Winding road By RANDY CAPPS
CLAYTON — Walking into the Clayton School of Creative Arts serves up a bevy of surprises. From the game room in back to the stage and bar in front, the space runs the gamut from pool hall to bar. It’s a fun and unique vibe for a school that offers art programs and summer camps — and a fitting one for its music programs. Tucked just to the right of the side entrance is a recording studio, complete with recording equipment and just the right sort of acoustics. It’s the home of Copper Still Recorder, the brainchild of
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Noel White. White, an Annapolis, Maryland, native who moved to Flowers Plantation with his family a little over two years ago, is a musician who has played the drums with acts like Underfoot, Art Garfunkel and Marcy’s Playground, to name a few. Through his time as a performer, and a bit of good luck, he was able to work as a drum technician for the likes of Herbie Hancock and Sting, touring the world and rubbing elbows with giants of the music industry. So, how did a guy who’s that plugged in to the music scene wind up in Johnston County? “My wife had a friend move down here about six years ago, and every time I’d go on tour with Sting, she would come down here and visit,” he said. “Because I’d be gone for three or four months at a time. ... So that’s how the Clayton thing came up. And I went to Elon, so when my wife said, ‘How do you feel about moving to North Carolina?’ Our second kid was on the way, and we knew we wanted to upgrade. ... I was cool with North Carolina, and I knew Raleigh was a nice city and we wouldn’t be far from it at all. It was a no-brainer.” His journey through the world of music led him here, and also led him to his wife, Jennifer Van Meter, who, one might guess, is also a musician. He
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worked with her on her first three albums, and the two of them wound up together. “We moved in together, got Ruckus the dog and the rest was history,” he said. Since then, Kate, 5, and Gus, 3, have joined the family band. “Both of their middle names are Van,” he said. “So, we call them the Van Whites.” Gus and Kate are a big part of the reason White decided to get off the road. “When you’re young enough, and your kids are young enough, you can get away with doing it,” he said, of the demanding travel schedule. “I got off the tour in 2019 and started a job with Harmon, who owns JBL and a bunch of other sound companies out of L.A. So that was a dream come true. I’m going to finally get off tour, but still travel a bit. Because Sting would have me on the road for three months, home for a week, then three months again. It was just too much. “My friends were like, ‘You got off the road just in time.’ Because we knew the first thing that would go (because of COVID) would be tours. We didn’t escape it, either, because by June of last year, they laid all the JBL Pro team off. It just had so much tied into concert sound. “That led me to a lot of sitting around with a lot of time on my hands. And I met Tom.”
