About Mountain Wind Media: My bio

I’ve always gravitated towards work that combines both technology and creativity. My involvement in the creative side has either been direct, or in support of it.

At an early age I became interested in science and technology, and would take apart old radios, TVs, and mechanical clocks to learn something about how they worked. I developed an interest in astronomy and electronics, and even thought that I might eventually become a scientist, or work in engineering.

By my early teens I had also been bitten by a couple of creative bugs in the forms of music and photography. But I really didn’t have the motor skills necessary to be a musician. Fortunately, photography turned out to be something I was better suited for, and I quickly became comfortable with both the technical and creative aspects of it. By the time I was 19 I was working full time as a photographer.

But I hadn’t lost my desire to be involved in music, and in the early 1970s audio recording looked like the best way that a not-quite-musician with a technical side, –like me, could accomplish that. I attended one of the very first audio recording schools, the Institute of Audio Research in New York City, and then had the good fortune to be hired by Sigma Sound Studios in Philadelphia.

Sigma was the hub of the then very popular Sound of Philadelphia music scene, and as an audio engineer there I worked with many well known recording artists. During my almost 25 years at Sigma I worked my way up from assistant engineer to studio/general manager, was the production coordinator for the in-house record label, and became involved with computers through an in-house software development project. I worked on numerous gold and platinum albums with artists such as Stevie Wonder, Robert Palmer, and Patti LaBelle.

By the late 90s, however, the Sound of Philadelphia scene had faded, and I made the switch to Disc Makers, the independent CD and DVD manufacturer. I worked there as a project/account manager, providing customer service to its wide range of clients including musicians, independent filmmakers, corporations, educational institutions, and non-profit organizations, –guiding their projects through the production process. I worked closely with graphic designers and prepress personnel, and learned about what they did and the technology involved. I also became involved with multimedia through the many CD-ROM projects that I handled.

Moving on from Disc Makers, I realized that I still wanted to be involved in something both technological and creative, –something that would utilize my visual orientation and computer background. So I’ve added web and graphic design and e-media to my repertoire. In combination with my previous experience, they became the basis for Mountain Wind Media.

 – Arthur Stoppe

Click here for a list of cool things I've done.