Recording stereo or mono on keyboards ?

mikeit

New member
hi guys!
i am new in here so please if i say anything wrong, correct me....i wanna know if you record keyboards stereo or mono. Are the right and left channel the same arent they ? I think i would go mono cause maybe stereo is not worth since when mixing you can duplicate the mono to sterreo....or you go stereo.
 
Unless you are extremely limited in the number of tracks you can record, I would record the keyboards in stereo, assuming your keyboard offers the appropriate outputs.

I'm not a keyboard player per se, but I own one and have used them via step sequencing, so I do know a little bit about them.

If your keyboard offers onboard effects such as reverb, chorus, or delay, these effects sometimes take advantage of stereo to enhance the realism of the effects.

I had a keyboard about a zillion years ago that would allow you to set a single key as the center, then set the maximum panning on either end of the keyboard, and it would automatically calculate and set the pan for each key. The result was that as you moved up and down the keyboard, the sound would be panned back and forth from left to right (and vice versa).

I don't even remember what brand that keyboard was because, other than that neat effect, the keyboard was such a total POS that I wound up giving it away.

So you're better off tracking it in stereo, even if you later just set the balance to the center making it effectively mono, because if you record it in mono, you can't really turn it back into stereo...
 
I'd say it really depends on the patch and what you intend for it to do in the soundfield. Writing a soft, ambient type of piece and using pads? Stereo...to take advantage of some of the stereo dependent info in the patch itself. Piano playing a prominent role? If the piano patch was sampled in stereo, you probably want to maintain that soundfield.
If the key parts aren't prominent, there shouldn't be an issue with going mono...not many organ patches benefit from stereo panning unless you are using some phase dependent Leslie simulators. Even then, most of those sum to mono just fine.
It's really dependent upon what else is going on in the tune, IMO.
 
hi guys!
i am new in here so please if i say anything wrong, correct me....i wanna know if you record keyboards stereo or mono.
Stereo, but on separate mono tracks instead of a single stereo track. That way, I can pan each side where I want it.


Are the right and left channel the same arent they ?
No. If they were, it wouldn't be stereo.

I think i would go mono cause maybe stereo is not worth since when mixing you can duplicate the mono to sterreo....or you go stereo.
copying a mono track doesn't create stereo. If it actually is stereo, the left and right channels will be different somehow. Most piano patches have the low notes panned farther to one side and the high notes panned the other way. There are effects, like someone else mentioned, that do different things on either side.

If you just copy a mono track, you still have mono.

one mono track panned center= the same thing coming out of both speakers
two copies of one mono track panned hard= the same thing coming out of both speakers = mono.
 
well guys thanks for your answers that in fact helped me to learn a little bit more about my recording!!! I really was in some way thinking on the stereo record as the best one since we can always bring it to a mono track and the opposite isnt possible!

So, i have a Yamaha PSR keyboard very basic but since i havent never played keyboards for me its just one more instrument which i really think its somehow basic too much for me...:D:D:D:Dbut money money didnt helped....no problem i am satisfied with it!

So i really plan to experiment, but in fact that stereo thing you told me its important and i really suspected....cause if it is stereo capable its for any reason.

For now i am limited to my equipment,i have a phone/output socket which is the only i can use to output my sound...to an amp or to my digital recorder....:Dmy pc....i dont have other options.

I really plan to buy one keyboard amp but for now my guitar amp does the job....and i am recording audio directly on pc


I also have my modelling processor (guitar one) which is a lot funny to use with this keyboard...better than nothing apart from some chorus/reverb this keyboard already has but i dont use it....i really go through the modelling processor and have some more real nice effects....and it works for me now.

So in fact the stereo its stereo as it has to be...right and left side have different stuff in there...ok!!!!!

:)
 
you can duplicate the mono to sterreo.

I know Farview already addressed this. But it's such a common mis-conception and comes up about once a week here, that it's worth repeating: Duplicating a mono track does not make it stereo. It simply makes it louder mono.
 
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