Kitt Wakeley is a Grammy award-winning artist/composer/producer with 7 #1 Billboard hits and 4 Grammy nominations to his credit, known for selling out prestigious venues such as Carnegie Hall in NYC. Kitt’s live performances are often billed as the Symphony of Sinners & Saints, based on his orchestral rock releases of the same name. With Wakeley on synths and piano, the albums feature guitar virtuosos Joe Satriani, Nuno Bettencourt (Extreme), Nita Strauss (Demi Lovato, Alice Cooper), and Orianthi (Alice Cooper, Richie Sambora, RSO). Additional contributors include drummer Kenny Aronoff (John Cougar, Joe Satriani), the London Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and more.
Symphony of Sinners & Saints: The Atmos Collection collects seven key tracks from both records, newly-remixed into Dolby Atmos by Tony Correlli at The Deep End Recording Studio and mastered by Alex ‘Pro Mix’ Solano. Though you can stream the Atmos mix on Apple Music, Tidal, and Amazon Music, it’s also available as an exclusive high-resolution immersive digital download through IAA’s online shop!
I recently had the chance to chat with both men about their immersive audio journeys, the complexities involved with mixing music in Dolby Atmos, and where they think the industry is headed.
Give me some background on your music careers. How did you guys come to be involved in this project?
Tony: I've been working in the Baltimore music scene for over 20 years, playing in bands and producing artists day and night. There is no shortage of talented artists in the area, and I’ve gotten to work with so many of them across so many different genres.
Though my main focus is still on producing music live with people in the same room–whether that means producing or playing keyboards–lately I’ve been taking on more mixing projects, especially during COVID.
I’ve known Kitt for a few years through many mutual musical friends. He hosts a Grammy afterparty, and I’ll see him there and at other events during Grammy week. He’s a very well-respected producer who’s worked with tons of great artists. He’s also known for doing these big symphonic classical-crossover albums, with tons of instrumentation–but it was all packed into a stereo mix.
I love his music, but I would still tell him that I wished it was coming out of more than two speakers–because there’s just so much happening in the tracks! Really, just as a listener and fan, I wanted to hear it in immersive. He knew I had an Atmos studio and had mixed some friends of his, so one day we were talking about music and he said he’d send me something to try out in Atmos.
I opened the files to find songs from both volumes of Sinners & Saints, and they featured musicians like Joe Satriani, Nuno Bettencourt, Nita Struass, Orianthi, Kenny Aronoff, and other great players. Plus, there was a live orchestra–the London Symphony and the Royal Philharmonic, recorded at Abbey Road. So it was all top-notch stuff, and it was such an enjoyable experience to work on the Atmos mix for these songs.
I ended up getting in touch with Alex because I wanted an outside opinion on the mixes in different monitors, and he was one of the only people I knew at the time with an Atmos setup. He started to give very helpful feedback, and that kind of evolved into a mastering role. So we definitely became a team on this project.
Alex: I’ve done it all—playing guitar, producing, mixing, and more. From 2005 to 2020, I worked as a product specialist for Avid, traveling across the U.S. to demonstrate Pro Tools at events. During that time, I also started creating YouTube tutorials on audio plugins, which quickly gained traction since online resources were scarce back then.
When Apple announced spatial audio support in 2021, I was thrilled but found it challenging to navigate the ecosystem—understanding the technology, choosing the right interfaces, calibrating the room, and so on. With few online resources available, I began creating my own. I wasn’t alone in this, but I believe I helped pave the way as an early thought leader in immersive mixing.
Tony: It seemed like you were the only one doing it, because your videos kept popping up whenever I was trying to figure out the best binaural settings or anything else Atmos-related at that time!
Alex: I began immersive mixing in 2021 and have been fully dedicated to it ever since. Dolby helped me build my room to spec, and I now have over 500 completed Atmos mix credits. Today, about 80% of my work is focused solely on immersive mixing, with dedicated stereo mixes being rare requests—mainly for indie artists.
When I join a project, clients usually ask me to match the approved stereo master using stems. I enjoy this work, as I no longer spend 7-10 hours perfecting a stereo mix. For this particular project, my aim was to enhance Tony's mix while honoring his original vision and ensuring all delivery specifications were met.
How did you handle matching the immersive mixes to the stereo versions?
Tony: These songs had already been released in stereo, and several had topped the Billboard charts when they were singles or packaged in albums. But this particular collection is an Atmos-specific release, a compilation of songs from those two albums presented as new mixes. This granted me more freedom to reinterpret some things without feeling completely tethered to the original stereo mixes. It also came with the responsibility of keeping the songs consistent with each other when they had originally been separated into two albums with somewhat different tonalities.
One thing I really love about immersive audio is being able to use more natural EQ curves. I’ve gotten processed stems for some projects–and those can sound great, depending on the mixing and mastering team–but, as I’m sure you know, sometimes engineers have to squeeze things into that stereo mix with EQ and other processing. They may have to give the violins extra high-mid edge to get them to cut through. In order to get everything shoved into those two speakers, they have to make adjustments.
So when I was bringing these tracks into an immersive environment, I was able to make the EQ more natural to the acoustic instruments. I could take that midrange spike out of violins now that they had their own space and weren’t fighting with everything else. In an Atmos mix, we don’t need to lean into a limiter so much, because we can make it more dynamic and open-sounding. The transients can be more natural. That’s especially important with acoustic instruments and the symphonic tracks I was working with for this album.
There are so many layers in these recordings, including a real choir. It can almost blend in with everything else in a stereo mix. When we spread it out in Dolby Atmos, you can really pick out the parts and appreciate the arrangements. I don’t mind that it’s more apparent than in the stereo mix, because the Atmos version is meant to stand on its own.
The problem I find with a lot of the catalog stuff on Apple Music is that because it was mixed from stems, you’re stuck with all these processing decisions that were meant to maximize the two-channel experience. So if you’re mixing a heavy rock album and the drums were printed to a stereo track with all the reverb and compression baked in, it’s going to sound small and weak when you break that out into a 12 or 16-speaker environment.
Tony: I agree, and in this case the stems I got from Kitt were very broken down, which is ideal. The kick, snare, toms, and cymbals were all separated out. I also had access to raw files whenever I needed them, which was also useful for work I did on the toms and building a center channel mix. I was able to have the kick, snare, and bass hit from the center speaker. I’m a big fan of the center channel because it gives you that extra percussion and punch in rock. It’s my belief that the center channel will only become more important as more vehicles become Atmos-equipped.
When it comes to mixing music in Dolby Atmos, what is your philosophy? Some mixers take a more conservative approach, focusing most of the instrumentation to the front stage, while others go the more adventurous route and place elements fully behind or above the listener. It sounds like you fall more to the latter category.
Tony: If you have the speakers, use them! If someone wants to hear an immersive mix, I’ll immerse them in it. It would be wasteful to only use the surrounds and top speakers for a splash of reverb. So you’re right–I’m solidly in the adventurous camp, because I find it boring and even frustrating when the Atmos version of a song is essentially the stereo mix with some surround reverb and a few non-critical elements moved to the sides or ceiling a bit.
It seems to have become a trend lately to place most of the Atmos mix in the left and right channels, not even using the center! I suspect they do this to sound similar to the stereo mix in AirPods, but–at least in my opinion–that’s a short-sighted goal. I believe more people will adopt multi-channel speaker setups over time. I agree with Steve Genewick that the main goal for us should be to make it sound good on speakers, because binaural is always changing. Apple is constantly updating their Spatial Audio processing. We need to look ahead when we’re mixing because the technology is moving fast and consumer participation is really just beginning.
Tony Correlli at The Deep End Studio (photo by Shane Gardner).
I just did a session with a folk trio playing live in my big tracking room, and I miked it for Atmos. When I played it back in my control room, it sounded exactly like it did when I was standing in the room with the players. I love that, and it just doesn’t happen that way from two speakers positioned in front of you. Binaural gives a sense of it, but it’s really meant for a speaker setup as the surrounds are playing back mics specifically positioned for those speakers only.
Alex: For me, the approach depends on the song’s arrangement. With folk or country music that features just guitar, vocals, and a few additional elements, filling the entire space can be challenging. It’s crucial to be intentional in spreading those sounds–especially with drier recordings, where you can’t depend on reverb to fill out the other speakers. In smaller productions, I sometimes prefer a quad approach, positioning elements in the rear speakers rather than the sides.
Do you find that it’s difficult to achieve a good balance between the Atmos mix on headphones versus speakers in a room?
Alex: Binaural audio can be challenging, and I’ve learned this through years of trial and error. For instance, panning a stereo stem fully to the side speakers causes a 3-5 dB volume boost in headphones, which is substantial and requires compensation. Additionally, adjusting the object size from zero to one introduces a 1-2 dB volume difference. These are nuances you often have to discover on your own, since resources on these pitfalls are scarce.
Another layer of complexity is that binaural technology is constantly evolving. As you know, Apple overrides binaural settings with its own spatialization. Reflecting on Tony's point, I strive to make my mixes adaptable and future-proof. If someone listens to one of my mixes on speakers a decade or two from now, I want them to feel it was thoughtfully crafted.
At the end of the day, we’re service providers. Often, clients–whether artists, labels, publishers, distributors, or managers–are mainly interested in getting that Dolby logo on their track in Apple Music, boosting playlist placement potential and revenue. Creative impact and listener experience aren’t usually their primary concerns, which is where people like Tony and I add value.
It’s frustrating, because we all know that an Atmos mix heard on a decent speaker system–doesn’t necessarily have to be 7.1.4 or 9.1.6–is such an amazing listening experience. At least in this stage of the game, you’re not really getting anything close to that with headphones.
Tony: Yeah, there's nothing like it. Once you experience it, it's hard to go back.
I’m glad to see it’s getting more accessible. I was in Costco recently and I saw home speaker setups and even soundbar systems there that support Dolby Atmos. I’m all for it. It wasn’t that long ago that the only place to hear an Atmos mix was in a post-production facility or a movie theater.
When mixing on speakers, do you typically check alternative speaker configurations (5.1.2, 7.1.2, etc) in the Renderer? It is interesting and sometimes surprising to hear how the mixes translate to smaller setups. For instance if you go from 7.1.4 down to 5.1, both the side and rear channels get combined into a single pair of surrounds–so if you’re listening on a 5.1 setup with rear speakers placed behind the listener, you can end up with a very back-heavy presentation. .
Tony: Yes. It’s critical to do that, and I end up spending more time listening than mixing for that very reason. The 5.1 mix is very revealing. Sometimes I think a mix is balanced when I’m listening in 7.1.4 or 9.1.4, but then when I hear the 5.1 version and see how much lands in those rear speakers I'll re-think the front and rear balance. I’ve found those mixes to translate better, so I’ve come to trust the 5.1 playback.
Do you mix primarily with objects, or a combination of beds and objects?
Tony: I've been getting more into using just the bed lately, but it's been a combination of both. Usually I’ll use the bed for the ground speakers and then put four objects up in the top corners to access the height speakers separately. I have wides in my system as well, which also require objects, but for whatever reason I haven’t been able to get 9.1.4 or 9.1.6 to play in Apple Music, so I have been sticking to 7.1.4 for now.
For this particular project, I put some of the risers and other effects on objects so I could get more specific with the placement and movement. Most of the core instrumentation–drums, guitars, and vocals–is in the bed and the stationary objects that I use to access the top channels. I understand the argument for using all objects, but it creates complications for bus processing and mastering in genres that call for hot mixes–and this album definitely has a rock edge. The files I sent to Alex were essentially a 7.1 bed with four objects on top.
That seems to be a common approach for music mixers. I wonder why Dolby decided to limit beds to 7.1.2 rather than 7.1.4?
Alex: It’s important to remember that Atmos was originally designed for film. Film mixers have been using the Dolby Renderer since 2011 or 2012, so they’re accustomed to working with 7.1.2 beds. If Dolby suddenly expanded the number of channels in the bed, it would disrupt workflows across the film industry–where large, complex mixing templates are standard for big-budget productions.
For music, I like the hybrid approach with quad objects layered on top to account for the .4 ceiling channels. For mastering, it was essential that I could import ADMs into Pro Tools without altering the input configuration. This way, I could bring files into a single session, arrange them in sequence, and master the entire album as a cohesive collection—just as I would in stereo mastering.
Tony: In the early days, I remember another issue with mixing in Atmos in Pro Tools was the limited bus size. You couldn’t just make a 7.1.4 bus, so you’d have to get creative. It used to take me forever to finish mixes because the routing was so complex and time-consuming. It was like building a specific virtual mixing board for each song, and you couldn’t rely on templates because every song has its own needs.
Do you ever use the Dolby Album Assembler for mastering?
Alex: No, I usually work directly in Pro Tools. The album assembler is handy if you want to tweak individual track levels, but it’s very limited in terms of audio processing.
It seems like the ‘object bed’ method is becoming more popular for Atmos music mixes. There are static objects placed in all the speaker location–either 7.1.4 or 9.1.6–and you mix through those using an aux track. What do you guys think of that approach?
Alex: When I first got into immersive mixing, I visited several Dolby-certified studios around L.A. I remember one engineer showing me his session template. It was incredibly complex, with object locations not only for the speakers but also for intermediary positions–like halfway between ground level and the heights. He mentioned spending countless hours building these sessions but was hesitant to use them, worried about potential routing errors. That was eye-opening for me: the idea that you could invest so much effort into constructing a virtual soundscape without full confidence it’s functioning as intended.
In film, objects are valuable for precise placement in a large theater setting. But in music, over-reliance on objects can lead to unnecessary complexity and, in some cases, detract from musicality. Ultimately, it’s about finding the workflow that best supports the mixer’s creative process.
If you could mix any record–new or old–in Atmos, which would you choose?
Alex: In college in 2003, I attended a private seminar by Bruce Swedien, where he played the a cappella masters of Michael Jackson's Thriller (1982) and discussed the art and science of music mixing. This experience profoundly influenced my approach to mixing. Swedien emphasized that developing a sonic personality begins with setting a benchmark for your mind’s ear. In immersive audio, the goal isn’t to follow trends but to uncover each engineer’s unique artistic identity and use the format to craft an original sonic landscape that connects with its listeners.
Given the chance to create immersive mixes of any classic album, I'd choose Thriller. The album's rich array of elements offers immense potential for spatial audio. I believe that if Bruce Swedien had access to immersive formats like Atmos during the original production, he would have embraced the opportunity to experiment and push creative boundaries.
Tony: My answer right now is The Cure’s Disintegration (1989), but that could change tomorrow. [laughs] I can vividly imagine how it would sound in my head–those guitar strums in “Lovesong” could be above me when it hits that cool nine chord right at the beginning. “Plainsong” is just crying out for an immersive mix! I’m surprised that it hasn't been mixed in Atmos yet.
It would be an interesting challenge, because I’ve never taken on a catalog project like that. I’ve read the interviews on your site with people who have–like Brad Leigh doing the Billy Joel catalog in Atmos–and it sounds fascinating, but you’re limited by what’s on the masters and people’s familiarity with the music. It’s a different process. You may not get the flexibility like I had working on Kitt’s music, where it was intended to be a completely new and different experience.
What are some of your favorite Atmos mixes out today?
Alex: One of my favorite Atmos mixes is Keith Urban's “Right on Back To You”, and it's the track I use to demo my Dolby rig for new clients. The song opens with thunderstorm effects, placing the rain in the height speakers and using the LFE for the thunder, immediately immersing listeners in the storyline. Another track for showcasing the immersive format is “Stressed Out” by 21 Pilots, mixed by Dave Way. His placement of the lead vocals in the center channel is remarkable, adding depth and focus that's perfect for demonstrating the potential of Atmos.
That Keith Urban track with the thunderstorm effects overhead sounds a lot like the Atmos mix of The Doors’ “Riders on the Storm,” which is one of my go-to demos.
Tony: Yeah, that one’s great as well. One of the coolest parts in that mix is how you can pick up Jim Morrison whispering along with himself from behind you. I didn’t really notice it in the original stereo mix, but it’s apparent in Atmos and it adds this sort of extra creepy factor that’s really effective.
Can you share any details about other upcoming immersive projects you're working on?
Alex: A recent immersive project I worked on was The Forever Sessions Vol. 1, the new album by All Time Low. Matt Huber handled the stereo mixes, which sound incredible, and I created the Atmos mixes from his stems. The record has a dense sound, so we aimed to maintain that intensity while wrapping the music around the listener for a fully immersive experience.
Tony: I’m in the middle of producing an album with Ashes Remain. Joe Rickard is mixing it, then giving my tracks back to me for the Atmos mix using a combination of his stems and the multitracks that I engineered, which is a cool process and a unique workflow. I recorded the album with Atmos in mind and put mics all over in the live room when tracking drums. The drummer came in to the control room for playback, and I had it spread into all the speakers and it he immediately felt like he was back in the live room hearing his real kit. I love that experience.
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