With a rich fifty plus year history and an eye toward the future, one local studio has seen it all. From the opening salvos of the British invasion, to the onslaught of the home recording revolution, Ken-Del Studios has stood the test of time.

Armed with little more than a quarter inch tape machine, a couple of microphones, and years of experience in radio, Ed Kennedy struck out on his own to open his first studio in 1950. Occupying the same building as the local musician’s union on Shipley Street in Wilmington, Delaware, the original Ken-Del Studios hosted the area’s top talent of the day, from soul legend Solomon Burke to the psychedelic pioneering Blues Magoos.

With the introduction of the ADAT in early 1990’s, many commercial recording facilities fell to the economic pressure of musicians being able to affordably make high quality recordings in their own homes. While equipment manufacturers had their sights set on this very large and very lucrative market with the mantra “faster, cheaper, better”, studios had to adapt to the changing business climate, or die. For Ken-Del, diversification was the key, offering allied services such as cassette (and later, compact disc) duplication, equipment rentals and film and tape storage.

More recent developments in recording technology have further changed the way artists work, and thus, the role of the commercial recording studio. Affordable computer based digital audio workstations, or DAWs, have made long distance collaborations not only possible, but commonplace. “It's not uncommon for me to swap (audio) files with musicians in Atlanta, Vegas, even Europe” says Ken-Del’s chief engineer Paul Janocha, “we truly are working on a global stage.”

With such a crowded stage, the recording artist needs a competitive edge to get their music heard. “That’s where I come in” states Janocha. “These days you can make amazing sounding recordings by yourself at home, but there’s no substitution for recording real musicians playing real instruments in real rooms.” For Janocha, that means utilizing a blend of state of the art digital recording technology and vintage analog gear from Ken-Del’s early years. “We’ve got vintage microphones here that cost more than some studio’s entire set up, and believe me, there’s a reason people will spend thousands of dollars for a single microphone.”

Today, Ken-Del Productions is a 25,000 square foot, multi-room facility, designed by world renowned studio designer John Storyk (whose client list includes such names as Jimmi Hendrix, Whitney Houston, and Ace Frehly). The studio has recently hosted such notable artists as Grammy nominated singer/songwriter Paul Lewis, former Allman Brother (and Wilmington native) Johnny Neel, SoulOh, members of Ike, Mercy River, Gypsy Sullivan and many, many more.