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Is there a piece of hardware that can bring a sometimes off key singer, into the correct pitch at a live performance?
thanks.

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RemyRAD Wed, 02/21/2007 - 18:59

There are numerous hardware devices, that offer low latency, real-time pitch change and pitch correction. These are not cheap and if improperly used can make your singers sound like a yodaling chimpanzee.????????? I would like to hear that.

For instance, an old 1978 Eventide H910 harmonizer can give you real-time pitch change but at the expense of a 36 ms delay. Whereas an old 1980s, Yowmama SPX90, provided real-time pitch change with a lower latency and therefore made it better for live applications.

I believe Anteres and TC both have active hardware pitch correction devices. I'm sure other people will give you more information here.

If you're interested, my mother is one of the world's great singing teachers and former Metropolitan Opera star. She'll teach them how to correct the pitch and put us out of work!

Dammit Mom!
Ms. Remy Ann David

Shindog Thu, 02/22/2007 - 05:20

Hmmm,
A yodaling chimpanzee! That would be visually interesting as it would be to the ear!
As we live on the other side of the Pacific, singing lessons from your mother is somewhat problematic, and with this particular singer, she would need a lot of patience!
But it was a very kind offer.
I will chase up Anteres and TC and see what I can find, thank you for the advice,
Always enjoy reading your posts,
Shindog

moonbaby Thu, 02/22/2007 - 06:50

BobRogers wrote: I have never seen these things used effectively in a live situation to improve the sound of a band. I have however, seen one occasion where I swear the sound guy (not me!) was using one of these gizmos tosabotage a band that had really pissed him off.

:lol:
Yeah, I've seen that too, Bob. In fact, I witnessed a sound guy in a CHURCH drop the pastor's (a female!) voice to one like Darth Vader's
on the opening of her sermon the last service he was there! I wonder where he'll end up...! Ah, church politics...
I have an Antares Vocal Producer, and I bought it to use with a couple of local country diva-wannabe's I was working with a couple of years ago.
It really isn't as "plug-and-play" as you would want for live performance.
You have to sit down with the unit and pre-produce with it- program the key, the scaling, and other processing parameters. It's a pain at first, and even when you get the hang of it, it is a bit limited in its' scope. It is definitely helpful for certain performers, but they each need to have their own programs carefully mapped out to use.

sheet Mon, 03/05/2007 - 06:51

Antares has AutoTune, and it isn't that expensive. No other devices mentioned above, aside from AutoTune, are designed for corrective uses. As we all heard on SuperBowl Sunday, Billy Joel was using it, and it sucked.

There isn't even any software allowing on pitch vocals to go unprocessed while processing any of pitch vocal. Even the best software used in recording provides the best results only loading the off pitch sections and processing them.

The best option still is to have the "talent" sing songs in their range, on pitch. You can also help if they are consistantly sharp or flat, by decreasing or increasing the monitor volume.