Meet Gerard Baladad, a Doha-based online dBs Institute student, who’s using his degree to develop his music production and sound engineering career.
At dBs Institute, our Online Music Production Master’s degree gives global students access to our state-of-the-art education. Online students can study from wherever they are in the world, on a schedule that suits their lives and fits around their careers.
So far, students have joined the dBs community from Latin America, the Middle East, the Far East, Europe and closer to home here in the UK. Gerard Baladad is a Filipino national currently based in Doha, Qatar and is using his online postgraduate degree at dBs to develop his music production and sound engineering career at the same time as working professionally as a Sound Engineer & Music Composer at Al Jazeera Media Network.
Interested in music since the tender age of two, Gerard, who was born in the Philippines and immigrated to Qatar when he was 7 years old, always thought he would follow in his father’s footsteps and become a mechanical engineer. It was only when he discovered that, through a career in sound engineering, he could combine his love of music with his natural proficiency with technology and engineering, that his professional interest in music really took off.
Throughout his undergraduate studies, Gerard worked as an intern at Katara Studios in Qatar, where he gained hands-on experience in high-end studio environments. After graduating with First-Class Honours in his BA (Hons) Music Production and Sound Engineering from Middlesex University, he went on to work at Qatar Television as a Sound Engineer and Broadcast Sound Mixer, mixing the channel’s live programs, including coverage of the 2022 FIFA World Cup. Soon after, he joined Al Jazeera Media Network as a Sound Engineer and Music Composer, where he currently works. In the same year he joined them, he began studying the Online MA Music Production and Sound Engineering degree (Now MA Music Production) at dBs Institute.
“When I first started at Al Jazeera,” says Gerard, “I primarily did recording and mixing, but then they discovered that I also composed music, and that's when they started giving me composition projects little by little. At first, I composed small stings for shows, and now I work on documentaries, where I compose full orchestral pieces, and pieces with Arabic music requirements. That's when I started implementing the Oud, the Qanun, and different Arabic styles. My role now is a mix of recording, editing, mixing, sound design, and music composition. I record full podcasts, I sometimes mix documentaries, I do sound design for social media content, and I also compose music for various shows and platforms.”
“There's always something new. Whenever they ask me to compose something, they give me the emotions they want, whether it should sound Western or Middle Eastern, and then they give me the freedom to explore sonic options and the direction of the piece. I love that they give me freedom, and there is always something new to learn in each project. Before I went to Al Jazeera, I had never composed Arabic music. I didn’t realise how deep Arabic music is, it’s in its own world.”
Working for Al Jazeera has given Gerard the opportunity to work on several projects in a wide variety of formats, from podcasts to documentaries, all of which are watched by millions of people across the world.
“Two of the projects I’m most proud of are composing the official sonic branding for Al Jazeera’s Atheer Platform,” says Gerard, “Atheer’s episodes get millions of views, so I’m really proud of that. Secondly, I have composed for Al Jazeera 360, which is another huge Al Jazeera platform which broadcasts documentaries. I have composed various pieces for AJ360’s shows in a hybrid of Arabic and Western styles. The fact that I successfully delivered full compositions in a different style from what I’m used to composing was a huge achievement for me. That's also watched by millions of people, so I’m really happy about it.”
Living in Qatar, which Gerard describes as incredibly supportive of the creative arts, multi-cultural and a place where he feels like he “belongs”, has allowed him to invest time into his music industry career, but how has he managed his work alongside studying from another time zone?
“It just takes proper time management, and you need to be interested in what you're doing to get through the challenges. You need to have passion,” says Gerard, “dBs is very helpful as well, as they record each webinar, so I get to watch them when I have the time.”
“I've been really enjoying my master’s so far,” continues Gerard, “The lecturers are very supportive of us. It was a challenge to work full-time plus study, but the modules make it very easy to follow the course, and the lecturers are very helpful. Any questions we have, they are very responsive… The teaching is very professional. In the class, the levels of expertise are very varied. Some questions that get asked are quite simple, and some are very technical. The lecturers cater to everyone. They provide for everyone's needs.”
“They teach us how to handle larger projects, larger responsibilities and larger requirements, which is very relevant to my work. The way the master’s course teaches us to approach a task is helping me in how I approach tasks at work. Although the course is very challenging, it’s very rewarding and it’s an opportunity for me to express myself more creatively, too.”
So, now nearing the end of his master’s education at dBs, which will be completed later in 2025, what does Gerard hope to achieve in the future after graduation?
“I really don't know what the future holds for me,” he says, “I hope that having the master’s degree will give me more opportunities and enable me to pursue larger projects. It’s a physical proof that I can handle larger projects in the future. I treat this as a stepping stone for me in my career, trying to get additional accreditation. I would love to be among the successful alumni who have graduated from dBs in the future.”
To learn more about Gerard and his work, visit his website or check out his Instagram.
Want to follow Gerard’s footsteps and study an industry-focused postgraduate degree from anywhere in the world? Learn more about our online degrees.
