1. William Frank Szymczyk is an American music producer and recording engineer best known for working with rock and blues musicians, most notably the Eagles in the 1970s.
23 Facts About Bill Szymczyk
1. 2.
Bill Szymczyk re-emerged in the late 2000s, taking on select projects including the 2007 Eagles album Long Road Out of Eden and the 2008 eponymous debut of Brian Vander Ark.
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Unlike many music producers, Bill Szymczyk has no background as a musician.
4.
Bill Szymczyk was originally a sonar operator for the US Navy and took some audio production classes as part of his Navy training.
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Bill Szymczyk was born in Muskegon, Michigan on February 13,1943.
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Bill Szymczyk's mother worked as a nurse, and his father held several jobs, including factory worker and maintenance at a school.
7.
Bill Szymczyk joined the United States Navy in 1960, where he worked as a sonar technician.
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Bill Szymczyk began working at a firm which produced demo recordings for Screen Gems Records and worked extensively with Brill Building songwriters such as Carole King and Gerry Goffin.
9.
Bill Szymczyk worked as an assistant to music producers and songwriters Quincy Jones and Jerry Ragovoy, eventually working his way up to chief engineer at Ragavoy's Hit Factory recording studio in New York City.
10.
Bill Szymczyk dropped out of NYU to work full-time in the music industry.
11.
Bill Szymczyk left the Hit Factory and took a job at ABC Records, taking a large pay cut in exchange for the opportunity to move from engineer to producer.
12.
Bill Szymczyk produced his follow-up studio album Completely Well, which featured "The Thrill Is Gone", the biggest hit of King's career and his signature song.
13.
Bill Szymczyk would continue to produce blues albums throughout the early 1970s for the likes of King and Albert Collins.
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Bill Szymczyk was moved several times while working for ABC Records; first to Los Angeles when ABC acquired Dunhill Records and Bill Szymczyk took over production for the West Coast operations, and later to Denver when he decided to form his own label, Tumbleweed Records.
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Bill Szymczyk worked for a while as a disc jockey at radio station KFML, and continued to produce albums in New York and Los Angeles, such as the J Geils Band's 1971 album The Morning After, recorded at the Los Angeles Record Plant.
16.
Bill Szymczyk did extensive work at the Colorado studio Caribou Ranch.
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Bill Szymczyk would be the sole producer for the next three Eagles studio albums, including 1976's Hotel California, the first to feature Joe Walsh.
18.
Bill Szymczyk was instrumental in giving the Eagles a more "rock sound" and helping them to move away from their country rock roots.
19.
Bill Szymczyk worked in the studio for the Edgar Winter Group's biggest hit, the Rick Derringer-produced "Frankenstein", and later produced Derringer's best known solo album All American Boy and its hit single, "Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo".
20.
Bill Szymczyk's workload tailed off in the mid-1980s, due mostly to his own financial success.
21.
Bill Szymczyk returned to work with the Eagles on the 2007 album Long Road Out of Eden, and followed that with the 2008 solo debut of ex-Verve Pipe singer Brian Vander Ark.
22.
Bill Szymczyk's has frequently been noted as the sort of producer who pushes bands to expand their musical horizons; he has been brought in with the specific intent of changing a band's sound.
23.
Rather than recording harmony vocals individually, and mixing them together later, as was common, Bill Szymczyk preferred to capture the Eagles singing in ensemble, often spending many hours to record each phrase "just right".