Bruce Swedien, the studio engineer who helped define Michael Jackson’s 1980s sound, has died aged 86.
His daughter Roberta said he had died in his sleep on Monday night. No cause of death has been reported.
In a Facebook post, she wrote: “My dad, Bruce Swedien, passed away peacefully last night, November 16th. He was 86. A legend in the music industry for over 65 years and 5-time Grammy winner, he was known for his work with Quincy Jones, Michael Jackson and many more.
“He had a long life full of love, great music, big boats and a beautiful marriage. We will celebrate that life. He was loved by everyone. Rest in peace dear sweet Daddy-ji. We will love you forever, Bea and Roberta.”
Swedien was admired by generations of music producers, including Jones, with whom he worked on Michael Jackson’s albums Off the Wall, Thriller and Bad; Swedien also worked on Bad’s follow-up, Dangerous.
Jones has paid tribute on Instagram, calling Swedien a “sonic genius … He was without question the absolute best engineer in the business, and for more than 70 years I wouldn’t even think about going into a recording session unless I knew Bruce was behind the board.
“Along with the late great [songwriter] Rod Temperton, we reached heights that we could have never imagined and made history together. I have always said it’s no accident that more than four decades later no matter where I go in the world, in every club, like clockwork at the witching hour you hear Billie Jean, Beat It, Wanna Be Starting Something, and Thriller … to this day I can hear artists trying to replicate him.”
Swedien was born in Minneapolis in 1934. His parents were both classically trained musicians, and Swedien credited their enthusiasm for music making a “permanent impression” on him.
After studying electrical engineering and music at the University of Minnesota, Swedien and his family moved to Chicago in 1958, where he began recording jazz artists including Duke Ellington and Sarah Vaughan. “I have worked with many very talented artists in music, but none can compare with Duke Ellington for genuine love of what we are doing,” Swedien wrote in 2013.
Come the late 1960s he also began working with soul artists, helping to make Higher and Higher and I Get the Sweetest Feeling hits for Jackie Wilson. After partnering with Jones, the pair worked together on hit records by Rufus and Chaka Khan, George Benson, and Donna Summer. “We have had heated arguments resulting from differences of opinion between us,” Swedien has said. “I don’t think that brothers always agree, either. What has made our relationship last is the fact that true friendship, such as ours, is based on mutual respect.”
Swedien also worked with Paul McCartney, Diana Ross, Mick Jagger, Barbra Streisand, Jennifer Lopez, Roberta Flack and others. In an interview with Tape Op he said: “Music recording is not very forgiving. That is a lifetime commitment, you have to do it. It isn’t going to come to you; you have to go after it.”
Swedien pioneered a recording technique he called the Acusonic Recording Process while working on Thriller. “Quincy wanted a name for the process that I used when I recorded Michael’s stuff, because what I did was record all of the tracks analogue first,” Swedien explained in a 2018 interview with Reverb. “Digital recording was available and we were all quite impressed with its clarity, but if you start the music in digital you can never go back to analogue and it won’t sound as good.”
He continued: “The sound of pure analogue 24-track, two-track, or even mono is very warm and musical. It captures music with great realism. So I recorded it in analogue, but took it a step further. I decided to use all of the analogue tracks in pairs to create stereophonic recordings. Every sound source in those recordings is recorded on two tracks in real stereo.”
