How do i mix keys?

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Hie guys im doing a song lyk 'All Of Me by Johm Legend' style. One vocal dead center thruout the song & a midi keayboard doing the 'piano thing'. The question is how do i pan the keys so that there is a stereo balance? I dont want the keys sound lopsided but spread in the stereo field a bit!
 
Sounds like the keys are dead center in Legend's song. I don't really understand the rest of your question though...if it's just one track, the best place you can put it for "spread" would be center. Honestly in that song it's just a nice piano recorded really well. That's always kinda hard to match with a midi keyboard. You can get close, but nothing beats the real thing.
 
I usually pan the keys left to right/low to high as a stereo track when I want them to fill out the whole mix....but I'm actually miking a piano in stereo and recording it like that....one mic on the low side one on the high...etc.

For a MIDI piano....find a stereo patch.
 
Funny, years ago there were so many recordings with one main instrument panned to one side and the other side just left open, but these days nobody wants to leave a lopsided mix.
 
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miroslav said:
I usually pan the keys left to right/low to high as a stereo track when I want them to fill out the whole mix....but I'm actually miking a piano in stereo and recording it like that....one mic on the low side one on the high...etc.

For a MIDI piano....find a stereo patch.
Click to expand...

Never tried that, good to know.

OP, try that.
 
I always use a stereo patch on my electronic (not MIDI) piano parts. I usually won't keep them dead center panned, even for parts of the song that are just piano or piano/vocals. Just a little to one side or the other, with width reduced.
 
If it is MIDI, you can create two tracks, using the VSTi twice, the parts you want left you separate out those notes, and same approach on the right side. Bad side is, you take the hit on using the VSTI twice. But you can achieve it.
 
PDP said:
Funny, years ago there were so many recordings with one main instrument panned to one side and the other side just left open, but these days nobody wants to leave a lopsided mix.
Click to expand...
That happened for a very short time, just with a lot of classic songs. A lot of the popular mixers at the time had panning switches, so the choice was left, center, and right. Nothing in between. Couple that with only 4-8 tracks to work with, and you end up with lobsided mixes.

At the time, am radio was big, so the songs were going to be listened to in mono a lot.
 
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