1/28/2009 BEACHWOOD -- When they announce the winners at next weekend's Grammys, chances are a number of Greater Clevelanders will be heading for the stage.
There's a Grammy nominee or a winner almost everywhere you look at Telarc, the Beachwood company that has become a world leader in music production.
"We're very proud of the fact that a lot of people from Northeast Ohio here have set the trends for how recorded music is heard today, as well as the quality of that music," says Dave Love, president of Heads Up International, the recording company which merged with Telarc in 2000.
Telarc has won 59 Grammys since its first in 1980, and has been nominated for hundreds more. This year Telarc has another 19 Grammy nominations.
At the audio console of his production suite at Telarc, chief engineer Michael Bishop talks about his past Grammy wins and the work he's been nominated for again this year.
"We're unbelievably proud to bring the notoriety to Cleveland, our home town," says Bishop. "We're just a little gem hidden away here in Beachwood. A lot of people don't know we're here, that there's a major force in the music industry buried away here in Cleveland.
Telarc is now into all kinds of music. What started as a classical music company in 1977 has now risen among the best in producing other genres as well.
"What's exciting with what we're doing here in Cleveland is that of the 19 Grammys we're nominated for this year, it's a whole broad spectrum of genres," says Love. "From world music to blues, to traditional and contemporary blues, classical. So we like the diversification."
But with that diversification comes more competition. It's not easy crafting the finest sound for people who enjoy vastly different kinds of music, and then getting Grammys for it.
"There are easily 30 thousand entries into the Grammys," chief engineer Bishop points out. "And to even just make it to the nominations is quite an honor."
The staff of Telarc has acquired a world-wide reputation over the last 30 years. Love says it is well deserved.
"Some of these people are not only the leaders in their field, but leaders in their field all over the world. And that's what makes it so exciting. We can be here in Northeast Ohio and put out our products and have employees that are really at the top of their game in the recording industry," says Love.
And as technologically and artistically advanced the company is, Telarc has recently gone back to its beginnings in one respect. The company has begun to press vinyl LPs, demanded by die-hard nostalgia fans. The LPs can come with a coupon so the music can also be downloaded free.
Whatever the format, Love says the success of the company is due to its aherence to its founding principles.
"Quality to us is first and foremost. We want to capture the sound so everything you hear is true," Love explains. "Basically that's been our slogan for a long time."
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