Craig Bauer


Craig Bauer is an American Grammy Award winning mixing engineer and record producer. He has been nominated for two Album of the Year Grammy Awards for his work on Kanye West’s multiplatinum album Late Registration and double platinum follow-up album, Graduation. He won a Grammy Award in 2008 for mixing The Clark Sisters’ 2007 album, "Live: One Last Time".
In 2012, he mixed Ed Sheeran's live performances at HINGE studios as part of series, which has collectively garnered 95 million views on YouTube. The performances included "The A Team", "Give Me Love", "You Don't Need Me, I Don't Need You", "Lego House" and "Be My Husband".
Craig Bauer has worked with high-profile artists across multiple genres, including; pop, singer-songwriter, electronica, rock, country, jazz, hip-hop, gospel and R&B. His clients include: Kanye West, Lupe Fiasco, Justin Timberlake, Halo Circus, Justin Young, THE Nghbrs, Anita Wilson, Ed Sheeran, The Clark Sisters, Janet Jackson, Rihanna, Common, Jennifer Hudson, Lil’ Kim, Wu-Tang Clan, Da Brat, Brian Culbertson, Richard Marx, 98°, Yolanda Adams, Steve Cole, Dave Koz, Dennis DeYoung, Styx, Donald Lawrence, Destiny’s Child, Public Enemy, Hezekiah Walker and The Smashing Pumpkins.
He also mixed the Saturday Night Live Digital Short “Motherlover” featuring Justin Timberlake and Andy Sandburg.

Awards

Craig Bauer received a Grammy award at the 50th Annual Grammy Awards for mixing The Clark Sisters’ 2007 album, Live: One Last Time and has been recognized by NARAS and the Grammy‘s for over 30 nominations in various categories and genres. He has been nominated twice for Album of the Year.

Life and career

Craig Bauer was born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio, where he worked through the ranks of the studios there before migrating to Chicago, Illinois in the early 1990s to open his own recording studio. Beyond the technical aspects of being a mixing engineer, he is also musician. He studied Classical Piano and Music Education at Ohio State University and is also a skilled guitar player.
In 1993, he opened Hinge Studios at 320 W. Ohio Street in Chicago, Illinois. Many of his first clients were jazz artists, including, Dave Koz, Brian Culbertson, Steve Cole and Peter White.
By 1997, Craig Bauer began working with a young rap group dubbed “The Go Getters”, which included a very young Kanye West. Several of the demos that Kanye West recorded at Hinge Studios were built into tracks on the album The College Dropout. Bauer later mixed “Heard ‘Em Say”, “Roses”, “Bring Me Down”, “Addiction”
and “Late” on Kanye West’s Late Registration Album which was nominated for the Album of the Year Grammy Award at the 48th Annual Grammy Awards. He also mixed on Kanye's follow-up album Graduation, which was nominated again for Album of the Year at the 50th Annual Grammy Awards.
Craig Bauer mixed Lupe Fiasco’s debut studio album Lupe Fiasco’s Food & Liquor in 2006, which received four Grammy Award nominations at the 49th Grammy Awards, including Grammy Award for Best Rap Album. In 2007, he mixed the majority of Fiasco’s second album, Lupe Fiasco’s The Cool, including the hit single “Superstar” which peaked at #10 on the Billboard Hot 100. The Cool was nominated for 4 awards at the 51st Grammy Awards.
In 2008, Craig Bauer won his first Grammy award for mixing The Clark Sisters album Live: One Last Time at the 50th Annual Grammy Awards. Later that year he moved Hinge Studios to 1719 S. Clinton Street in Chicago. Today, Craig Bauer and Hinge Studios is located in Los Angeles, California.
At the 2018 Winter NAMM Show, Bauer hosted an Avid Mixing Master Class with the Avid S6 & MTRX Interface, featuring his work on "Narcissist" performed by Allison Iraheta and Halo Circus. Over the summer he also hosted a Master Class for Avid in Nashville. Bauer is also a beta tester for the Avid S6 control surface and complementary software.
Craig Bauer is an artist endorser for Hear Technologies, Plugin Alliance and Brainworx. He has also developed a line of custom presets.

Hinge Studios

Opened by Craig Bauer in 1993, Hinge Studios was a premiere Midwest recording and mixing facility located in Chicago, Illinois. Hinge Studios was a pioneer in ushering in the world of digital recording with one of the country’s first Euphonix CSII digitally controlled recording consoles and the very first Otari RADAR 48 track hard disk recording system.
In 2014, Hinge Studios relocated to Los Angeles, California, where the studio was temporarily operating at the historic Devonshire Studios in North Hollywood. Hinge Studios is now permanently located in Los Angeles, California, in a highly acclaimed Northward Acoustics designed room. The studio features an Avid S6 control surface and ATC speakers.
Hinge Studios Chicago was once dubbed “Kanye West’s fortress of solitude in the late ‘90s” by MTVNews.
In 2012, Ed Sheeran performed at Hinge Studios Chicago for “The Live Room” video series powered by the Warner Music Group.

Selected Discography