Holly Archibald Raynes

Holly Archibald Raynes, Executive Producer and COO Soundtrack Boston

Looking relaxed and comfortable in her office near Boston’s theatre district, 32-year old Holly Archibald Raynes oversees audio production services for film, television and commercial projects at Soundtrack Boston. She graduated from Boston University with a degree in broadcasting and film and has worked as a producer of television and radio commercials at Arnold Worldwide and as a unit manager for Nova on WGBH. Some of the major projects at Soundtrack Boston at this time are: “Knock First!” on ABC Family and “Bob the Builder” on WGBH.

Holly: I was a producer at Arnold Worldwide and Soundtrack was one of my vendors. I brought a lot of radio and video projects over here. I did some music here. There’s a composer on staff, Mike Secher, who does a wide range of work for a bunch of agencies in town. So he did some work for me. I worked with just about all of the engineers over here. I think audio was maybe my favorite parts of production. Maybe it was the least stressful part of production. Pre-production is crazy and harried and you’re doing a million things at once, then there’s the production part when you sort of sit back and watch it all happen and have [to] let things go to the director and the production company. Then once you are in the post side of things, I think I preferred post. When I came to the audio facility, I just really enjoyed being on this end of things. I was very comfortable here. At WGBH, I was no longer involved in production and I missed that. It was a lot of paperwork. One day I got a call that this job had opened up and as one of their old clients, they thought I might be a good fit and I jumped at it. Just knowing Soundtrack so well and that I loved coming over here as a client.

Holly: Every day is different. I like different projects and challenges every day. Not a day goes by that I don’t have a client calling me with a different challenge that they need solved. I’m always helping them to solve it and that’s something I enjoy doing. We’re very much a team here and I think that’s why everyone likes working here so much. Part of the draw is that everyone at soundtrack enjoys working here; from my receptionist to the top engineers. Everyone seems to really like being a part of the company. There are 23 people here and it’s a nice little family. I like to service clients. It’s nice at the end of the day when clients walk out happy and Soundtrack’s had a great reputation for years and it’s nice to carry that on.

A: The client will call and tell us a little about the project and we’ll put them in the scheduling and they know the engineer they want or we’ll suggest an engineer who can serve their needs. I think we’re a team because everything’s a reflection on soundtrack. If the engineer does a fantastic job for example but the dub is screwed up and gets to the client, the client forgets that the engineer did a flawless job. So I make sure that everyone in the dub room and machine room feels that they are a part of the bigger picture. I make sure that they see the end product and know that’s their goal and that makes them care more about the process.

Holly: I think the big picture is ultimately to continue to do the best job that we can do. The best quality! We always want to put out the best audio quality that we can. We want to do flawless work. We don’t want to just give the clients what they want but add to it and provide creative input. We never want to say no. Somebody might bring us a project and even if we’ve never done it before, we say, “Yes, we can do that.” Scout the production company that does “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” is doing a show called “Knock First!” on ABC Family and we had never done a reality show before. We’d never done a TV show. It was between us and a bunch of New York facilities who had obviously had the experience before. I said, “Of course we can do it.” I did all the research and the process went back and forth for six weeks. I said, “Please come in and please give us a chance. We have the capability here. There’s nothing technologically that (engineer) Brian McKeever can’t handle.” And we got the job. There going to give us in total, 55 shows.

Amy: What makes you so persistent and what do you bring to this position that enables you to excel? What is your management style?

Holly: Part of it is personality. I’m somewhat determined. I’m a little unafraid. I feel like we have nothing to lose by trying to talk someone into giving us a chance. We have a terrific reputation. You can always fix things. I believe that if something goes wrong, there’s always an answer. I’ve always taken chances in my life personally and I’ve never really hit a wall. I’m not afraid of change and I’m not afraid of changing things. And I’m not afraid of doing that with this company. I believe in the honesty policy. I feel you get what you give. I think if I am honest about someone’s performance, they are thankful for that. I think people appreciate honesty. Regardless of if it’s unpleasant to hear sometimes, I think people want to know good or bad feedback. And I give both. I try to be very balanced.

Holly: In the past, I’ve noticed that women get married, pregnant and leave because there’s so much travel in producing that there are very few women at the upper tier. Thus far in this position, I haven’t encountered anyone unwilling or unable to deal with a woman in a position. My boss is a man but he’s always hired women to run this company so I have to look at that in a positive light. This company is at least half women. The engineers who are all men all respect me. I think I’m very fortunate at this company. I don’t know if it’s because it’s so small.

Holly: It is mostly commercial. We do that one show for ABC. We work on WGBH documentaries. When any celebrities come into town and if they’re working on a film, we’re the studio they work with. Phil Ramone was here over the weekend and we had an ISDN to London where Kevin Spacey was filming. The Farrelly brothers were here. Kate Hudson was here for ALEX AND EMMA and came in to do ADR (looping/dialogue replacement) with Rob Reiner. On occasion we get bands. A lot are special events. Every so often Aerosmith will come in.

Holly: I would like to see more television work come our way. I would love to get more documentary work. Our way of marketing has always been word of mouth. We have our annual Christmas party, we have barbeques all through the summer and we might have a wine and cheese party now and then to showcase our engineers work. We have a huge repertoire of clients but I feel that there are smaller clients in the area that I’d like to reach out to and get Soundtrack’s name out there.

Amy Steele works in corporate communications and is a freelance entertainment reporter. She received her M.S. in journalism from Boston University and her B.A. in English and Political Science from Simmons College. She resides in Brighton.