Herb Trawick on Pensado's Success

Music Connection: What was the highlight of the Pensado Awards?
Herb Trawick: Well it was somewhere between the drunk hip-hop guy, who did his thing, and the authentic moments where people just were heartfelt. We got a chance to see Bruce Sweiden’s family gather around him and Quincy Jones. We got a chance to hear how Barbara Streisand feels about who makes all her records, and who she trusts so much. And then go to hip-hop, and have that happen. It’s the breadth of the industry that is really interesting that we try to serve so well, to have Above & Beyond, who are just a huge EDM act, to stop and take a moment. You hear your name a lot, and I guess they like us. I was just back there and you just have these emotional moments and you go, “God they care, they care,” so, there are a lot of moments.

MC: This is only the awards’ second year, and it’s gotten so big. We can only imagine next year will be bigger.
Trawick: Yeah I think we’re gonna do it on a space shuttle. I actually already have the idea for next year but I’m not sharing. It’ll be cool.

MC: Can you elaborate on how it feels to know that the idea of Pensado’s has gotten so huge?
Trawick: We are talking about an idea that was based on my partner having a medical incident and him saying, “I need to figure out what to do,” and me going, “Try this,” and then one piece fell, and another piece fell. So all we did was keep our heads down and took it really seriously. I run my team relatively hard, we shoot a real television show and what we just try to do is serve the audience and it just came back to us and kept coming back to us and bigger and bigger. And now we’re talking about things I couldn’t have even imagined five years ago—just huge, massive things, which we will be announcing shortly.

MC: What can Pensado’s bring to new artists and producers?
Trawick: So it’s sort of simple--we’re a one hour talk show about audio, and we bring on the very best professionals weekly to talk about what they do. We also talk about the stories that inspire them and how they get over the challenges. It’s not just a technical show. People, fortunately, find us a bit entertaining, which is a good thing. And I think whether you’re an old guy or a young guy, what ever the case may be, you’ll find something or somebody that will inspire you or teach you or do whatever.

That’s what they tell us, and we’re just going to keep going. 150 countries, 500-600,000 people a month. We’re on for an hour on YouTube, which is unheard of, and we just keep building and building. So that’s really what it is. And it’s for anybody in audio, so if you just listen to Spotify, you can find something on our show. If you want to mix records, you can do that. If you do ADR or Foley or gaming or whatever, you’ll find something in our show that’s applicable.