MURFREESBORO, Tenn. — A chance meeting at a Blue Raider football game last fall led an international audio production student to record a song with a Murfreesboro-based band at one of the state-of-the-art studios in Middle Tennessee State University‘s College of Media and Entertainment.

Mahi Parsai was working as a sound engineer and running audio during MTSU’s homecoming game against Duke University last year when he first heard Stones River Revival perform.

“I moved across the globe to pursue my career in audio engineering, and this project was the perfect opportunity to motivate me. I’ve felt strongly about my decision to study at MTSU as an international student ever since,” said Parsai, who is from India.

“I couldn’t be more thankful to Stones River Revival for being patient and adjusting to my workflow. It was a great experience collaborating and working through the technical and creative aspects of the recording process.”

Reflecting on the homecoming game experience, band member Chuck Harvill admitted that the artists “were a little apprehensive about performing in a stadium setting for an event like that, where there is so much that can go wrong. Mahi did such a great job handling our concerns, and everything went better than expected.”

Self-described as a “dad band” known for their acoustic interpretation of classic and modern classics, Stones River Revival is made up of Harvill (a School of Agriculture alum), Nathan Brown and Rob Janson (a Marketing alum).

“We call ourselves a ‘dad band’ because at the end of the day, we’re really a bunch of dads just doing this for pure fun,” explained Janson, who also previously worked at MTSU in the university’s Division of Marketing and Communications as a strategic communications manager in charge of multimedia marketing content.

Parsai said he enjoyed mixing Stones River Revival’s set so much at the football game that he asked them if they would be interested in recording a song with him for his recording studio techniques class with the university’s highly rated Recording Industry program.

“They were excited about the idea, and then we started planning the session,” Parsai said.

Harvill added, “Mahi was truly professional, so when he asked us to come record with him, it was really an easy, ‘Yes! We’d love to!'”

Parsai said it was his first-ever studio project, and the song, “Moving On,” was recorded over a few eight-hour sessions in Studio D located in the East Main Building on the outskirts of campus.

“Getting to record and perform at our alma mater after all of these years was kind of a full-circle moment for us,” Janson said of the experience. “We had just finished writing our first Stones River Revival original, ‘Moving On,’ so the time couldn’t have been better.”

Parsai said the first step of the recording process was tracking the instruments one by one, starting with drums, then bass, acoustic guitar, banjo and vocals. After tracking, Parsai did a rough mix, which is a preliminary version of a song, so the band could hear how it was shaping up.

Once the overdubs with vocals and acoustic guitar were finished in the studio, Parsai spent about two weeks mixing the song and sharing demo versions with Stones River Revival to fine-tune the song and get the exact finish the band was looking for.

“It was a great experience collaborating and working through the technical and creative aspects of the recording process,” he said.

“The experience helped me build both technical skills and confidence as an engineer… it also taught me how important patience, communication and flexibility are in a studio environment — skills that will definitely help me in my future career in audio,” he added.  

Janson and Harvill said working with Parsai was a great experience made even better by recording at their alma mater.

“Mahi really managed that session so well, and the facility, like all the MTSU studios, is state-of-the-art so that we couldn’t have dreamed up a better experience as our first recording session as a band,” Janson said. “I had spent a lot of time in Studios A and B as a student and employee at MTSU… (but) it was a real treat to experience it for the first time as a musician recording there.”

“We had a great time in the studio, and the track really came out great. Better than we ever expected it to,” Harvill added.

Expected to graduate next spring, Parsai called the project rewarding and an opportunity that will stay with him forever.

“My favorite part was connecting with the band and helping bring their music to life in the studio,” he said. “It was really rewarding to take a song from scratch and transform it into a polished recording.”

To listen to Stone River Revival’s song “Moving On,” visit  http://stonesriverrevival.com/.

For more information about MTSU’s audio production major, visit https://www.mtsu.edu/program/audio-production-b-s/.

—   DeAnn Hays (deann.hays@mtsu.edu)