Music too loud or too quiet

[balky]

Here's another type of arrangement of that song from the same era - Loads of brass and woods - not how her vocal is constant in terms of level and the the basics - piano, bass and vocal stay pretty much fixed - but the saxes and trumpets blast over the top, and the solos are brought up. We often think of recent (as in say, 90s onwards) techniques as the ones that work on everything, but the older ones still work on the right material. Here, you could slap on compressors on her voice and level up the quiet to extreme accompaniment, but that's not how it's done to recreate the sound off the time. Even here double bass is allowed to vanish at some points. I like her stuff - if you google, she even did stuff with Les Paul!

Thanks for sharing this! This one is done totally in a different mood I like it a lot! Elina took a more lyrical approach .

 

[balky]

How was the Orchestra recorded? Was it sampled or did you record a real symphony? None the less - the vocals don't have enough presence in comparison to the orchestra - this might be fixed by cutting some midrange out of the Orchestra - in terms of side chains / Buses - I recorded my daughter and used the following: Logic Channel EQ, Drawmer S73 Compressor, Logic DEsser, and Waves Vocal Rider on the vocal tracks - which were bussed out to Abbey Road Plates, Logic Echo, Waves CLA-76, Waves Doubler, and Native Instruments Raum (Reverb) - you can listen to the results and see what you think: https://homerecording.com/bbs/threads/river-song-and-video.421623/#post-4777434

Hi

I have no idea how the orchestra was recorded and where. I was presented with this accompaniment and that is pretty much it . Evidently, that's the only one she could find... Sometimes it is nearly impossible to find what you want, and if you do find it, no guarantee you will like the way it sounds ))

You did a very good job recording your daughter!!!

 

[rob aylestone]

This makes it clear. We’ve been thinking you were riding the faders and compressing individual tracks from a session, most of the comments don’t make sense if it’s a premixed track, because they’re glued together and anything to change the balance can only be eq band based.

 

[HumanPlanet]

SO, I decided to use the automation.

OK, fair enough

This is the best way for this!

Best? Do you mean on the vocal track in this case

Thanks (TalismanRich) for reminding of this option.

WTF!!! (No offence TR)

As an aside, you don't seem to consider volume automation, it's your friend.

Moving on

Only I did not automate the volume, but EQd down at 800 hz Q-factor 0.1

Thats pretty wide and not very targeted

and it took away the energy of the music

Is this really what you want

As far as fab filterl, I did have it, for some reason it is called PRO Q3.

It's called Pro-Q3 as it's an update to Pro-Q2. I suspect the next one will be...

Here is the new file ))

I'm taking my ball and going home.

 

[balky]

OK, fair enough
Best? Do you mean on the vocal track in this case

This song is slow and everything changes slowly, so the automation worked great. I can't even hear when it does. But the voice is not struggling at getting through the music

WTF!!! (No offence TR)

I thanked him for reminding me of automation But I am greatful to every single person who replied to my post, and to you for suggesting this new way of doing it with PRO-Q

Thats pretty wide and not very targeted

True, but the goal was to make it quieter at some loud spots.

Is this really what you want

Lowering the volume was the goal, perhaps Energy was not an appropriate word at describing this. sorry.

It's called Pro-Q3 as it's an update to Pro-Q2. I suspect the next one will be...

I understand, but in Nuendo it starts with FAB ... so that is why I was loking for it. and I did dind it, but it was not vst3. vst3 was Pro Q 3 in EQ section. Don't know why nuendo filtered it like this.

 

[balky]

This makes it clear. We’ve been thinking you were riding the faders and compressing individual tracks from a session, most of the comments don’t make sense if it’s a premixed track, because they’re glued together and anything to change the balance can only be eq band based.

HM... I am not sure what made you think this way really I mentioned in my post that this is just an instrumental file.
but that is ok. I learned a few things from this dialogue.

I want to try to make this track sound old now retroish. Will try to figure this out on my own first

 

[rob aylestone]

My fault you said the instrumental was either loud or soft, so I assumed you meant the mix, bar the vocal, not a backing track. Raymond responded asking if you recorded it and we just got confused by 'instrumental' - not to worry, we assumed we were talking about how the whole track was recorded. If you want the track to be retroish - then just dump the compression - the people who recorded the track have already sorted the mix, you are double treating, so instead of compressing the mix, just make the vocal you recorded fit that, and all will be well.

 

[balky]

I just wanted to clarify that we recorded the vocal to already produced and finished instrumental track (no vocal).

I will try thanks for the suggestion, Rob

 

[HumanPlanet]

I want to try to make this track sound old now retroish.

Too old, too retro?

View attachment Moon River Retro.mp3


I'm only playing! I'll go away now.


P.S. I knew what you were talking about from the beginning, it was written in your opening post.

 

[balky]

Too old, too retro?

View attachment 130035


I'm only playing! I'll go away now.


P.S. I knew what you were talking about from the beginning, it was written in your opening post.

whew, I am glad you were playing . It is never my intensions to hurt anyone's feelings

Your retroish is a bit extreme Sometimes I do go that far... I usually use Vinyl by Izotop and such for this kind of retro

I was rather talking 60's. ELLA like quality... I tried, here... don't know if it is to that effect yet. but another ear never hurts

 

[HumanPlanet]

whew, I am glad you were playing . It is never my intensions to hurt anyone's feelings

Your retroish is a bit extreme Sometimes I do go that far... I usually use Vinyl by Izotop and such for this kind of retro

I was rather talking 60's. ELLA like quality... I tried, here... don't know if it is to that effect yet. but another ear never hurts

You could try dynamic inverse EQ matching, although this may not have been possible in the 60s...

 

[HumanPlanet]

SO, I decided to use the automation. This is the best way for this! Thanks (TalismanRich) for reminding of automation option. Only I did not automate the volume, but EQd down at 800 hz Q-factor 0.1 ... and it took away the energy (loudness) of the music at certain spots

As far as fab filterl, I did have it, for some reason it is called PRO Q3. I was looking for the wrong thing LOL

Here is the new file ))

By the way, listen to the clarity of the vocal (for example) between 55 seconds and 1 minute 25 seconds and you should hear why this broad Q untargeted approach doesn't work so well for seating a vocal track into an instrumental track.

 

[balky]

By the way, listen to the clarity of the vocal (for example) between 55 seconds and 1 minute 25 seconds and you should hear why this broad Q untargeted approach doesn't work so well for seating a vocal track into an instrumental track.

Oh, perhaps you are right. only used it in certain spots that were very loud. If I used just volume, i think if would have been too obvious. .

By the way, perhaps you could educate me as far as seating a vocal track into an instrumental track. Usually I compare the graphs of music and vocal and wherever they overlap, I reduce frequency there by 1.5-2.5 . But that is how I do it. Probably wrong LOL

 

[HumanPlanet]

Here, found this tutorial for you on 2 track mixing. Different genre but that's irrelevant.



Finally try it and see how you get on.

 

[Papanate]

Hi

I have no idea how the orchestra was recorded and where. I was presented with this accompaniment and that is pretty much it . Evidently, that's the only one she could find... Sometimes it is nearly impossible to find what you want, and if you do find it, no guarantee you will like the way it sounds ))

You did a very good job recording your daughter!!!

Thank you. Did you just record the vocalist over the music? Do you have Tracks - a multitrack of the music by any chance?

 

[balky]

Thank you. Did you just record the vocalist over the music? Do you have Tracks - a multitrack of the music by any chance?

Yes, we just recorded the vocal, and no, unfortunately; the life would've been so much easier if we had the melody as a multitrack version . I wish I could be of more help.

 

[rob aylestone]

Oh, perhaps you are right. only used it in certain spots that were very loud. If I used just volume, i think if would have been too obvious. .

By the way, perhaps you could educate me as far as seating a vocal track into an instrumental track. Usually I compare the graphs of music and vocal and wherever they overlap, I reduce frequency there by 1.5-2.5 . But that is how I do it. Probably wrong LOL

Compare the graphs? Have you ever painted a picture using those paint by numbers kits?

this is crazy. Put yourself in a live sound scenario. All those faders, all those people, no graphs, no reducing frequencies by some magic number guaranteed to make it sit, or probably not. It’s a brain and ears thing. The only time you use eyes is when ears fail, and a spectral display for me usually just shows what your ears have already told you - too much in the same place.

 

[balky]

Compare the graphs? Have you ever painted a picture using those paint by numbers kits?

this is crazy. Put yourself in a live sound scenario. All those faders, all those people, no graphs, no reducing frequencies by some magic number guaranteed to make it sit, or probably not. It’s a brain and ears thing. The only time you use eyes is when ears fail, and a spectral display for me usually just shows what your ears have already told you - too much in the same place.

Well, I understand what you are saying. I don't blindly trust what I'am seeing, so ultimately, I do go by my ear, of course.

 

[balky]

Here, found this tutorial for you on 2 track mixing. Different genre but that's irrelevant.



Finally try it and see how you get on.

Oh, thanks! Great tutorial!
only, I tried what he did, and I really do not hear any difference... I am deaf to such subtle nuances probably bummer.

 

[TalismanRich]

I watched the video, and listened on a nice pair of speakers. What I heard was a great way to squeeze the life and dynamics out of a voice, homogenize it so that it will always be louder than the road noise in the car, and remove some of the timbre that is part of the human voice.

It's not a path that I'm planning to take, but I'll never be doing any "pro" mixes.