Tutorial - the Computer Music Guide to Basic Mixing

What is mixing? Mixing is the process of balancing sound. It is a skill. It is also creative, but that doesn't mean it can't be taught. However, to become good at doing anything you have to practise, practise, practise, as any good mum will tell you. Don't expect that after reading this article you will be able to go away and create the most amazing track on the planet, because you won't. This guide is designed to help those of you who are new to mixing get a better idea of where to start, where you're going, and where you might end up going wrong. The first thing you need to understand is that mixing is a subjective art, and the 'process' of a mix is very much dependant on the type of music that you're working on. So let's take, for example, a typical pop record consisting of drums, bass, keyboards, guitars and a vocal, and see how we would go about creating a mix for it.

Take it from the top We're going to assume at this point that you have a basic studio facility - ie, a computer (PC or Mac), a soundcard and a MIDI sequencer with hard disk recording. We're also going to assume you've got a few ideas looping round and round. So how do you make it sound professional? The first thing to do is mute everything - there, sounds better already doesn't it? OK, bad joke... Initially it's important to establish the element that gives our mix its identity. This is usually the part that plays or sings the main tune/sound, providing the 'story' to a piece of music, and therefore is usually the most prominent. In our example mix, this would be the vocal. You can now use this part for two very important jobs: 1. To constantly test the mix, and 2. To keep you focused on where you're going. So now, with everything muted and a firm idea of what your mix is about, you can begin. Most mixes are built around the rhythm section of a song, so let's start with those parts of your track. First, the bass drum. It's a good idea to separate each different rhythm sound onto its own track within your sequencer. With most multitimbral synths, the drum kit is usually part 10 (MIDI channel 10), but that doesn't mean you can't have as many tracks as you like on MIDI channel 10. So if you have several drum sounds all playing from the same track, split them up like this:

G G G G

Bass drum track 1 MIDI channel 10 Closed hi-hat track 2 MIDI channel 10 Open hi-hat track 3 MIDI channel 10 Snare drum track 4 MIDI channel 10 Putting each drum on a separate track makes life that bit easier

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Tutorial - the Computer Music Guide to Basic Mixing

Easy on the EQ
Don't destroy your mix! Most musicians love fiddling with EQ and it is great fun, but just as EQ has the power to correct faults with your sound production, it also has the power to completely destroy your mix, leaving you in a world of ear shattering confusion - so be careful. EQ should be applied with maximum care and attention. It's normally used to correct a sound that is nearly right, as opposed to turning an already bad sound into a good one. It's far better to change the sound completely than to force it with loads of EQ. Imagine your mix with bottom (100Hz), middle (1kHz) and top (10kHz) frequency ranges. A good general approach is to boost the bottom and top frequencies and drop the middle slightly, thus sweetening the mix as a whole. Bear in mind the standard V-shaped slope that you would set on the graphic EQ of your home hi-fi system and try to apply that all the way across your mix. Sounds tricky? Well, it is. So to help you, here is a very rough guide to where the instruments in our example mix lie within the frequency range, listed in approximate order from low to high...
G

Bass drum: 30Hz (sub bass drum) to 400Hz (woody middle) Bass: 30Hz (sub bass) to 1kHz (goose) Snare drum: 220Hz (door slam) to 6kHz (dustbin lid) Keys/guitars: 100Hz (warm pad) to 8kHz (metal/glassy keys) Vocal: 100Hz (Louis Armstrong) to 16kHz (breathy whisper) Hi-hats: 3kHz (clack) to 6kHz ('tsss')

sweep the associated frequency pot. You should be able to hear that the range gets louder as you move through the frequencies that your part is playing. Sweep each frequency selector in turn (boosting the associated gain) until you find the range that affects your instrument the most. Another tip: If you do boost or cut frequencies from a sound, it will affect the overall volume level of that sound, so you may need to adjust the main level in the mix accordingly.

You can see from this list that there would be no point in boosting the low frequencies on the hi-hat part as their range is way above the 100Hz area. The same can be said about boosting high frequencies on the bass drum. Professional EQ pots work in the same way as a graphic EQ on a hi-fi. You select a frequency with the frequency pot and then boost or cut that frequency with the EQ gain/cut pot. Tip: When mixing, if you're unsure of the frequency range of a particular instrument, turn each of the EQ gains up, one at a time, about half way and

Treat these knobs with the respect they deserve...

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Tutorial - the Computer Music Guide to Basic Mixing

You might think this is a bit if a waste of time because with all the drum sounds on the same MIDI channel, you can't alter volume levels (among other things) independently. However, there is a way around this, as described in Drum kit presets (over the page). This separation process is good practice for several reasons. Firstly it enables you to quickly see which parts are playing at any point in your track by simply looking at the arrangement or the MIDI activity meters (if your sequencer has them). Secondly it gives you, at the very least, individual control over the mute buttons for each sound, and these are recordable. This opens up more creative possibilities later on... In general, every different part should be on a separate track in your sequencer. For example, if you're playing some chords with a string sound and you want to add a tune with the same sound on the same MIDI channel, put the tune on a separate track. You normally have a huge if not unlimited amount of MIDI tracks in a sequencer, so use them! This gives you much more control over your mix and helps you to identify problems quickly and deal with them more effectively, since it's easier to see where everything is. So, to balance your drums, start with the loudest sound - say, the bass drum. Make sure its volume/velocity (again, see Drum kit presets) is set to full (consideration for the 'feel' of the instrument should also be taken into account). This gives you the best signal to noise ratio, thus reducing any annoying hiss or hum to a minimum. This may seem a bit picky with regard to small programming suites, but as your studio expands, noise can become a major problem, so once again this is good practice. At this point it should be said, TURN ALL YOUR EFFECTS PROCESSORS OFF. As a novice sound engineer, balancing your sounds using 'dry' signals can help you to become aware of every element of a mix and how each part interacts with the others. Effects are usually added towards the end of a mix as the final icing on the cake.

Next, unmute the two hi-hat tracks and set their volumes until you're happy with them in relation to the bass drum. Then do the same for the snare drum. You now have the core element of your rhythm section thumping away. Don't worry about any other rhythm parts just yet. Check your mix so far by fading up the vocal part until it sounds just louder than the drums. Everything should sound clean and crisp - turn the volume up quite loud to make sure. Now turn the volume down again and mute the vocal.

At this point you should be checking out the vocals with the drums

Adding Effects
Keep it simple A good rule of thumb here is: Less is more. If your mix is not going according to your liking, don't swamp it with loads of reverb and chorus - that just makes things worse. As you add more and more effects to your parts, they become indistinguishable from one another and the dynamics of the mix are quickly swallowed up in a whirlpool of flanging delays. Try to keep some contrast in your mix. Adopt the approach of adding a little reverb here, a little chorus there, etc. So to help you stay on the right track, try to keep your drums 'dry' (no effects) if you can, as this is the best way to keep the mix punchy. If you want to make your drums sound 'live', try putting a touch of reverb on the snare drum alone. It's surprising what a difference this can make. The vocal may also benefit from the tiniest amounts of reverb or delay - but nothing too loud or long as things can get messy very quickly. Remember also that many chorus effects are in stereo, so the moment you apply one to a part of the mix, the stereo image for that sound that you so carefully set up earlier is lost or at least diffused. In general, use effects where they are needed rather than just sporadically splashing them all over your mix. They do sound good, but not on everything simultaneously.

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Tutorial - the Computer Music Guide to Basic Mixing

Volume control

Be careful not to drown out the other instruments that are already playing. These rhythmic parts are fundamentally accompaniments and should therefore A couple of important tips at this point: Don't constantly provide a support to the parts which are already playing. mix at high volume. Also, don't constantly mix at the It can be a good idea to pan these rhythmic keyboard/ same volume. Check your mix frequently using a very guitar parts to different sides of your stereo mix - this low volume and at various mid-level volumes, and every helps to differentiate them without the need for now and then crank it up to really hear how things hit complicated EQ adjustments. Check your mix once again hard. Look at your speakers when you do this to help you with the vocal. to identify when you're overdriving them. When the mix (NB. Panning a sound fully left or right actually reduces is finished, you should listen to it from start to finish at a its overall level by 3dB. This should be taken into high level, turning it down again if you need to make account, particularly if you're listening to your mix from a further alterations. Your ears can get tired and even distance or in mono.) damaged if you listen to loud music for long periods, resulting in a muffled version of the sound that you're Leave the vocal in the mix now and add any internal/ listening to. Don't mess with your ears - you need to external effects you wish. Finally, mute everything once keep them in the best condition possible. more and run through the mix process again, only this time concentrate solely on the balance or levels of your Anyway, back to our mix. The next thing to add is the parts, as you have now set up the EQ, panning and bassline. Again, alter its volume until you're happy with effects. If you're still not happy with your mix, don't it, but pay particular attention to how it fits or clashes worry. It takes a lot of practice to get it right, and most with the bass drum. Very often, the bass and the bass professional sound engineers will often 'flatten' their mix drum play together and if you're not careful at this stage, and start again several times before they finally collapse it's easy to end up with a 'bass heavy' mix. The reason at the mixing desk. for this is that these two parts contain similar low frequencies and you can get a doubling up effect when they hit at the same time. Try to blend the frequencies of It should be restated that mixing is a subjective thing and that this guide is just that - a guide. There is no right the bass and bass drum using a little EQ (see Easy on or wrong way to create a mix, so don't worry if you find the EQ on the previous page) so that they gel together you prefer to do things differently to anyone else. The more, and re-adjust the level of the bass again. Check main idea is to have fun. your mix with the vocal, as before. Now, again one by one, add any rhythm keyboard or rhythm guitar parts you have.

Pan your instruments to hear them more distictly...

Even if your not happy at this stage you can always start again.

Drum kit presets Handier than you think...

At first glance, the part 10 rhythm set-ups may not appear very useful, but if you delve deep and really look at how you can edit them, they are quite versatile (depending on your synth). You have just about all the parameters necessary to mix your drums internally to a very high standard. Earlier we mentioned the limitations of having all the drum sounds on the same MIDI channel; well, this is where you get round them. There are independent controls for each drum sound in your rhythm set-up. These include: Level, Pan, Velocity Sensitivity, TVA Envelope, Cutoff, Resonance, TVF Envelope, Pitch, Pitch Envelope and individual sends to the internal effects onboard your synth. On some more powerful synths/soundcards you even have individual real-time controllers such as pitch bend and modulation. Many of these parameters should be utilised if you are to create a defined and well-spread rhythm section in your mix. Obviously the levels should be altered as necessary to create the right balance for your instruments, and you can also individually adjust the tone of each drum sound by simply using the Cutoff for that instrument, again readjusting the level as you do it. Panning your drum sounds (particularly those not included in the 'core' of your rhythm section) should also be considered. This again helps to separate sounds across the stereo image, thus minimising the 'boxy' end result that can easily occur when all your sounds are coming from the same synth - a common problem with small studio set-ups. That said, though, panning is a

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Tutorial - the Computer Music Guide to Basic Mixing

creative tool, so don't worry about right or wrong - just check out any Beatles album. As we progress up the ladder of synth programming and sound-balancing skills, the introduction of real-time controllers can add flare and life to your final mix. Assigning pitch bend or modulation controllers to various parameters of your individual drum sounds can have amazing effects - and we're not talking about the internal/external effects processors here. Try assigning the pitch bend controller to the Level of the snare drum, then constructing a slope for the pitch bend control of that MIDI channel over a four-bar loop. Program the snare drum to play sixteenths and you have the gradual crescendo effect that is typically used in dance music. Now change the assignment of the pitch bend controller to a different parameter - say, Cutoff. You can even assign the modulation controller to another parameter simultaneously. Of course, you need a synth/soundcard that has these real-time controller capabilities - if yours doesn't, buy one that does. It's worth it.

Real time controller functionality is a must. If you haven't got it, er... get it.

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