David Rideau

I believe it was the year 2000 when I first met Dave. He booked a percussion session in studio B at the Village Recorder in Los Angeles, and I was working as his assistant engineer. The first thing I remember from that day is how Dave brought his own microphones - a pair of B&K 4006’s (now DPA) with power supplies. The sound of the percussion he tracked was impeccable, and very HiFi.

Our relationship came full circle a couple years later when I began working with Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, who Dave has lots of history with, including a ton of collaboration with Steve Hodge, Jimmy and Terry’s head mixing engineer at the time. Dave would often stop by Jimmy and Terry’s 3rd floor studio at the Village to say hi, and for me it was just amazing to have the opportunity to interact and learn from such great talent. My favorite mix technique that I learned from Dave was how to add air to a lead vocal so that it opened up without sounding too bright. At the time, this was a breakthrough for me, and I used that technique on all of my mixes from then on.

For a little context, here is an overview of Dave’s background:

Dave Rideau is a Grammy winner and four-time nominee. He has been making records and mixing for film and TV for more than thirty years. 

The Los Angeles based mixer and engineer has earned dozens of gold and platinum records for his work with musicians and on movie soundtracks. Rideau's work has taken him to Europe, Japan, China and Brazil.

His discography includes: Sting, TLC, Janet Jackson, Brenda Russell, Earth Wind and Fire, George Benson, Juan Gabriel, Al Jarreau, Kirk Franklin and Boney James. His film score mixes include the upcoming Disney+ ‘Safety’ (scored by Marcus Miller) and the classic ‘Scarface.’ His television music mixing includes HBO's dramatic theme to the boxing series “24/7”.

Rideau has also mixed in surround and various other immersive formats including the Dolby ATMOS version of the Miles Davis album ‘Kind Of Blue.’

You can also check out Dave’s engineering credits here at allmusic.com.

We sent Dave our Ecoplate reverb plugin for first tests, and here is what he said:

“The Ecoplate plugin is an accurate representation of a product that I’ve loved and used on countless projects over the years. In addition to the spot-on reproduction, the GUI gives creatives the perfect toolset to tweak parameters that previously would have to be added to the signal chain.

Well done!"