Thread: mixing instruments and vocals seperately

Your vocals are likely to come out sounding like they've been "pasted on top of" the mix.

Mixing is the art of getting all of the elements to sit together well. Pretty hard to properly mix the music tracks absent the vocals and expect there to be no conflicts when the vocals are added in. There's simply no good reason to do things this way.

Just give your mixing engineer a very clear idea of the vocal sound you are looking for, then listen to his/her preliminary mix and ask for any needed adjustment in the sound.

Jeff

Originally Posted by thatjeffguy

Your vocals are likely to come out sounding like they've been "pasted on top of" the mix.

Mixing is the art of getting all of the elements to sit together well. Pretty hard to properly mix the music tracks absent the vocals and expect there to be no conflicts when the vocals are added in. There's simply no good reason to do things this way.

Just give your mixing engineer a very clear idea of the vocal sound you are looking for, then listen to his/her preliminary mix and ask for any needed adjustment in the sound.

Jeff

^^^^^^^ I agree with you my friend!

That's the right way to work with! Trial and error is the way to go when someone is mixing for you... 'till you say... now it sounds just as I want...

cant this be fixing during the mastering process though?

cant this be fixing during the mastering process though?

Absolutely NOT!

Asking that question indicates that you don't yet have a good understanding about just what mixing and mastering are all about how they differ in practice and function. Do some reading and studying on the subjects so you can limit your mistakes and gain more understanding. An improperly mixed track will still be improperly mixed after the mastering process.

Mixing deals with individual tracks. Setting levels, dynamics, EQ and effects of each individual track so that each element has it's own place in the mix. They have to fit together like a puzzle. If you add another piece to the puzzle, the other pieces need to be reshaped and repositioned to make room for it.

Mastering, on the other hand, does NOT deal with individual tracks. The mastering engineer deals only with the two-track (stereo) mix. Levels, dynamics, EQ and effects of individual tracks are not accessible to the mastering engineer.

So you need to have the mix right before you send it to mastering.

Hope this helps!

Jeff

Originally Posted by thatjeffguy

Absolutely NOT!

Asking that question indicates that you don't yet have a good understanding about just what mixing and mastering are all about how they differ in practice and function. Do some reading and studying on the subjects so you can limit your mistakes and gain more understanding. An improperly mixed track will still be improperly mixed after the mastering process.

Mixing deals with individual tracks. Setting levels, dynamics, EQ and effects of each individual track so that each element has it's own place in the mix. They have to fit together like a puzzle. If you add another piece to the puzzle, the other pieces need to be reshaped and repositioned to make room for it.

Mastering, on the other hand, does NOT deal with individual tracks. The mastering engineer deals only with the two-track (stereo) mix. Levels, dynamics, EQ and effects of individual tracks are not accessible to the mastering engineer.

So you need to have the mix right before you send it to mastering.

Hope this helps!

Jeff

Hope that bright comment above helps artists to ensure that Mastering is so important and so different from the mixing stage, and also to complement that's why Mastering is so demanding and important... A good Mix will result in a super Mastering work, a bad mix will end in a poor Mastering process, although the mastering engineer will do as much as possible to ensure that everyone will listen the work the best it can, but no miracles can't be done with a bad mix!

Mixing and Mastering engineers need to be recognized for their hard work and not just as tools of the trade, since what WE do is pure art, TOO! (just a side note ;p)

To finalize there's a so called Mastering Stem technique, which is a mastering technique that will need the various stems of each mixing instrument or instruments, such as Drums, Guitars, Bass, Vocals, SFX, Synths, Strings and etc. The mastering engineer will then end up with various tracks and will master the various stems in one Master stereo file! It's a sort of Mixing / Mastering, but it's to expensive nowadays, since each stem needs to be master individually and then all stems needs to be listen together as one stereo Master as I told you before!

Cheers and good luck!

I'm interested in stem mastering and remixing.

The remix culture is doing this a lot now. Check out Indaba music. Very cool site with great opportunities. I have a membership there. I want to get more involved but time........ just not enough lately.