artists. ...
since the recording of the first album ''
Volume 1: Sound Magic'' in mid-1995, and has twice been nominated for a
Grammy Award. As of 2010, the recorded output of the group has so far been exclusively released by
Peter Gabriel
Peter Brian Gabriel (born 13 February 1950) is an English musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, and activist. He rose to fame as the original lead singer of the progressive rock band Genesis. After leaving Genesis in 1975, he launched ...
's ''
Real World Records''. (The next two albums, ''
Volume 2: Release'' and ''
Volume 3: Further in Time'' earned the afore-mentioned Grammy Nominations). The group recorded and released three more albums ''
Seed'', ''
Pod
Pod or POD may refer to:
Biology
* Pod (fruit), a type of fruit of a flowering plant
* Husk or pod of a legume
* Pod of whales or other marine mammals
* "-pod", a suffix meaning "foot" used in taxonomy
Electronics and computing
* Proper ort ...
'' (an album of remixes and re-workings), and ''
Volume 5: Anatomic''. Russell has written film music for several feature films, including ''
Hotel Rwanda'' and the Lebanese film ''
Bosta''.
History
Russell commenced his musical career in 1979, joining UK band
The Enid on bass guitar and keyboards a few months after completing a BA Hons degree in music. His most notable contribution to the band's catalogue was "Once She Was", an arrangement of the folk song melody "
Scarborough Fair". He remained a member until 1981, citing his increasing dissatisfaction with the whimsical vocally-based direction that the band was taking, as his reason for leaving. With fellow ex-Enid keyboard player
William Gilmour he formed the instrumental rock band
Craft, who recorded an album which was released in 1984. He subsequently focused on studio building and sound engineering for the rest of the 1980s, notably at Utopia and Swanyard Studios before designing and building his own studio in North London, England in 1991.
Sonic Innovation opened in 1992 and has been the headquarters for the majority of Russell's music production, recording, CD mastering and film music composition activities ever since.
References
Entry on Afro Celt Sound System fansiteSonic Innovation Website
Year of birth missing (living people)
Living people
American record producers
American audio engineers
Afro Celt Sound System members
The Enid members
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