Dave Sorbara and Tom Westin are two young musicians who have been working together writing music and doing sound design for television commercials for nearly two years. The pair has garnered a good reputation as musicians with a good sense for the business. Add sound design veteran Elizabeth Taylor to the mix as producer and suddenly their company, GraysonMatthews Audio Design, is a musical force to be reckoned with in Toronto.

GraysonMatthews (named after a fictitious gentleman created by Sorbara and Westin – the kind of suave chap everyone wants to know) has produced the audio design for spots including Molson Canadian, Levi’s, Nortel, Ziploc and Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Its body of work features all types of styles and genres of music, and some truly risk-taking sound design. A good example of the latter is a spot they recently completed for Nearly Naked Lingerie. The infamous ‘Heist’ spot is completely devoid of music, but features the handiwork of the GraysonMatthews team as they grunted and groaned their way to a truly classic moment in Canadian spot-making (those who have seen the spot will understand).

Westin (who specializes in guitar) and Sorbara (piano) joined up with Taylor late last year. They were brought together while working on the opening of Nelvana’s Blaster’s Universe series. Taylor says she was impressed with the pair immediately.

‘What I saw in these guys was an ability to turn things around really quickly, lots of talent, and an understanding of the business and an understanding of the music side of this business,’ says Taylor. ‘At the time [of the Blaster’s Universe job], I wasn’t really working with any one composer and I wanted to get back into the commercial side of things, because I enjoy it. We all started talking and decided this could be a beautiful marriage.’

Westin says he and Sorbara have been working together on various projects for going on three years. After developing a five-spot reel, he says GraysonMatthews began to generate interest at ad agencies.

‘They seemed to like what we were doing,’ says Westin. ‘When we hooked up with Elizabeth, it gave everyone that much more reason to look, because Elizabeth Taylor has a reputation of someone who fosters and breeds talent.’

GraysonMatthews has moved into its own space in Toronto’s east end. The facility is fully equipped with sound equipment, consoles, studios and offices. Add a generous helping of framed classic movie posters ranging from Forbidden Planet to The Wild One and you get an idea of what the innards of GraysonMatthews looks like (the grand piano is on its way).

Both in their mid-20s, Sorbara and Westin see themselves as an alternative to the Toronto audio design mainstays. Taylor says although these young musicians are arguably more in tune with the music of the day, the GraysonMatthews gents can handle any kind of music or sound situation.

‘I think it is great for some of the younger creative teams to be working with people their own age, but it’s all business,’ says Taylor. ‘If people are really good at what they do it shouldn’t matter how old they are. There are lots of creative people who have been doing this for a long time and they are going to be excited just because there is a new option for sound design and music.’

When designing the sound or music for a spot, Taylor says, often a creative team will use a reference cd to give Westin and Sorbara an idea of the feel they are looking for in the spot.

‘Some creative people are very well versed in music and some are not,’ she says. ‘Depending on the creative team and who has worked on the project so far, they may come to you with absolutely no idea of what they want, [while] some are very specific.’

GraysonMatthews is looking to add a crown jewel to its reel courtesy of some ads for Bell. Westin and Sorbara have written a new sting for Bell ads, which has kept them busy over the last month. They also completed the sound design for the spots.

According to Sorbara, he and Westin presented four different works for the ads, and Bell chose the ‘hippest’ sounding one. He also admits they were nervous going into the initial meeting, but the Bell executives were so impressed with what they heard that one asked if he could have a looped cd copy of the sting to play in his car.