Eh, I've had a couple of Full Sail graduates come work for me. One was useless, the other went on to become my head engineer. The one who succeeded did so because of his work ethic, natural talent, and attitude, not because of anything he learned at Full Sail. My advice would be to steer him away from that line of work altogether. There is very little opportunity and tons of qualified people already flooding the field. Studios are closing left and right, every day. Not just small time studios, but huge institutions who invented the techniques and gear being used. If he has his heart set on it, I'd suggest he get an EE degree, which could be useful in a career that actually has some opportunity. He can always take some music production courses too or better yet, find an internship where he can learn hands-on from somebody who's actually doing it for real. If he meets the right people and has the talent, the opportunity will likely present itself. If not, he may be able to get into musical equipment design/manufacture, or other field where an EE degree applies.
Early on, after high school, although I was on a path to get into studio work, I found myself getting more opportunities in live sound. I picked up a bunch of union over-hire work at the local theater, and got scooped up by a local sound company that was growing by leaps and bounds. I was lucky enough to grow my career along with it. 10 years ago, that company was bought out by a much larger AV integration company looking to bolster its live event abilities. Here I am now, working in sales and design, and I have some nights and weekends free to play around in my project studio doing projects that I can pick and choose, not relying on it to keep my family fed.
With recording, while you'll always have some higher end studios for those willing to pay for the quality, you have more and more musos doing it themselves in project studios, putting out OK sounding albums, and the market is supporting these trends. However, amateurs can't put together complex sound systems. it just doesn't work that way. And event production isn't as reliant on the music industry. Our biggest clients are Pepsi and United Technologies who do huge events - product rollouts, meetings, merger announcements, etc. but while the corporate market was hobbling along last decade, live music was pretty strong and carried us along. In between, we have sporting events (ESPN's a huge client), large religious gatherings, political rallies, and college commencements. Event production is far from glorious work. Long hours, and you bust your ass, but also end up sitting around for long periods as well. There is good money to be made though, and if you have the talent, you work your way up to a position where you aren't busting ass as much.
Most college courses do little to prepare you for live sound or event production work. It's just a hard field to teach in a classroom setting. If your son was to come to me in four years with a music production degree, I would most like hire him for the skills he learned as a Marine, as opposed to those he learned in school. If he can drive a truck, follow safety protocols, take direction well and work in a team, then he is a step ahead of most college graduates. I've rambled, and don't know if I've helped, or just dicouraged. Good luck to him, and if you or he has any questions I can help with, feel free to PM me.
0 and getting up at 5:30 to do it again you wonder why you ever wanted to do it in the first place. Not a bad idea to give these kids a taste of "show biz glamour" before they find out in real life what it's like. We used to call them "50 milers". Because 50 miles from where they joined the show they would decide they didn't like working that hard for that little money and they would quit and go home.
