The choice between headphones and monitors can significantly affect the mixing process, influencing everything from spatial perception to frequency response. Recognizing the importance of selecting the right tool for mixing is crucial for achieving the best possible sound quality in music production.

Analysis of Headphones for Mixing

The journey of mixing music is a nuanced one, with the choice of monitoring through headphones or studio monitors playing a pivotal role. This section delves into a detailed analysis of both, exploring their advantages and challenges, to guide mixers in making informed decisions that suit their unique needs and environments.

Headphones have become an indispensable tool in the arsenal of modern music producers and engineers. Their portability is unmatched, allowing for the flexibility to mix in a variety of settings, from a bustling café to a quiet hotel room. This mobility is a boon for those who find inspiration in changing environments or for those whose lifestyle demands constant movement.

Beyond their convenience, headphones offer an intimate listening experience that brings out the minutiae in a mix. This level of detail and isolation is particularly beneficial when identifying and rectifying subtle imperfections that might be masked by the acoustical characteristics of a room. For critical listening tasks, such as editing and fine-tuning effects, headphones can provide a clarity that is hard to replicate with monitors.

From a financial perspective, high-quality headphones often present a more accessible entry point into professional mixing. They sidestep the need for acoustical treatment, which can be a significant expense and a complex undertaking. This cost-effectiveness makes headphones an attractive option for those at the beginning of their mixing journey or for established mixers seeking a secondary reference tool.

However, the very nature of headphones can introduce certain challenges. The closed environment can exaggerate the stereo field and skew frequency balance, potentially leading to mixes that feel unbalanced or disconnected when played through speakers. Moreover, prolonged use at high volumes can result in ear fatigue, subtly influencing mixing decisions over time. Another hurdle is ensuring that mixes translate well across various playback systems, a task that often requires extensive cross-referencing due to the isolated listening environment headphones provide.

Analysis of Monitors for Mixing

Studio monitors, on the other hand, are revered for their ability to reproduce sound with a level of authenticity and naturalness that headphones struggle to match. They offer a flat frequency response, crucial for achieving a mix that sounds consistent and balanced across different listening environments. The representation of spatial dynamics and the stereo image is more accurate, aiding in the placement of elements within the mix and creating a more immersive listening experience.

Mixing in a room with well-calibrated monitors allows for a holistic assessment of mix balance and dynamics. This environment facilitates decisions that contribute to a cohesive and dynamic mix, reflecting how listeners will experience the music in real-world settings.

Despite these advantages, monitors are not without their challenges. The accuracy of sound reproduction is heavily influenced by the room's acoustics. Without proper treatment, reflections and standing waves can color the sound, leading to mixes that may not translate well outside the studio. This dependence on room acoustics necessitates a significant investment in acoustic treatment to create an optimal listening environment.

Moreover, the initial investment in quality studio monitors and the required treatment can be substantial, posing a barrier for those with limited budgets. Additionally, using monitors at appropriate listening levels may not be feasible in all environments, such as apartments or shared spaces, where noise can be a concern.

Combining Headphones and Monitors for Mixing

The ideal mixing process does not exclusively rely on headphones or monitors but leverages the strengths of both. Employing headphones allows mixers to dive deep into the details and nuances of their work, while monitors provide a broader perspective, ensuring the mix feels cohesive and balanced in a real-world environment. This dual approach facilitates a more comprehensive understanding of how a mix will translate across different listening scenarios, from intimate headphone listening to expansive speaker systems.

Understanding the characteristics, advantages, and limitations of both headphones and monitors is paramount. This knowledge empowers mixers to make strategic decisions, adapting their workflow to the demands of each project and the constraints of their working environment. By embracing the unique contributions of both monitoring methods, mixers can achieve the highest quality mixes that resonate with listeners across any platform.

Case Studies 

The debate between mixing with headphones and monitors is enriched by insights from professionals in the music production industry. Many experienced mixers have shared their preferences, workflows, and the rationale behind their choices, providing valuable perspectives for those navigating this decision.

• Insights from professionals who mix exclusively on headphones or monitors: Some professionals prefer to mix exclusively on headphones due to their portability and the level of detail they can discern. Others swear by monitors for their natural sound reproduction and spatial accuracy. Each group has developed strategies to mitigate the drawbacks of their chosen method, such as referencing multiple systems or investing in acoustic treatment.
• Examples of successful mixes done on headphones and how they translated to other systems: There are numerous case studies of successful mixes that were primarily done on headphones, which later translated well across various playback systems. These examples often highlight the importance of cross-referencing mixes on different devices and the use of reference tracks to ensure a mix translates well.
• The role of personal workflow and environment in choosing between headphones and monitors: The choice between headphones and monitors often comes down to personal workflow preferences and the physical environment in which one mixes. For instance, those working in untreated rooms or needing to keep noise levels down may lean towards headphones, while those with access to acoustically treated spaces may prefer monitors.

Final Thoughts

In music production, the debate between using headphones and monitors for mixing is not about choosing one over the other but understanding their complementary roles. Headphones offer portability and the ability to pick up on fine details, making them ideal for critical listening and editing. They are also cost-effective, providing a practical solution for those starting out or working with limited budgets. On the other hand, studio monitors excel in delivering natural and authentic sound, crucial for accurately assessing spatial dynamics and stereo imaging, which is essential for creating immersive mixes. However, achieving this level of sound reproduction with monitors requires a significant investment in acoustic treatment and is influenced by the mixing environment.

The key to a perfect mix lies in leveraging both headphones and monitors, integrating their strengths to enhance the mixing process. This approach allows mixers to benefit from the detailed listening environment of headphones and the authentic sound reproduction of monitors. By understanding and adapting to the advantages and limitations of each, mixers can ensure their mixes translate well across different listening scenarios, resulting in music that resonates with listeners on any playback system. Success in mixing, therefore, depends on the mixer's ability to skillfully navigate these tools, combining their unique benefits to achieve the highest quality in their musical projects.

Looking for the best free music production tools on the web? SoundShockAudio has the largest collection of free music production tools that you can download from.

The music industry has always been at the forefront of technological innovation, from the advent of vinyl records to the digital streaming revolution. The emergence of AI is the latest development poised to redefine the industry. 

AI's role in music production and composition is multifaceted, offering tools that can generate new melodies, enhance music production processes, and even complete unfinished works by legendary artists. However, this technological advancement also raises questions about authenticity, copyright issues, and the potential displacement of human creativity.

The Revolutionary Role of AI in Music Creation

AI in Composition

AI tools like AIVA and Amper Music are revolutionizing the composition process by enabling the generation of new melodies, chord progressions, and lyrics. These tools analyze vast datasets of existing music to identify patterns and generate new compositions that can mimic various styles and genres. 

For instance, AIVA has been used to create music for films, advertisements, and games, showcasing its versatility and creative potential.

AI in Music Production

In music production, AI enhances processes such as mixing, mastering, and sound design. LANDR, for example, uses AI to provide automated mastering services, adjusting the subtleties of a track to ensure it's polished to perfection. This technology streamlines the production process, allowing artists to focus more on the creative aspects of music creation.

Case Studies

Notable examples of AI's impact include the completion of a new Beatles song with AI assistance, using an old demo tape by John Lennon. This project utilized AI tools to isolate Lennon's voice and integrate it with new parts recorded by surviving members. Another example is Taryn Southern's AI-generated album, which utilized various AI platforms to compose and produce music, highlighting the potential of AI as a creative partner.

Opportunities Presented by AI in Music

Democratization of Music Production

AI levels the playing field for aspiring musicians and producers by providing access to sophisticated tools that were previously available only to those with significant resources. This democratization of music production enables a wider range of artists to bring their visions to life.

Enhanced Creativity and Efficiency

AI serves as a creative partner, offering new ideas and speeding up the production process. It can generate endless variations on a theme, providing musicians with a rich source of inspiration and allowing for rapid experimentation.

Be sure to check out SoundShockAudio if you need more inspiration for your next track. SoundShockAudio has the largest collection of free music production resources that you can download from today! 

Personalization of Music Experience

AI's role in creating personalized listening experiences is exemplified by services like Spotify's Discover Weekly, which uses algorithms to suggest songs based on a user's listening habits. This personalization enhances the listener's experience by introducing them to new music tailored to their preferences.

Challenges and Ethical Considerations

Authenticity and Emotional Depth

A major debate surrounding AI in music is its ability to capture the emotional essence of music compared to human composers. Critics argue that AI-generated music may lack the depth and authenticity of compositions created by humans, potentially leading to a homogenized musical landscape.

Copyright and Ownership Issues

The use of AI in music raises complex legal challenges, including copyright infringement concerns. As AI-generated music becomes more indistinguishable from human-created music, determining ownership and ensuring fair compensation for creators becomes increasingly difficult.

Potential Job Displacement

There is concern that AI could displace musicians and producers if it becomes overly dominant in the creative process. While AI can enhance music production, it is essential to balance its use to ensure that it complements rather than replaces human creativity.

AI Tools and Technologies in Music Production

Overview of Leading AI Music Tools

Tools like AIVA, Amper Music, and LANDR demonstrate the capabilities of AI in music creation and production. These platforms offer a range of services, from composition and arrangement to mastering and sound design, showcasing the versatility of AI in enhancing the music production process.

Innovative AI Applications

Unique applications of AI in music include virtual instruments and AI-driven mastering services. These technologies allow for the creation of new sounds and the optimization of audio quality, further expanding the creative possibilities for musicians and producers[3].

The Future of AI in Music

Predictions and Trends

The future of AI in music technology is likely to see further advancements in AI's creative capabilities and its integration into the music production process. Predictions include the development of more sophisticated AI composition tools and the expansion of AI's role in personalizing music experiences.

Balancing Human Creativity with AI

As the music industry navigates the integration of AI, finding a balance between leveraging AI advancements and preserving the essence of human creativity in music will be crucial. Musicians and producers can utilize AI as a tool to enhance their creative processes while ensuring that the human touch remains central to music creation.

Final Thoughts

The impact of AI on music production and composition is profound, offering both significant opportunities and challenges. As AI continues to evolve, its role in the music industry will undoubtedly expand, transforming the way music is created, produced, and experienced. Embracing AI advancements while maintaining the human element in music will be key to harnessing the full potential of this technological revolution.

Hello Stephen. Maybe you can use this on your blog. When I record any guitars I always mic them. I just don’t like the sound of direct miking for electric and especially acoustic guitar. I mic my electric guitar cab and and use a x/y configuration on my old Gibson acoustic. I point the “arrow” of the mics at the 12th fret about 6” away. My question is. When I am using the x/y configuration how do you mix these mics? Do you pan them and treat each one as its own track? Do you mix the two mics down to one track? Do you use a splitter of some sort? What do you do when mixing this configuration for acoustic guitar? Also, if you were to mix them down to one track would you then double track the acoustic, as I do with electric, and pan them?

We are in agreement that using microphones to record acoustic guitar always sounds much better than any DI/Pickup I've ever heard.

If you haven't already stumbled across it, at the bottom of this post there is a very short video I produced comparing the sound of 4 different popular recording techniques for acoustic guitar. With a great sounding guitar, a good sounding room, and a good guitar player, you rarely have to do a lot of processing to get a good acoustic guitar sound. Most of the processing might be a touch of EQ, maybe some compression, to help it fit into a busy mix, and then maybe a touch of reverb for some more ambience.

As to your specific question, if I'm recording in X-Y, as shown in example #3 of the video below, I'll use two of the same microphones that are hopefully matched fairly well, and I'll record them to a stereo track, with them panned hard left and right (i.e., one microphone to the left channel only, and the other to the right channel only). The typical X-Y configuration doesn't give you a super wide stereo sound... although it can vary depending on how close to the guitar and the placement on the guitar. So, any processing I do is applied to the stereo track, i.e., both channels are being processed the same. Sometimes I'll collapse the stereo field a bit and move the guitar to one side or the other if I need to make space and balance it out against some other instruments. If I want that really wide stereo sound, then the only way to really get that is with double-tracking, as in example #4 in the video.

 

Hello again Stephen. You’ve been very helpful to me and I am hoping you will help me through one more dilemma. I am putting a mic in my all tube Marshall combo to record distortion guitar. I am using a Sennheiser e609, a dynamic mic, right up against the grill off my Marshall DSL40. I have to say that the recorded image does not really match what my amp sounds like. Its a little muddy and I am wondering what could I do, or what you do to make your distortion guitar mixes sound good. Or maybe there is a better mic placement technique you know of or something I should do in the mix? Using Slate digital and Presonus plugins in Studio One 4 just so you know. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Let me ask you a question in return: Do you normally listen to a guitar amp with your ear right up against the grill? If not, then it's not any wonder that a microphone right up against the grill doesn't sound the way you are used to hearing it. I know several guitar players who absolutely hate it when someone puts one microphone right up against the grill for recording, even though that seems to be a fairly "standard" technique.

The keys to recording ANY instrument, including amps, are:

• microphone choice
• microphone position
• instrument/amp position in the room

That's really all there is to it. If you don't like the sound you are hearing through your monitors, change one of those 3 things, and listen again. Repeat until you find the sound you like. It's even better if you have an assistant who can be moving the microphone very slowly in the studio, while you are listening in the control room, and can hear the changes in real time while the microphone is being moved. It's amazing how much difference moving the microphone a very small amount can make in the sound.

If you don't have lots of different microphones to choose from, then you still have the other 2 things you can play around with. For example, if you think your sound is a bit muddy and dull, then try moving the microphone more towards the center of the speaker cone in your amp. The closer to the center you get, the brighter the sound will be. Conversely, if it's too harsh, then move it more towards the edge of the speaker cone.

Then you can also try moving it further away from the grill, which may help "open" up the sound a bit more. Or, maybe your room has some nodes that are causing some of the lower/muddy frequencies to build up. In that case, try moving your amp further away from the wall, or getting it up off the floor (I often set amps on top of a chair), to minimize reflections/build-up from the floor or wall.

If you want a sound that is closer to what you hear while you are playing your guitar, then put the microphone closer to where you usually stand/sit when playing, rather than right up against the grill. Sometimes the added bit of room tone you get when you get the microphone away from the grill may be just what you are looking for. I will often have one microphone up close to the grill and then one further back in the room, adjusting the positioning until they sound good blended together without any phasing issues. That often gives you a more "natural" sound, and with those 2 microphones routed to separate tracks, you can control the blend later in the mix depending on if you want a really up front sound (close microphone), or more of the room tone sound.

Hello sir. I am hoping you’ll answer this question for me no matter what. I am wanting to do summing with my mixes. I can’t afford to buy an analog summing mixer and was wondering how to do it digitally. Not that I don’t know how to do summing I have a good understanding of how to do summing, but could you recommend any plugins to do this with? Maybe I already have something that would work in my DAW, Studio One 4 Pro. Thanks, I hope to hear from you.

The mixer built-in to your DAW is already doing the summing for you. Perhaps you don't understand what summing means? Route a bunch of channels to a "master" buss in your DAW, and they are all being summed together and you get the combined sum of all the audio tracks out of that bus. No plugin needed.

But analog summing gives your mix and analog sound. How do I get my digital summing to sound analog? Maybe a mixer plugin on the Master Buss? Is this the only difference between digital and analog summing?

Depends on what you mean by "analog sound". Do you mean distortion and cross talk and noise? There is nothing "magic" about analog that makes things sound "better". Normally what you are hearing when people describe the "analog" sound is some form of distortion... and certain types of distortion can "color" the signal in a pleasing way. Some of those analog summing mixers are designed to add some of that kind of color, or distortion, through the use of tubes or transformers (usually), and those are the more expensive ones. While other analog mixers are actually very simple circuits that are very clean, but they may have some insert points to allow you to add your own analog processing (such as compressors or maybe a tube preamp) to get the "color" you want.

So, if you want a digital mix to sound analog, you first have to define what type of "analog" sound you want... because it can go anywhere from almost as "clean" as digital, to huge amounts of distortion and noise (of all different types), and everything in between.

There are many plugins that emulate the analog sound of consoles, by measuring and capturing the frequency response and distortions that some of these analog consoles add to the signal. I'm fond of the Slate Digital plugins myself, and use their Virtual Console Collection and Virtual Mix Bus plugin on almost every mix. It's very subtle, but it does add some color. Slate also has some tube emulation plugins that can add more distortion if needed, in varying amounts and different colors. Waves also makes the NLS series of plugins, which emulates multiple different channels of several popular consoles, and is maybe my second choice for console emulation plugins. If you just want to play around with different types and amounts of distortion, Decapitator from SoundToys can be a lot of fun. That's for more obvious types of distortion, usually, but you can blend in subtle amounts to things like a vocal track to make it a bit more aggressive.

But, don't get fooled by all the hype, and especially all the people who try to say that only analog sounds good. More important than either analog or digital, or even which plugins (or hardware) you use, is the person doing the mixing. The only way you get good at mixing is with lots and lots and lots of practice and really learning how to listen in the right way (with good monitors in a good room). At this point in my career, I could be more than happy and make great sounding mixes with ONLY the stock plugins built-in to Cubase Pro (and I've done that for some clients who wanted me to send them a project to see how I mix). It's all in the person and their ears! Don't waste tons of money on expensive analog gear at this point... many top mixing engineers have gone completely "in the box" with nothing but plugins these days, and are turning out incredible sounding mixes.

The Mixing of Quiet Scream - Part 1 - Track Layout and Groups

This is the not so glamorous, but very important part of mixing. Getting your tracks organized, and setting up your groups/busses, and folders.

Part 1 in a series of mixing the song "Quiet Scream" from the Conversation CD by Greg Adams & East Bay Soul.

Like and subscribe to my YouTube channel to be notified of new videos as they are posted:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfj0dftwTG0GZWbH6ZmuMiQ

This video shows just one way that you can use a couple of delays, instead of reverb, for the main vocal effects when mixing. For this song, I used a short diffuse delay to create a subtle ambient effect throughout the song. Then I used a longer echo that is brought up and down with automation throughout the song, at very low levels during the verses, and then louder during the choruses. I also ramp up the long delay during long held out notes to give them a longer tail.

The song is "Grow Old With Me" by Greg Adams and East Bay Soul, which I mixed for their "That's Life" CD. Vocals by Darryl Walker.
Visit: http://eastbaysoul.com for more info and to purchase their CDs.

How To Record Acoustic Guitar

A quick comparison of 4 popular acoustic guitar recording techniques

The purpose of this video is to let you compare the sound of different recording techniques for the acoustic guitar. All of the techniques were recorded in one performance pass, so the performance is the same for each. A second recording was done for the double-tracking method (#4). NO reverb, delay, or chorus effects used, although there is some compression and EQ (applied equally to all).

Technique #1 - A single small diaphragm condenser microphone slightly above the guitar and aimed at about the 12th fret, where the neck meets the body. This is the most common single microphone tracking method. In this recording an Audio Technica AT-4031 microphone is used, running through the A Designs Pacifica preamp, through a Cranesong Trakker compressor and then through the UA2192 Master Audio Interface.

Technique #2 - This adds a large diaphragm condenser microphone, aimed at the lower part of the guitar body, to create a stereo sound along with the microphone from #1 above. For this recording, an Audio Technica 4060 tube microphone was used, going through the 2nd channel of the A Designs Pacifica preamp, and through a second Cranesong Trakker compressor that was stereo linked with the other one. Also going through the second channel of the UA2192 converters.

Technique #3 - This is a stereo recording with two identical microphones configured in an X-Y arrangement, and set a little further back from the guitar. This gives a different kind of stereo sound, which is not as wide as in method #2, but would collapse to mono better. In this recording, we are using two Audio Technica 4041 small diaphragm condenser microphones, going through a Presonus ADL 600 tube microphone pre-amp, and then through the Drawmer 1968 Mercenary Edition tube compressor, and then through a couple channels of the Lynx Aurora 8 A/D converters.

Technique #4 - Double Tracking - This is by far the most popular technique to get that big wide stereo sound for acoustic, as well as electric, guitars. For this, we go back to technique #1 with a single small diaphragm condenser microphone at about the 12th fret. But, then we have the guitar player play the same thing two different times, as accurately as possible. Each take is recorded on its own track, and then those tracks are panned hard left and right in the mix. The result it a big and wide, yet natural, sound. Sloppy playing will ruin this effect, though, so the guitar player needs to be good enough to play the parts exactly the same way twice. It's the subtle differences in timing and pitch that make it work and sound great!

Here are some actual questions posted:

Yo people so what's the best plugin for making snares?

Hey guys, quick question: Anyone have recommendations on the best orchestral plug-ins?

best premium quality recording audio interfaces for solo artists?

Best soundcard for routing DAW through external effects?

Which DAW?

The list goes on and on, those are just a few recent ones I saw with a quick look. But, you get the idea. People love to post vague questions about "what's the best" something or other, and usually don't go into ANY specifics about what they are recording, what their budget is, what type of environment, skill level, preferred work flow, etc.

The short answer to ALL of these question is: There is no "Best" of anything!

If there was a "best" something, that was truly best for everyone and every possible scenario, then wouldn't all the others have gone out of business by now?

There is a good reason why there are so many different choices for music gear and software, because there simply isn't one combination of gear, or even one piece of gear in a certain category, that is the "best" for every possible situation.

I think it's mostly that "these young kids" are generally lazy and possibly have some entitlement issues. They don't want to do the work themselves to figure out what is going to work "best" for them. They don't want to use their ears and decide for themselves. They just want someone else to tell them what is best. Then, they get mad when they get a bunch of sarcastic answers. Often someone else jumps in to tell us old cranky guys that we aren't being helpful when we try to tell them (sometimes very sarcastically) that what's "best" is a matter of opinion and highly dependent on the specific situation.

In my own studio, I don't have just one of everything, because none of the gear or software that I own is "best" for every situation. If I was ONLY working on my own music, and recording the same things, and always wanting the same sound for everything, then I could certainly narrow down my selection of gear considerably. But, I need to work with a wide variety of musicians/artists in a wide variety of styles, with all different types of instruments and voices. So, I own a LOT of microphones, quite a few different pre-amps and compressors, and a HUGE amount of software and plugins (probably way too much, but I am a geek and love my toys).

Also, even if there was a "best" of something, maybe you don't always want the "best"? Sometimes you want something that adds some color or character, or even has some grit or distortion. There are plenty of times when I go for something based on the character it adds, rather than what's going to technically give me the "best" reproduction.

So, the proper types of questions should be worded more like "What is your favorite ___?" or "What are some recommendations for ___?" followed by a good amount of detail about your budget, location, style of music, instruments you'll be recording, preferred workflow, etc. Even then, you still need to do the research and try things out for yourself to figure out which one works best, or is at least good enough, for your particular situation.

But, hey, if you want to know what the best DAW is, it's Cubase Pro!
(for me, maybe not for you)

How should I go about getting my music copyrighted as a musician and producer? And also whats the best equipment to use for recording?

Out of these two questions, copyright info is the easiest to answer, so I'll address that first.

I'm not a lawyer, so I strongly recommend getting legal advice from a lawyer that specializes in the music business and/or copyright law in your country. I can only answer with what I know for the USA and our copyright laws.

From my understanding, and what I've read from many others on the subject, as soon as you put down a creative work in some tangible form, then you own the copyright. That's automatic. Nothing that you have to do, as long as you have something tangible (lyrics on paper, music recorded to tape/CD, etc.).

The problem is when there is a dispute over potential copyright infringement, then you must be able to prove that your version was created first. The best way to do that, and the one that would have the most merit in a court of law, is to register your works with the U.S. Copyright Office. That way you have legal proof at least of when you registered the work. Then, if somebody creates something that infringes on your copyright, after you have already registered, you would have a much better chance of winning the case (although you also have to show that they had access to your work, and purposely copied it).

More info on copyright and registration can be found here:
https://www.copyright.gov/registration/

whats the best equipment to use for recording?

The short answer to this is that there is no "best" equipment for recording.

The longer answer is that "it depends".

• What are you recording?
• How many simultaneous inputs do you need to record at once?
• What kind of budget do you have?
• What styles of music will you be recording?
• What is your preferred workflow?
• Do you prefer analog or digital?
• Do you like Mac or PC (if going digital)?
• Which of the many different software DAW systems makes the most sense to you and fits your workflow?

There are simply too many variables and too many choices to give a simple "this is the best system" type of answer. If you have millions of dollars to spend on a high-end custom built studio, my answer would be a lot different than if you are someone buying pre-made beats and trying to record rap vocals in your apartment on your notebook computer.

What I like may not be what you like. Some people like Macs, and some like PCs, and many of them are very vocal about claiming which is best. But, if you are going to go with a software based system, you should go to a music store that has all the most popular choices, and try them out in person to see which interface makes the most sense to you and fits your needs, then build a good system around that.

There is so much more to it than computer and software, though. Acoustic treatment, good monitors, microphones, stands, and accessories all cost money as well, and come in a staggering number of options and price ranges.

Sometimes the "best" way to go is to start small and simple, and work your way up. Adding more and better gear as you can afford it and as you master what you already own. Be careful, though, it can quickly become a money pit!

 

Hi! I have two questions. Firstly, do you think that an older iMac (mid-2011) with RAM upgraded to 20GB would have sufficient capability to run music recording and processing software? Sorry, I have the software, but not the time to learn and put it through its paces and really test it. I was upsold a MacBook Pro today, and have a limited time to decide if I want to return it. I also bought a Rode NT1 microphone, but read your article about the SM58. I would be recording female vocals in both a large room with little to no padding, and a tiny closet done up in studio foam. The vocals go the range from very loud, operatic or Broadway-style, to quiet lullabies. I read your article, googled whether the Rode NT1 is a large condenser mic like the kind you tell us not to get, and then went, Oops. Now wondering if I need to return the Rode for the SM58. Or if it would work for me due to the large room (with high ceilings) and loud volume of the vocals. Thank you for any and all advice you can share!

I'm not a Mac person, so I can't comment on that specific Mac. It really depends on the processor and hard drive as to how suitable it will be for recording. The amount of RAM won't make a whole lot of difference unless you need to have a lot of samples loaded into RAM at once (for a virtual sampler, for instance, that doesn't stream well from disk). 2011 isn't that old, and my own studio DAW (PC that I custom built myself) is almost that old. I'm running on an older i7 processor, with quite a few fast hard drives installed, and only 12GB of RAM. The only time I run into issues now is when I'm mixing and trying to use a lot of the newer plugins that are very processor hungry. If you are mostly doing simple recordings at home, and not trying to run a whole lot of virtual instruments and/or plugins at the same time, your older computer will probably be fine. The only thing you would need to check is that the software and drivers are compatible with your OS version and your hardware. If that computer works for your needs, no need to update to the latest/greatest thing.

Regarding your microphone, I haven't personally used the Rode NT1, but, in general, most people prefer to use a large diaphragm condenser microphone for vocals. It's not that I was trying to say that you couldn't use it, just that it will be much more sensitive than a dynamic microphone and will pick up more room noise if your room isn't treated. The tiny closet done up in studio foam will probably work to give you a fairly dead sound, so you should try some recordings in there first to see if you like the sound. For the larger room, if you are finding you are getting too much room noise for you liking, you can always hack together some DIY gobos to put in a U-Shape around your microphone to block some reflections. Use whatever you can find to create some makeshift frames and hang some heavy quilts or packing blankets over them. Or, even use some mattresses.

The SM-58 is relatively inexpensive (around $100), so if you have the cash, I would pick up one in addition to keeping your Rode. You can never have too many microphones! Each microphone sounds different, just like every voice is different, so it's good to try out different microphones to see which sounds best for what you will be recording. Also, there may be times where you want the sound of the Rode, and others where you want the sound of the SM58, since it sounds like the type of vocals you do are wide ranging in style.

Let's start at the source and go through all the possible reasons your mixes might suck, and what the pros do differently.

It all begins at the source!

Maybe it's just that you and/or the musicians you are working with simply can't deliver a great sound to begin with. Sometimes you just have to be brutally honest with yourself, and recognize that you (or the musicians you work with) don't have the skills and proficiency yet to make your instruments/parts sound great on their own. Part of this can also be the quality of your instruments. And, by "instrument", I also include vocals, as the voice is usually the most prominent instrument in any song with vocals.

You know why most recordings and mixes that the professional engineers work on sound great? Because they aren't working with beginners! For the most part, they are working with seasoned professionals who have already put in the time to learn how to get great sounds out of the instruments, and who can also afford professional quality instruments and keep them maintained properly.

Back before the home recording boom, when I was just starting out at the major studio I worked at, I often got the all night shifts recording low budget bands that didn't have a lot of experience (or money) yet. Many of these bands would come in and say something like "We want the drums to sound like {insert some famous band}". Similarly, the would usually say the same thing about the guitars and bass. Problem was that none of these bands could play like the musicians in those famous bands they cited. Additionally, their instruments were also rarely up to the quality level that those famous bands could afford. I'm a pretty damn good recording and mixing engineer, but I can't perform miracles!

Your musical arrangement sucks!

This is something I often run into with amateur musicians, especially solo artists that do everything themselves. You can't get a great sounding mix if you don't have a great arrangement that isn't over-crowded with too many parts. I have covered this twice already, so I will try not to repeat myself yet again, but it's VERY important. Check out these posts:
Less is More - Bigger sounds through simplification
Better Mixes through Subtraction

Your recording room sounds like crap!

Let's assume that you have the source nailed down, your chops and instrument are pro level, and you have written a great song with a great musical arrangement. What about your recording space? If you are recording any instruments, or vocals, with a microphone, then the room you record in plays a major role in the sound that will be captured. I would venture to say that in many cases the room itself is far more important, and has more impact on the sound, than the microphone and the rest of the gear in your recording chain. If you are recording in any kind of room in your home, or even your garage, and you don't have any kind of proper acoustic treatment, then you are more likely than not getting the sound of your room into your recording. In addition to boxy sounding small room reverb and early reflections, the dimensions of your room will cause all sorts of nasty frequency problems if you have parallel surfaces (as almost all homes do).

That small room reverb type of sound will kill the definition of most anything you record with a microphone, and make it extremely hard for you to get anywhere close to that up front and present "in your face" vocal sound. It will always sound exactly like it was recorded in a small room, and will smear the sound.

Pros know better, and they record at major studios that were acoustically designed by professional studio designers, and usually have put a HUGE amount of money into just the construction and acoustics of the studio, to get the best sound possible. Even with many modern engineers working from home based studios these days (myself included), they still know enough to put a large amount of their budget into the acoustics to take the room out of the equation (or at least make it sound good). I'm not talking about throwing up a bunch of acoustic foam products, or egg cartons either. If you don't know what you're doing, hire an acoustic consultant to help you (I did when doing the remodel for my studio in our home). Still, when I need to record a large group, or something where I want a nice natural room sound, I will rent out major studios in the area to do the recording.

However, there are some things you can do to counteract the room sound a bit if you can't invest in a lot of proper acoustical treatment. It's a bit counter-intuitive, but when recording things like vocals in an untreated room, you usually do NOT want to use a large diaphragm condenser microphone! Those are too sensitive, and they will pick up too much of the room sound. Instead, use a dynamic microphone and work it as close as possible so that the signal you want is much louder than any reflections from the surfaces in your room. Similarly, position yourself as far away from any walls or reflective surfaces as possible. It has been said the Bono, from U2, likes to record his vocals in the control room using a lowly handheld Shure SM58, without headphones (listening through the studio monitors). That's the kind of microphone that you need to think of when recording at home. If you have a great voice, and know how to properly work with the microphone, you can get great vocals with just an SM58, and not have to worry about too much bleed into the microphone of room reflections and other sounds.

This works for things other than vocals as well. Guitar amps can be recorded up close with something like an SM57 (still the first choice in many major studios as well) and not worrying too much about room sounds since the amp will usually be MUCH louder. However, even with that, you may need to move the amp around, or even get it up off the floor, to change how the sound of the amp is affected by nearby surfaces and get a better recorded sound.

Your recording gear Sucks!

I'm almost hesitate to put this in here, because even most of the cheap recording gear these days still can sound fairly decent, and the items above are usually much more important than the actual gear that you use. But, there is definitely some crap gear out there that can definitely affect the sound quality of your recorded tracks, thus making it difficult to get a good sounding mix. It's much easier to get a great sounding mix if you have great sounding tracks to begin with! If you're still using adapters to plug your microphone or other gear into the little 1/8 inch audio input on your computer, it's time to at least start looking at a decent audio interface for your computer (USB, Thunderbolt, Firewire, etc.).

You need more practice, experience, and/or talent!

Let's face it, even if you have a handle on everything above, it takes a LOT of time, practice/experience, and a certain amount of natural talent to become a really good mixing engineer! There is a reason that most successful band/artists don't do their own mixing -- they simply don't have the time to dedicate to getting great at that, while still having time to be great musicians, songwriters, and performers. It's difficult to be a master at everything, so you have to decide what's important to you, and maybe let some other professionals handle the rest.

If you're more of an engineer than an artist, and your goal is to be a great recording/mixing engineer, then you need to put in the time! Just like you don't pick up a guitar and suddenly turn into a David Gilmour (or whoever your favorite guitar player is), you can't just buy some gear and suddenly become a great mixing engineer. It takes many years of practice and experience to get really good at any artistic endeavor, and mixing is no exception. It's fairly easy to learn the technical side of things, but it's also an art form that is not easily mastered.

In addition to putting in the years of practice it takes to get good at mixing, there is definitely a certain amount of natural talent involved, that not everyone has. Some people pick it up much faster because of their ability to really listen and make the right mixing choices for the song.

Best thing you can do to get better, is to read all the mixing advice you can find from pros that you admire, and then practice mixing every day (just like you would practice an instrument). Solicit bands/artists on the internet to send you their tracks to mix for free while you are learning. Not only will that give you a variety of material to practice with, but you'll also learn how to communicate and work with bands/artists, to try to deliver something that they like (as they will almost always ask for some changes to your mixes).

The "Secrets" of the mixing pros!

I already wrote an article on "The Secrets top Mixing Engineers don’t want you to know!", but I'll summarize the main "secret" here.

The main reason that the pros get great sounding mixes is that everything except the last point in this article (practice/experience & natural talent) has already been taken care of for them! Most of the time, the pro mixing engineers get great sounding tracks recorded by other professional engineers in great sounding studios with great sounding gear, along with great musicians who really know how to play (and have great sounding instruments), as well as great songs and arrangements (well, not always). Combine all of that with the years of experience and the natural talent of the professional mixing engineers, and it's hard not to get a great sounding mix!

It's going to be very hard to compete with the pros if you are trying to do everything yourself out of a bedroom studio. It can be done, but it's definitely much more difficult! So, go through the list of points above, and do your best to get everything under control as much as you possibly can, and then just keep practicing!  Good luck!

Hi Stephen,
I came across your article; “Inserts vs Effects Sends – Which to use for what” and seeing the amount of knowledge you have on the subject I thought I'll try my luck asking you a question. I've recently bought my first ever mixer, Soundcraft Signature 12MTK which I wanted to use for multi-track recording with Ableton. Multi-track works fine,However, I was very surprised when I recorded some tracks and then during the playback I couldn't hear any of the mixer's internal effects which I was using during recording. I've tried changing some settings around in Ableton and I also tried different buttons on the mixer but to no avail. Finally I emailed Soundcraft's support and I was told the following "unfortunately there is not a way to record the internal FX on the Signature consoles. The USB send is directly after the mic pre so FX will not be included ". This reply really floored me. I'd really appreciate if someone else could confirm the above statement, but also perhaps there's another way of achieving this ?
Your answer is much appreciated.
Regards
Bob

Hi Bob,

I won't go into specifics on that particular mixer, since I don't own it, nor do I know anything about it other than a quick glance at the product page with a quick Google search after you submitted your question.  Instead, I'll discuss why you are not able to record the effects (FX), and why this is something you usually would NOT want to do during tracking anyway.

First, let me link to the article you mentioned: Inserts vs Effects Sends – Which to use for what

For anyone else reading this, it's important to have the background from that article first.

As mentioned in that article, things like reverb and delay/echo, are usually set up on an FX send, so that they can be used from multiple channels (so you can put a bit of reverb on the vocals AND the drum channels, for example, and control the amount of reverb on each using the send knobs).  However, these FX are NOT being returned, or "inserted", into the individual channels. Instead, the outputs from the various FX are all on their own channels, or buss.

To understand a bit further, lets go back to the mostly analog days of recording (when I got my start). You had a big analog console with many individual channels, that were usually mono, and sometimes you had some extra stereo busses to work with, but usually just the main stereo output, and then possibly some dedicated FX return busses.  Each channel on the boards had analog inserts that came up on a patch bay, plus built-in EQ (usually), and usually a certain number of FX or Aux send knobs. The FX or Aux send knobs could be used for setting up headphone mixes as well as for sends to FX units.  The actual output of the send busses was usually also on the patch bay, and so you had to physically connect it to wherever you wanted it to go via a cable. Sometimes one or more of those send busses would be "normalled" to certain pieces of gear, such as a plate reverb or other FX unit in the studio. In those days, we had very limited number of FX units, because each one was a physical piece of gear.

So, think of how this works if you have just one or two FX units to share for your entire mixing or recording session.  You want to be able to have reverb on more than just one track, so you would NOT patch the reverb on an insert on just one channel. Besides needing to use the reverb for more than one channel, if you inserted it on just one channel, then your reverb would be mono (assuming, like most mixers, that all your channels with mic inputs are mono) -- so, you would lose the stereo width of the reverb or other FX you were trying to use if you inserted it on a channel.  Instead, since you are trying to use that FX for more than one channel of audio, you connect one of your master FX send outputs from your mixer to the input of the FX. Then, the corresponding FX send knob for each channel becomes a separate mini-mixer where you can "send" different amounts of signal from as many channels as you want to that FX unit.  Now, you have to connect the output of that FX unit, which is usually stereo, back to your mixer somewhere. As mentioned above, some mixers have dedicated FX return channels, which are usually very simplified channels with just an volume knob or fader and no inserts or sends of their own. But, you could also connect the outputs of the FX up to two regular channels on the board, panning one left and one right for stereo, and maybe have a bit more control since they are on full channels. Or, you might have some other stereo busses on the mixer that you can use.  It doesn't matter where they are connected, but it's the fact that they are connected to separate inputs on the mixer. It would not be possible, without a big signal splitter/distributor, to connect the output of the FX to every individual audio channel on the mixer (so that the reverb would be blended back in with the original audio, such as the vocal). Plus, it wouldn't make sense to do that anyway, since the output of the FX would be the effected sum of ALL the channels that sent some signal to that FX via the FX sends.  So, for example, if you sent a lot of vocals into a reverb, plus some of the snare drum, then the output of that reverb would have vocals AND snare drum reverb!  It's just ONE FX unit, and it can't possibly separate out the different signals coming into it (especially since they have all been pre-mixed via the various FX sends knobs and corresponding FX send master output).

So, even in the "old days" of analog consoles, when we were recording to multitrack recorders, you would route individual channels to individual tracks of your tape recorder (professional analog recording consoles usually had 24 record busses that were directly connected to the 24 inputs of our 2-inch, 24 track tape machines).  The output to the recording buss was after the inserts and built-in EQ, but before the faders (so you could use the faders to set up a monitor mix without affecting the levels going to tape). We would often use our FX to add some reverb to the vocals or other instruments while recording, just because most artists are used to hearing things that way when they record, but this was just for monitoring. Since these are FX on sends/returns, they didn't get recorded to the tape machine. If you wanted to record those FX while recording, you had to patch the FX return into their own channels on the board and then route those channels through recording busses to one or two tracks on the tape machine (depending on if you wanted mono or stereo).  Any EQ we used, plus any processing we inserted via channel inserts (usually some compression), would get recorded to tape for each channel that used those as the EQ and inserts were usually wired before the record buss.  But, since FX are entirely separate, they are NOT recorded unless you specifically hook them up in a way that you can record the outputs.

Back to the future! So, now that everything has become largely digital, your mixer may be a combination of analog and digital components and busses, but the basic architecture is pretty much the same.  Many of these modern mixers have one or more built-in FX engines for things like reverb, chorus, and delay. For example, looking at the specs of your specific Soundcraft mixer, it says it has a single FX engine.  So, that's basically the same as us having just a single FX unit (hardware) in the "old days".  You need to be able to share those FX among many channels, so it's configured as an FX send/return, and the output is NOT going back to any of the individual channels. Thus, those effects from that single processor can NOT be recorded via any of the individual channel outputs that are using it as a send/return device.  If you wanted to actually record the output of the FX, you would need to see if your mixer allows it to be returned to its own separate channels, OR if the FX output shows up as separate inputs in your DAW (through USB, since that is how your mixer connects). Usually, those type of built-in effects do NOT show up on their own outputs and can NOT be re-routed to individual channels. The only option in that case would be to record the MASTER stereo buss output, but that would include the entire mix that you are monitoring, so that's usually not a good option either. That would only work if you are doing something like a solo vocal and not monitoring any background music (or if your mixer allows you to set up a headphone mix from other aux sends, and allows you to route only certain things to the stereo master).

Part 2 - Should you record with FX?

This should probably be its own article, but it applies to your question, so I'll put it here for now.

The question of whether or not you should record with FX is a common one, and one that is sometimes hotly debated.

There is one school of thought that says you should make your decisions on how you want things to sound and commit that sound to tape (hard drive these days). The other side says you should never record FX with the original audio, so that you can more appropriately choose and blend the right FX during the mixing stage when you can hear how everything works together.

The only real answer to the question is: It depends!

Let's create a quick list of some reasons for both sides of the argument:

Possible reasons to record with FX:

• All you have is hardware (or a single FX processing unit in a digital mixer, with no decent DAW plugin alternatives), and the same FX unit needs to be used to created different FX for different tracks
• Your DAW (or other recording/mixing setup) doesn't have enough power to handle multiple FX during mixing, so you need to record/commit at least some FX during recording
• The FX are an integral part of the sound, such as a special delay that is a big part of a sound, or things like guitar FX that are part of the sound of that instrument
• You like to make your mix decisions early in the process and commit to tape/disk while recording so you don't have as many choices/decisions to make during your final mix

Possible reasons to record without FX:

• You have better plugin FX in your DAW than any hardware or built-in mixer effects
• You want the full control of choosing the proper FX and the amount to blend in during the final mixing
• You've got a powerful DAW with more than enough FX and power to handle as many FX as you need during mixing
• You just aren't sure what kind of FX are going to work in the full mix when you are recording
• You have an artist (singer, musician), who likes to hear a LOT of FX during recording, but you know that is way more than you are going to want when you mix

My Personal Opinion:

I almost never record with FX.  Mostly that applies to reverb, chorus, delay, and other "time based" effects. Those type of effects are hard to judge correctly until you are doing the final mix and can listen in context of the full mix.  Plus, I almost always end up automating those types of FX, bringing echo/delay up and down throughout the mix (or on/off for special echos), as well as automating the amount of reverb in different sections of the song. I'll usually do that in my DAW by automating the send levels or send enable/disable to various effects.

I especially do not like it when people send me tracks for mixing, and they already have a ton of reverb on each track. At that point, there is not much I can do, as if I try to add any additional processing (such as compression), it also affects the reverb. Plus, I can't "clean up" the mix or give it more clarity if it's already muddied up by excessive reverb. Excessive reverb and chorus are my pet peeves, and most synth patches are just swimming with lots of both of those to make those sounds sound better on their own (but rarely sound great in the context of a full mix). I have much better reverb FX than most artists who are sending me tracks to mix, so I want the tracks as "dry" as possible.

The exceptions for me are when the FX are a big part of the sound. That's mostly things like distortion on a guitar (or synth) that is a big part of the sound, or maybe even a rhythmic delay that is crucial to the sound.  Even if an artist has some FX on a track that they really love (that was NOT recorded, but applied later via inserts), I will often ask them to send me a "dry" version along with the "wet" version (with FX). That way, if I think the amount of FX they put on the track was too much for the mix, I can use their "dry" version to either blend in more of the dry signal, or to totally recreate the FX using their wet version as reference and blend to taste.

Is that your final answer?

Bob, there's a very long winded answer to your question!  Based on the quick scan of the product page of your specific mixer, I don't think you are missing out much on not being able to record the FX from that single built-in FX processor, as it seems they also include the Lexicon plugin that you can use in your software.  I would save your reverb, chorus, delay, and other FX decisions until the mixing stage and be happy that they included that plugin for free. That plugin should have pretty much the same FX as what you have in your mixer, but allow you to use any many instances as your computer can handle (so you can have different reverb, delays, etc. all going at once), probably with a lot more control over the settings.  Use the built-in effects for what they were intended, which is just to allow some reverb/delay for the artist "comfort" in their monitors while recording, but save the final FX decisions until mixing when you will have much more control.

guys i am a big party freak.. was just wondering if i burn mp3 songs (320 kbps) onto an audio format cd, will it sound even better???

The short answer is NO.

Once audio has been encoded to the MP3 format, which is a lossy compressed format, you can't get back the audio information that was thrown away.

If you don't know what "lossy compression" means, Google it, or check out the Wikipedia page here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lossy_compression

By definition, Red Book audio CDs use 2-channel (stereo), 16 bit, uncompressed PCM audio at a sampling frequency of 44.1Khz. Even though you can convert MP3 files to Wave files in the CD Audio format, you can't regain the information that was thrown away during the MP3 encoding process.

More on the Audio CD format here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compact_Disc_Digital_Audio

If you want smaller file size than uncompressed Wave or AIFF files, without losing audio quality, then you need to use a lossless compression format, such as FLAC:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FLAC

But, you can't burn FLAC files to an audio CD without first converting them back to Wave or AIFF in the proper format.

Note that some modern CD players can play MP3 files from a CD-R, where the MP3 files are burned as data files (CD-ROM mode), and the player just reads the MP3 files and decodes them just like any other MP3 player. However, they still won't sound any better than the MP3 files as you can't regain any of the damage done during that encoding. Possibly your CD player may have better sounding D/A converters which might possibly make a noticeable difference compared to a cheap phone or MP3 player, but it still won't sound as good as an audio CD that was created with the original, uncompressed audio.

Starting in April 2016, I'm taking song submissions for a chance to get your song mixed for free, along with some online promotion.

Roughly once every other month (schedule permitting), I'll pick one song from all the current submissions through my mixing site, and do the mixing and mastering at no cost to the band/artist. Each time a free mix is completed, I'll do a bit of promotion for the artist and post the finished mix (streaming only) on my site. Depending on the type of work I do on it, and how busy I am at the time, I may also create a mix breakdown tutorial video of the song, showing what techniques I used to get the sound of the mix. Links to the band/artist site (or any online stores carrying the music) will be included in all promotions.

So, why am I doing this?

Certainly I get some promotional value for my mixing services, but it's mostly because I really do love mixing great songs from great bands/artists, and am very much interested in finding some new projects to work on, just for the enjoyment of it!

I've had a good and long career so far in the music recording & mixing business so far, but I realize that many young bands & artists these days (with the current state of the music industry) simply can't afford to hire a professional like myself, and so have not had the chance to experience the difference that a professional mix can make. So, I'm looking for great songs from bands and artists, that I think I would really enjoy mixing, and want to give them the chance to get at least one song professionally mixed at no cost or obligation.

Submit your song for consideration on my mixing web site at: http://stephensherrardmixing.com/free-mixing-submissions/

Please share with all your musicians friends as well!  I'm looking forward to hearing all the submissions!

Hi, please see link I have placed and let me know that how can I edit my voice as dual voice. What we call this function. Just help and rest I will practice thru different software.

I removed the links from this question, but the vocal effects were basic voice doubling effects that can be heard in many songs.

There are several ways to get the "vocal doubling" effect:

1. The most obvious one, and usually the best sounding, is to simply sing the part a second time. The closer you can match the timing and pitch of your original track, the better it will sound. No matter how good you are, you will never be able to match the timing and pitch perfectly between two vocal takes, and the resulting differences will be truly random, giving the most natural "chorus" type doubling effect. Most professional singers do it this way, because it still sounds the best.  Usually if you just want to thicken the voice a bit, without it being obvious that you doubled the voice, then you keep the volume of the double quite a bit lower than the main lead... just loud enough that you hear that natural chorus & thickening, but not loud enough that the listener can tell that you are singing the part twice (again, you really need to be accurate with your timing, because sloppy timing of the double will make it more obvious that it's a second track).
2. If you are too lazy to sing the part a second time, or are not very good at accurately doubling yourself, or if you simply prefer a more synthetic/processed double sound, then my next favorite effect to use is a micro pitch shift type effect, popularized by the Eventide Harmonizer series of processors back in the day. This type of effect usually does a very small amount of pitch shifting, usually going up on one side and down on the other side (such as +5 cents on the left, and -5 cents on the right), and also a very small amount of delay on each side (different amounts, such as 10 ms on left and 15 ms on the right). This gives a nice widening type double effect, although it is more of a "static" effect in that the pitch amounts and delays are fixed.  My favorite plugin for this these days is the Microshift plugin from SoundToys.
3. A kind of "do it yourself" doubling method would be to duplicate the lead vocal track, and then do some sort of automatic pitch correction to the double track, such as with Auto Tune or your DAW's built in pitch correction. Just do some sort of subtle pitch correction, enough to make it sound a bit different from the lead voice, and blend in to taste. If you want it to sound wider, copy the track twice, and use different pitch correct settings on each of the two duplicated tracks... pan one hard right and the other hard left, and maybe offset the tracks just a small amount (in the 10 to 20 millisecond range, different on each side).
4. There are also "doubler" type plugins that specifically try to create these effects. One of the newer ones that I really like a lot is the Waves Abbey Road Reel ADT plugin. That tries to recreate the classic ADT effects popularized by Abbey Road in the 60s. Waves also has an older "Doubler" plugin that does more of a modulating type doubling effects, that also works pretty good.

Recording and mixing an instrument such as an acoustic guitar can be as simple or as complex as you like but most important of all we need to get the sound right at the source to set us up for a good recording. Here at our Manchester recording studio, we have learnt the hard way in our early days, so remember - record a bad sound at source and you are starting on the wrong foot and leaving yourself open to a headache of a mix!

First off, if you have a selection of guitars or access to a number of different acoustics, then make sure you utilize your resources. Choosing the right guitar with the best sound for what you need will save you a lot of time later on when mixing. Think about what role the acoustic is going to play in the track; is it to be placed into a loud and busy mix and be heard through it’s top end, or is it the absolute main focus of the track? All of these kinds of questions help us understand what we need form the guitar itself but not only that, it will help your decision in step two now you know what you need form the guitar - choosing you microphone(s) and placement.

Today we’ll talk through two of our favorite microphone placements, but don’t let this stop you being creative and finding a better way to record your acoustic guitar. Use these ideas as a good place to start and go ahead and tweak away!

The ‘XY’ Technique

The first is the popular ‘XY’ placement. This involves two pencil condenser microphones crossed over at the 12th fret. They will both be aimed at the 12th fret and at an approximate 90 degree angle against each other. Move this placement up and down the fret board and sound hole to find the best sounding point. Remember, every guitar is different and no mic position will be applicable for two different guitars. The microphones should be around 6 inches away from the guitar, but again, use this as a guide and play about with the distance. When mixing these signals, pan them left and right for a stereo feel, panning harder for a widest stereo image.

Stereo Technique

The second microphone involves, again, two condenser microphones, however, this time we will need a large diaphragm condenser and a pencil condenser. The large diaphragm condenser will be position facing the bridge of the guitar at around 6 inches away and the pencil condenser at the same distance but at the 12th fret. This allows us to capture a good rich low end from the bridge and bright clarity from the 12th fret. The large condensers can be great for capturing low end due to their structure and size. Like the other technique, spread these signals using your pan tool in your chosen DAW. The great thing about this technique is that you can now balance the low end of your acoustic guitar by bringing in the bridge microphone until you are happy with the sound against your 12th fret position.

Single Large Diaphragm Condenser

For the times where the stereo sound isn’t necessary, placing a large condenser approximately 6 inches away from the guitar around the 12th fret can still give great results. The reason we recommend the large diaphragm over the pencil is because in the mixing stage, you have the option to keep or cut the rich and full low end that a large diaphragm condenser offers. Remember, when using this technique, it is important to find the point of perfect balance between the low and muddy sound the bridge can offer, to the clarity and sometimes thin sound the neck can give. You have less room for correction, compared to a stereo technique, when mixing.

Be wary of either side of your frequency ranges

A common problem when mixing acoustic guitars is the control on either the top or low end. Managing harsh top and low end can be achieved with a simple compressor. However, before we continue, we must stress; don’t over compress. Keep the ratio below 5:1:1 and make sure you’re threshold is only cutting up to 3 to 4 dB maximum. Over compression on an acoustic guitar takes away the dynamics from what can be a beautiful sounding instrument. Always listen back to the guitar in the mix and take some time away, to come back with fresh ears and a fresh outlook.

Use these three techniques and feel free to explore and experiment to achieve the sound you desire. Remember to make the right choices at the very beginning and most of all, have fun doing what can be a very satisfying recording experience.

Hi ! My compliments for you clear summarizing answers (sorry for my English), I have seen different mastering suites plugin considering normalize option good about the album building starting from the several songs. Which is the correct workflow ?
Master first the more important song (Dreamed as a great "hit"), the loudest or the lower one ? and then take below the other songs volume (after mastered it but before limiting ) below this "custom reference" level ?
What about headroom to preserve, a compromise for all the songs of the album ?

Is it a must mastering taking in account not only K-meter choices but loudness metering too (LUFS-EBU-ITU-R128...) or it is only a technical work of the broadcast audio engineer ? I read some broadcast don't accept bad lufs level...(?)

Do you know case in which the "using order" in a mastering chain fx doesn't reflect the order of the chain itself ? (using for example bus compressor first also if it is close to the end of the chain, typically before the limiter..)

Do you know if would be useful mix and master with binaural listening too ?

Thanks much for your time and patience, Best Regards, from Rome 🙂

-- Mauro

Hi Mauro,

Lots of questions! =)

There are no simple answers, though, as there is not a definitive "right" or "wrong" way to do things in the audio world. If it sounds good, it doesn't really matter how you got there.

Also, I will point out that, although I do quite a bit of mastering for clients, mastering is not my main job, and there are many high-end mastering engineers out there much more knowledgeable than myself when it comes to mastering.

Different mastering engineers use different processes and different tools, so I will only discuss the way I approach mastering, and maybe mention a few things about how some other mastering engineers work.

Plus, I will also highly suggest you check out the books Desktop Mastering by Steve Turnidge and/or Mastering Audio by Bob Katz.  Both of these guys know a lot more about mastering than I do, and you can probably learn a lot from those books, although I haven't personally read them.

For the first part of your question, regarding which song I start on, and which ones I do next, the answer is simply "it depends".  For my process, I will usually open all the files in my mastering software, which allows me to quickly skip around during playback to any song at any location, just by clicking.  Makes it really easy for me to do comparisons very quickly.  Many times I will start with whichever mix that the artist and myself think sounds the best.  If the mix is really good, then we know that, in general, we are just trying to get the song up close to modern loudness levels, and do a bit of enhancement.  We usually try to work on a mix that doesn't require lots of corrective mastering first, and then use that as a reference to match other songs to.  Other times I may pick the loudest song to start with, or the softest, or the one they want to use as a radio single.  But, yes, in general, I do the mastering for one song first, and then use that as a reference to try to match everything else to.

As far as headroom goes, unfortunately too many people are still too worried about loudness rather than sound quality, even though that is becoming less of an issue with most music players and services these days having built-in functions to try to automatically adjust the volumes of songs to keep the loudness roughly the same while you are listening. Thankfully, many of my clients don't care if their songs are the loudest out there, so I can do the mastering in a bit more conservative fashion, getting the loudness up close to modern levels, but not trying to make them as loud as possible.  In some cases there will be songs that simply can't be made to sound as loud as others, due to excessive bass or other types of sounds that may cause a bit more limiting distortion when pushing too hard. In those cases, I will adjust the mastering for the whole project with that song in mind, so that there is not a big loudness difference between songs.

I will refer you to the Bob Katz book when talking about metering and different ways of measuring loudness, and how that affects broadcast.  I deal mainly with music clients, and haven't done any broadcast audio for a very long time now. In the music world, it seems that anything goes! Most people just go for as loud as possible and don't care what any meters show.  However, recently iTunes has offered songs in a higher quality format, and have set some guidelines for a program they called "mastered for iTunes", which does require that a bit more headroom be left in the final master to prevent inter-sample clipping (peaks between sample points that are clipping).  I have a certain RMS level that I use as my target point for the loudest sections of a song, that gets me close to modern loudness levels, usually with minimal damage to the audio.  It's a good compromise range I shoot for that is certainly not as loud as a lot of music out there, but won't sound too soft either and does the least amount of damage to the mix.

As far as the order of processing goes in mastering, that is usually a case by case basis. However, if there is any "rule" in mastering, it's that limiting is always last in the chain so you can avoid clipping. Not every mastering engineer uses a digital limiter though... some of them use an analog mastering chain and then carefully set the levels going back into their converters. In fact, some of them will purposely clip their A/D converters to get a bit more loudness. But, these are higher end A/D converters that have plenty of extra headroom on the analog input side, and the amount of clipping is kept to a minimum to where you aren't hearing the clipping. In general, though, when mastering "in the box", the peak limiter needs to be the last item in the chain so you can prevent clipping in the final master.  As far as the order of any EQ, Compression, or other processing, that depends entirely on the song and what is needed to make it sound good. Sometimes you may use more than one compressor, and other times you may not use any compression at all. It really depends on what you are given to work with!

I'm not sure what you mean by binaural listening?  By definition, binaural means using both ears, which I always do!  There are binaural recording devices that look like a human head and basically have microphones where the ears are located, but that's just a fancy recording technique and doesn't really change how you would listen, although those types of recordings sound better when you listen through headphones.  If all you mean is if you should use headphones for mastering, my answer is that they should not be your only source for listening and making adjustments, but you should definitely be checking your work on headphones and any other sets of speakers or playback systems to have. Especially when you are just starting out, and don't already have the experience and confidence to know how things should sound on your main system, you should definitely be checking on more than one system. These days many people listen with headphones or earbuds, so you should definitely be checking your mixes and your mastering on those. Headphones are also good for hearing small details that you might miss from speakers (depending on the quality of your speakers and your listening levels).  I trust my studio monitors and have been doing this long enough that I know how things should sound on my system, so headphones are usually just an additional check that I do for everything (both when mixing and mastering). I have a few sets of studio monitors and a trusted pair of headphones that I regularly use. I do more cross checking between those during the mixing process to make sure I get my mixes right to start with. In mastering, I'm usually just using my main set of monitors, and then will do a final check on the little speakers and on headphones to make sure everything works well on those.

 

Enter the Valhalla Room!

Valhalla Room has become my "go to" plugin reverb for many reasons:

1. It sounds great, and has a wide variety of reverb types! Sound is everything, and if I can't quickly find and fine tune a reverb that works for the current project, and sounds great, then I move on to something else. These days I rarely even turn on my hardware reverbs, as Valhalla Room gets the job done 90% of the time.
2. The developer, Sean Costello is also from the Pacific Northwest, and I like to support local talent!
3. It's not some huge company cranking out products in a never ending quest for more profits. Sean is a gifted programmer, and is dedicated to creating software that sounds great!
4. The prices are extremely reasonable! All his plugins are just $50! A bargain for the quality!  I have all of his plugins except the newest VintageVerb (which I will most likely get soon).
5. The graphics are simple and easy to use. He doesn't try to fool you with painstaking recreations of hardware reverbs, or any other type of fancy graphics which would distract you from the sound. It's all about the sound and ease of use with Sean's plugins!
6. Flexible with a huge variety of reverbs.  Lots of different algorithms, and many great presets to start with. Then, you can tweak to your heart's content with all the controls you could want (and more)! Very easy to dial in the perfect reverb for whatever you are working on.  Everything from long dark reverbs, to short bright ambient reverbs, are all quick and easy to achieve... just select a preset that's close, and then fine tune.

Not much else to say, except that you should give this one a try!  For $50, you really can't go wrong.

Also, no, I don't personally know Sean (but would like to meet up with him someday). I paid for the plugins, and am not getting any kind of compensation for this.  This is just another in my series of bringing attention to my favorite tools for my work, and I especially like to help out the "little guys" who don't get as much publicity as some of the bigger companies.