The music business in New Zealand is full of people you've never heard of unless you're in the music business. This week I'm writing about one of them.

His name is Simon Lynch. I've met him a couple of times in passing and through mutual friends I've been aware of him for years. Simon strikes me as emblematic of many people who are part of the music scene.



I say that because Simon has a sort of musical ‘day job' but spends much of his creative time on his own projects, projects I think you'd describe as labours of love.

Simon's day job

Simon is primarily a studio producer and engineer.

He's been intimately involved in the scene for more than 30 years. The ‘day job' I speak of is at Stebbings Studio in Auckland, where he's an on-call producer and masters albums for various major record companies, the likes of the latest ‘Now!' compilations and other TV-advertised collections.

Of course it takes a lot of experience to end up there. Simon's done a bunch of stuff. And I should probably have mentioned that he's also a songwriter, musician and more. He gigs with the Steve Tulloch Band, puts on the odd audio culture photographic display and runs his Slydogmania YouTube channel which has had millions of views.

Way back in the mid-1980s he had early success when Ardijah broke out nationally. – ‘When The Feeling Is Gone' is one of his songs.

He founded and ran Southside Records and has produced various number one hits, including Ngaire's ‘To Sir With Love' and D-Faction's ‘Down In The Boondocks'.

Recently he recorded John Rowles singing ‘The Losing Game', a waltz Simon wrote last summer. 'It was an honour,” says Simon.

'Such was the magnitude in my mind of New Zealand's greatest and most iconic singer that I filmed it for YouTube.” You can find it at: youtube.com/watch?v=AOas0FASxuQ

Labours of love

But it's Simon's projects on the side – the labours of love – that I admire the most. During the years Simon has produced many recordings for friends or simply people whose music he likes. Sessions for Ritchie Pickett for instance in the 1990s eventually released as the ‘White Horses' album; similarly, Hard To Handle's ‘Incubator Sessions', now online, all off Simon's own bat, simply because he loved them as live acts and their songs.

In 2010 he had great success with another Tauranga native: Tom Sharplin and Friends, including Shona Laing, recorded an album of classic Kiwiana ‘Let's Sing In The Sunshine'. It sat in the Top 20 for four weeks.

As Simon says: 'I guess I've been lucky to survive this long in the front end of the music industry where currently times have never been tougher”.

A lot of that is attitude. 'You can't sit still and expect things to happen in the music business so while I can I'll make every note count! I love all sorts of music, music is what I do and who I am and always have been I guess.”

A different destiny

But Simon originally meant to be something different. A concert pianist. And all these roads have led him back to that. In the last year he has digitally released his first ‘solo' album of three Beethoven Piano Sonatas, as well as an album entitled ‘Romantic Piano', featuring the music of Chopin, Schumann, Mozart and others.

He says it's 'taken thousands of hours to get to this level but it's worthwhile creating something for myself that sits outside playing in bands. I'm looking to bring a level of dramatic classical high-level piano to pop audiences, like a Nigel Kennedy I guess”.

To that end he's about to start performing solo classical piano concerts in Auckland, debuting at the Pumphouse in September with two Beethoven Sonatas, with a view to playing other places including Tauranga.

And Simon has a long connection with Tauranga, in addition to working with a bunch of Tauranga musicians. His father bought a Marine Parade bach in 1963; he's been holidaying at the Mount since he was in nappies.

As he says: 'I can see myself shifting to the Mount permanently in a few years and getting involved with motivating and helping others realise their musical potential. Giving back is a wonderful thing”.

watusi@thesun.co.nz