Throughout his career, Jay Kaufman has worked with many music and film greats, amassing a list that reads like a Who’s Who of the entertainment industry. A partial list includes John Mayer, Ramin Djawadi, Marco Beltrami, Toby Gad, Jesse Carmichael, Nate Barr, Martin Scorsese, John Fogerty, Frank Zappa, John Denver, David Bowie, Olivia Newton John, Danny Elfman, Robert Altman.
His early career included working at Creative Film Associates, Lions Gate Films, Motown Records, Cherokee Recording Studios, and as an independent film mixer and recording engineer.
In the mid 70’s Jay partnered with Allen Sides at his small studio on Ocean Way in Santa Monica. Over the next fifteen years, Ocean Way Recording grew to legendary status as one of the world’s most successful multi-room recording facilities, catering to some of the biggest names in show business including Eric Clapton, Michael Jackson, and Lionel Richie. As the Director of Operations and Chief Engineer, Jay played a principle role in the success of what is arguably one of the best sounding and maintained studio complexes in the world.
Upon leaving Ocean Way Recording, Jay offered his extensive talents as an independent acoustical, studio and systems engineer. He was known throughout the industry for his expertise in tuning rooms, building audiophile
speaker systems, designing and building recording studios, and designing, modifying and maintaining high-tech equipment. His clients included Bill Bodine Music, Coast Recording, Kiva Recording, The Matrix Alliance, and Hollywood Records.
Jay was eventually brought on at SMS Digital Post as Chief Operating Officer. During his tenure he transformed this post production facility to a world class operation, providing services to Disney, Universal, Lucas Arts, and Warner Bros. Part of this revitalization was the addition of a state-of-the-art dubbing theater, two ADR stages and a Foley stage which Jay designed and built.
In 2005, Jay formed Kaufman & Associates. Leveraging over 30 years of experience to provide his clients with the ultimate in studio design services including facilities design, acoustical consulting and A/V systems design and integration.
Over the years, Jay has built relationships with architects, structural engineers, interior designers, contractors, electricians, recording engineers, film mixers, and so on, all of whom are available to make your project and enormous success.
Jay is a member of: ASA (Acoustical Society of America), AES (Audio Engineering Society), SMTPE (Society of Motion Picture & Television Engineers), and HPA (Hollywood Post Alliance).