Petaluman creates the perfect sound

Petaluma entrepreneur Jeffrey Norman’s long-spanning career has put him in the mix with some of the world’s top musical acts, but he still takes time to help out at home, recording performances from a local kindergarten class and volunteering in the community.

Norman, an audio recording professional who concentrates his efforts on mastering sound, has worked with acts like the Doobie Brothers, the Allman Brothers, Les Claypool and Metallica, but he’s been the most immersed in working with The Grateful Dead, a project that he’s been involved with for about four decades.

The San Francisco native who operates his Mockingbird Mastering Studio in Petaluma, has been drawn to music since his childhood, he said.

“I played classical piano as a kid who was technically good, but my focus was more rock,” the 69-year-old said.

While studying business at University of California, Davis, Norman found himself listening to a variety of music, and was fascinated by not just the sound, but the presentation.

“How the music hit you, where it is placed in the sound stage, I was intrigued at how it was all put together - I wanted to learn to make that,” he said.

After serving a stint in the Army, Norman searched out a local studio in Santa Rosa. He started working for free before he found that his schedule quickly picked up, and he began logging 60 hours a week. He began to forage ahead, building a studio in Glen Ellen.

“I didn’t know anything, but that didn’t stop me,” he said.

By 1976, Norman took jobs in the bigger studios of San Francisco. He worked his way up to the post of first assistant engineer at legendary Wally Heider Studios, which led to the opportunity to work with such clients as John Fogerty, Huey Lewis and the News, Bruce Hornsby as well as The Grateful Dead.

“I learned on the job, I was fortunate to learn as I went,” he said.

By 1981, Norman was working at the Record Plant, editing and continuing to work with The Grateful Dead.

“(The Grateful Dead) recorded everything they did, not with the intent of publishing all their songs in album form but to hear how they sounded, how they performed at their gigs,” he said.

This led to a lot of tapes that needed editing and before long, Norman was working at the band’s San Rafael studio. Although the band closed the production studio in 2006, there was still plenty of work for Norman, and he’s still involved in editing the band’s work, remixing and mastering its huge repository of songs.

His musical career also led him to meet his future wife, Patty, who is related to a member of Bay Area band Night Ranger, one of the groups that he provided sound for a live gigs. The pair has two children, but Norman waited to start life as a family man until he was comfortable in his career, he said.

“I didn’t get married and have children until I was at a place in my career where I could choose my work times and so I could attend their games, ballet recitals, whatever they were doing,” he said.

In fact, it was when his daughter was attending McDowell Elementary School that Norman began making recordings of each year’s kindergarten class performing the songs they’ve learned over the year, a tradition he continues to this day.

Norman hopes to continue mastering and doing his own “self-interest” projects, making digital archives of old recordings. He takes pride in doing a “good, honest job, keeping my word and being a truthful person.”

“I think I get things in a form that doesn’t sound great sometimes and it’s satisfying to produce music that’s improved,” he said. “That to me is very satisfying.”