Overdubbing (the process of making an overdub, or overdubs) is a technique used by recording studios to add a supplementary recorded sound to a previously recorded performance.

Tracking (or "laying the basic tracks") of the rhythm section (usually including drums) to a song, then following with overdubs (solo instruments, such as keyboards or guitar, then finally vocals), has been the standard technique for recording popular music since the early 1960s.

Overdubs can be made for a variety of reasons. One of the most obvious is for convenience; for example, if a bass guitarist is temporarily unavailable, the recording can be made and the bass track added later. Similarly, if only one or two guitarists are available, but a song calls for multiple guitar parts, a guitarist can play both lead and rhythm guitar (For example, System of a Down's "Chop Suey!" or Deep Purple's "Smoke on the Water", where it would have been impossible for the guitarists to play the solos on electric guitars and riffs on rhythm guitars simultaneously). Singers who also play an instrument find overdubbing a convenience, since it allows them to focus on one role at a time.

The Carpenters were an American vocal and instrumental duo, consisting of siblings Karen and Richard Carpenter. Though often referred to by the public as The Carpenters, the duo's official name on authorized recordings and press materials is simply "Carpenters". During a period in the 1970s when louder and wilder rock was in great demand, Richard and Karen produced a distinctively soft musical style that made them among the best-selling music artists of all time.

Carpenters' melodic pop produced a record-breaking run of hit recordings on the American Top 40 and Adult Contemporary charts, and they became leading sellers in the soft rock, easy listening and adult contemporary genres. Carpenters had three #1 singles on the Billboard Hot 100 and fifteen #1 hits on the Adult Contemporary chart (see The Carpenters discography). In addition, they had twelve top 10 singles (including their #1 hits). To date, Carpenters' album and single sales total more than 100 million units.^{[citation needed]}

During their 14-year career, the Carpenters recorded 11 albums, thirty-one singles, five television specials, and a short-lived television series. They toured in the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, Australia, the Netherlands and Belgium. Their recording career ended with Karen's death in 1983 from cardiac arrest following complications of anorexia nervosa. Extensive news coverage of the circumstances surrounding her death increased public awareness of the consequences of eating disorders.

Galeazzo Frudua is an Italian luthier, bass, guitar and amplifier builder and guitar making teacher.

As a musician originally (he occasionally appeared in some main Italian TV programs), he attended the IPIALL school, best known as the International School of Luthierie of Cremona.

He began as a luthier in the 80's building electric and semi-acoustic guitars. In September 1988 he founded in Imola, the "Frudua Guitar Works" workshop. Initially this shop focused on guitar repair and then began specializing in the production of quality handmade instruments.

In those first 10 years the Frudua instruments became well known and admired in Italy where they toured and recorded with the most famious Italian major artists among them (known abroad) Ramazzotti, Ennio Morricone Orchestra, Laura Pausini, Pavarotti, Bocelli, Zucchero, Nek and many others.

In 1997 Frudua's company was covered as the subject of a Doctoral Degree discussion at I.U.L.M. University in Milan "Strategia e comunicazione nel settore delle chitarre elettriche in Italia. Il caso Frudua Guitar Works".

Paul Reed Smith (born February 18, 1956), is a luthier and the founder and owner of PRS Guitars.

Smith is originally from Bowie, Maryland.^{[citation needed]} He made his first guitar while at St. Mary's College of Maryland, and continued to build guitars after he finished college, making them one at a time, one a month. Together with another local, John "Orkie" Ingram, they formed the nucleus of what would become Paul Reed Smith Guitars.

Smith would often bring his guitars backstage at concerts, and eventually got his break when Derek St. Holmes, of the Ted Nugent Band, agreed to try out #2, the second guitar Smith had ever made. St. Holmes played the guitar for the first few songs of his set, and Smith told him that after he showed it to some other musicians, he would fly out to Detroit and give it to him. St. Holmes eventually sold the guitar for $200.

Smith then contacted Ted McCarty, former president of Gibson and creator of the Explorer, ES-335 and Flying V guitars, and McCarty became his mentor and adviser. The result of their collaboration was the current line of PRS Guitars, which include solid- and hollow-body guitars. The Private Stock line of PRS guitars are made utilizing a vast range of exotic materials including various stones, elaborately figured tone woods, and intricate shells for inlays.

Leonard Norman Cohen, CC GOQ (born 21 September 1934) is a Canadian singer-songwriter, musician, poet, and novelist. His work often explores religion, isolation, sexuality, and interpersonal relationships. Cohen has been inducted into the American Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and both the Canadian Music Hall of Fame and the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame. He is also a Companion of the Order of Canada, the nation's highest civilian honour.

While giving the speech at Cohen's induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on 10 March 2008, Lou Reed described Cohen as belonging to the "highest and most influential echelon of songwriters."

Cohen was born on 21 September 1934 in Westmount, Montreal, Quebec, into a middle-class Jewish family. He attended Roslyn Elementary School. His mother, Marsha Klinitsky, of Lithuanian Jewish ancestry, emigrated from Lithuania while his great-grandfather emigrated from Poland. He grew up in Westmount on the Island of Montreal. His grandfather was Lyon Cohen, founding president of the Canadian Jewish Congress. His father, Nathan Cohen, who owned a substantial Montreal clothing store, died when Cohen was nine years old. On the topic of being a Kohen, Cohen has said that, "I had a very Messianic childhood." He told Richard Goldstein in 1967. "I was told I was a descendant of Aaron, the high priest." Cohen attended Westmount High School, beginning in 1948 where he was involved with the Student Council and studied music and poetry. He became especially interested in the poetry of Federico Garcia Lorca. As a teenager, he learned to play the guitar, and formed a country-folk group called the Buckskin Boys. Although he initially played a regular acoustic guitar as a teenager, he soon switched to playing a classical guitar after meeting a young Spanish flamenco guitar player who taught him "a few chords and some flamenco."