You’re having your music mixed. Maybe you’re a veteran artist or maybe you’re brand new. Hopefully when you hear your mixes, you notice that they sound much better than the roughs. But do you know what steps actually go into the Mix process?
This article will give you an overview on what your Mix Engineer is doing and hopefully you’ll gain some knowledge to help you better communicate with engineering and production professionals to create great records of your art.
STEPS OF THE MIXING PROCESS
Clean up and correction
EQ and compression
Levels and Panning
Reverb and Delay
Special FX
Referencing
CLEAN UP EDITING AND CORRECTION
This is where recording imperfections are smoothed out. Dead spaces are cut out, mouth noises, pops, and clicks are removed. Noise reduction may be applied to tracks with hum. Some of these moments in need of editing may not have been readily apparent while recording or listening to the rough mix, but will stand out more once the mix evolves and becomes clearer. If it’s stylistically appropriate, tuning can be applied.
EQ
Equalization, or EQ, adjusts the bass, midrange and treble of a sound. Areas of the sound spectrum like bass and treble are represented more precisely as frequencies, measured in Hertz (Hz) from 20Hz to 20kHz. EQ is the process of reducing undesirable frequencies and boosting underrepresented frequencies for each individual track, for groups of instruments and for the mix as a whole. Which frequencies you boost or cut will vary by the instrument. With vocals, for example, you’ll almost always be cutting some low frequencies to remove mud and adding high frequencies for shine and clarity. EQ also helps tracks blend together or stand out, when desired.
COMPRESSION
Compression has 4 main parameters. The Threshold tells the compressor “if my audio volume exceeds this level, reduce it.” The more your audio passes the threshold, the more it will be Compressed. Once the threshold is crossed, the Attack determines how fast the volume is reduced. When the audio falls back under the Threshold, the Release determines how fast the applied volume reduction ends and the audio returns to its normal level. The Ratio sets the ratio between how much compressed signal vs uncompressed signal is heard. The higher the ratio, the more compression you’re hearing.
Different compressors have their own sounds, but in general compression gives audio a sound that’s more punchy, aggressive, bright, distorted, thick and loud. Something that’s over-compressed may sound completely distorted or the audio may have a quality like it’s being sucked into itself. Compression can take a lot of hands-on trial and error to really understand but I have seen artists over the years build an ear for it through listening alone.
LEVELS AND PANNING
Level is the volume of each track and Panning is a track’s placement on the left to right spectrum. The way the levels are balanced can impact the energy, emotion and genre of a song. Panning is mostly to taste, but tracks are usually closer to center the more important they are to the song. The Bass, Kick, Snare and Lead Vocal are almost always panned directly in the center. Levels and panning can be automated throughout the song to create dynamics. Automation is mapped out on the computer and during playback will move the level and panning of tracks as programmed.
REVERB
Pretty much every recording you’ve ever heard incorporates the use of Reverb, both real and artificial. Put simply, Reverb is the effect that makes audio sound like it’s taking place in a space like a room, concert hall or cathedral. Different tracks of a Mix are given different levels of Reverb to create a sense of depth. The more Reverb a track has (we call this the Wet/Dry mix), the further away from the listener it sounds. A track with zero Reverb may sound like it’s happening an inch from your face, and that’s an illusion you might want to create sometimes as well.
DELAY
Delay happens when Reverb is slowed down to the point that discernible echos are created rather than just a washed out tail. In Mixing, Delays are most often synced to the tempo of the song so that they echo in time with the beat. Quiet delays are used to create subtle space and wetness while more audible delays are used to emphasize phrases, fill space, and add bounce. There’s another variety of delay called Slap Back that is too quick to echo on beat but too slow to sound like reverb.
SPECIAL FX
Special FX are touches on the mix that can create special and unique moments. A touch of Distortion, Chorus, Phase, Flange or any other number of FX can give a plain sounding instrument more life for a whole song or can be activated for just a moment of emphasis. Using Automation, effects can be programmed to switch on abruptly at key moments or to slowly blend in and change throughout the song.
REFERENCING
This last step is a good time to mention that, while I tried to make my steps of a mix chronological, another mixer may do it in a different order than I or I myself may jump around between the steps out of order. Referencing, though I l’ve listed it last, should happen throughout the mix process. Referencing is simply playing mixes that you’re a fan of up against your mix-in-progress. What do you notice? Is there anything you like about your reference mixes that you can apply to your mix? You need the audio file of these references so you can import them inside your mix file to hear a true side-by-side comparison. Keep in mind you'll be comparing a mix-in-progress to a mastered record, so you may need to lower the level of the reference to match the mix level.
Those are the steps of mixing a record as I see them. Hopefully if you’re an artist at any level, this gave you some information to better communicate with your engineers and producers. Or if you’re early in your engineering journey, I hope it helps you learn and develop your own mix process.
Contact me with your questions or to inquire about having your music mixed.
Drew Mantia
Feel Good Music Recordings
3146264270
feelgoodmusicrecordings@gmail.com