Artist Spotlight w/ Wesley Slover
Feb 28, 2023
First, can you tell us a bit about yourself?
Sure thing! I live in Grand Rapids, Michigan with my wife, two kids, and our swarm of (3) cats. In my spare time, I enjoy running, listening to way too many podcasts, and playing tabletop games with friends and strangers. I also love making ambient electronic music. With composing music as part of my job, I've found that making ambient music is a great way to reconnect with music as play and relaxation instead of "work".
I think applying the adage "under promise, over deliver" to scheduling has served me well as a freelancer. I think it's really important to not just "under promise" but set very clear expectations.
Can you tell us about your experience and the role you are primarily filling?
I've been a sound and music designer professionally for over 10 years. I run a small studio called Sanctus where we help clients figure out how sound and music can make their projects as effective as possible then we execute that plan. I split my time creative directing my team, composing music for projects, and developing the business.
I did various other audio work before, but Sanctus (Sono Sanctus when I started out) came out of a connection to the motion graphics community. Since then we've branched out into work that's not strictly "sound and music for motion graphics" but mograph plays a role in all sorts of content and products, so I'm never far from those roots.
If you could speak directly to the resourcing gods and powers that be, what would be your ideal project?
I think the ideal project would have to be user experience sound designing a car. We particularly love working on products because it's so satisfying to make sounds that are useful for people in their lives and I think automotive hits the goldilocks zone for sound design where the conditions are right for utilizing sound design. It's super useful to offload or supplement visual information for drivers, the cabin is a controlled acoustic environment, and it has a great audio playback system built in.
Do you have any dream clients?
As a lifelong fan and nerd, I'd love to work on something for Magic the Gathering. That said, I think our real dream clients are the agencies and studios we resonate with more than the brands that are the end clients. Coming alongside great studios who appreciate our involvement and supporting their work with sound and music is really the dream.
Lastly, do you have any memorable stories, life lessons, or tall tales you can share from your adventures as a freelancer?
I think applying the adage "under promise, over deliver" to scheduling has served me well as a freelancer. I think it's really important to not just "under promise" but set very clear expectations. To me "over-delivering" doesn't mean creating work that's beyond the scope, but it's hugely valuable to deliver with time to spare or proactively explore ideas that might help clients provide feedback. As a freelancer, it can be easy to forget that the people above you in the chain of command are responsible for you. If a client is contracting someone who's not a tried and tested collaborator, waiting for postings from the freelancer can feel scary.
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