Citylink

When Florida Atlantic University professor Michael Zager began designing the school’s commercial-music program last year, he figured the best way for students to apply what they learned was to run their own record label. So last month, the school launched Hoot Recordings, which Zager claims is more ambitious than even many major labels. “It’s modeled after the original Motown, where they did everything [in-house],” he says. “Most major labels, for example, don’t shoot videos. They hire people.”

Hoot’s all-student staff, however, includes videographers, choreographers, audio engineers, talent scouts, accountants, even pre-law students who handle contracts. While the staff is largely composed of FAU’s 60 commercial-music majors, who are required to work there, several students from Palm Beach Community College also have jobs with the label.

“There are a lot of schools that put out CDs,” Zager says, “but we haven’t found anything that’s modeled the way ours is. We literally do everything.”

Hoot is currently working with four South Florida artists: Amber Leigh, an FAU music-business major and country singer who plays several instruments; R&B/hip-hop vocalist Denise Le; funk/rock/reggae group The People Upstairs; and singer-guitarist Joel LeGros. Zager says Hoot will record any kind of music, from classical to rap.

Zager himself boasts a diverse musical background. In the late ’60s and early ’70s, he played in a jazz-rock band called Ten Wheel Drive. In 1978, the Michael Zager Band scored a hit with the disco song “Let’s All Chant,” which rose to the top of the U.K. dance chart. He says he has produced, composed and arranged music for motion pictures such as The Eyes of Laura Mars, The Last Days of Disco and Summer of Sam; TV and radio commercials; and albums by artists such as Peabo Bryson, Luther Vandross, and Cissy and Whitney Houston.

He says he created the program to teach students all aspects of the recording business, from working in a state-of-the-art studio to interacting with an 11-member advisory board, which counts among its members Dick Asher, a former president of CBS’ recording and publishing divisions.

Zager says that the label will release its first CD, a single by The People Upstairs, in early 2004 and that all sales profits will go right back into the label. “These are gonna be CD singles right now, not compilations,” he says. “Eventually, hopefully, some of the [acts will record] albums, depending on how radio reacts. With some of them, we will probably go for major-label distribution or independent national distribution, and some we’ll just distribute ourselves. It depends on the marketability.”

Meanwhile, Hoot’s A and R committee continues to search for new talent on campus, regularly accepting demos and holding battle-of-the-bands competitions. “[The faculty doesn’t] butt into that,” Zager says. “We faculty-supervise, but that’s all.”

Hoot is not the only college record label operating in South Florida. Ten years ago, the University of Miami-based ’Cane Records began with a $5,000 loan from the university’s School of Music. After releasing a CD by the band Treehouse in 1994, the label was able to pay the loan. ’Cane Records has since released CDs by the Youth Orchestra of Florida and hip-hop artist Burk, among others. The label is currently recording CDs by the UM marching band and the R&B trio Unison.

Students enrolled in UM’s Music Business and Entertainment Industries program are not required to work at the label, but Eric Stinnett, the label’s president and CEO, says they may one day have the option of working there for credit. Stinnett says the label prefers to work with groups that already have an active fan base. “If they can get gigs by themselves,” he says, “it’s just much better for us. We want to make it as easy for ’Cane Records as possible, because we don’t have a lot of capital income.

“When you’re not funded by the university,” he continues, “your budgets for artists aren’t tens of thousands of dollars or $5,000. Everything is on a small scale. But because of that, our graduates — and everyone who participates in ’Cane Records — have a much better understanding of recording-industry operations, and we know how to get money, how to do the fundraisers. So basically, we’re just that much ahead of the curve, because things haven’t been handed to us.”

For more information on the record labels, visit www.fau.edu/hoot and www.canerecords.com.

Contact Colleen Dougher at cdougher@citylinkmagazine.com.