Recording vocals to prerecorded guitar track

J

Jackster

New member
Can someone give me some tips on recording a vocal track to a prerecorded guitar track?
I am using Sonar Producer 8.5. I have an Allen & Heath ZED 12FX Mixer. How do I hear the prerecorded guitar track and my vocals at the same time (in headphones) and not have any of the guitar track included with the vocal track as it records? Any help will be appreciated. Thanks. Jack
 
Hi Jackster

Use your mixer as....a mixer! :)

The important thing, as you already know, will be keeping the recording send separate from the playback monitoring.
So if you use an Aux or Buss to send what you want to record out to your interface, you should be able to keep that stream clear of any backing tracks or pre-recorded audio from the computer.
Eg; microphone > desk channel > Send via Aux 1 line out to interface, so you'd need a balanced cable from the Aux send out plugged into an input port on the interface. Your mic signal can also still be monitored directly via the desk by headphones.

For listening to the backing, take the outputs of the soundcard playing whatever has been pre-recorded into a couple of channels in the desk, and this will also be able to be listened to with headphones. (Don't turn up the Aux 1 pot on these channels and none of this signal will be sent back to the soundcard)

Does that kind of make sense?

Dags
 
Hi Dags

Thanks for replying. I will try to make sense of what information that you have given me. My Allen & Heath mixer is my interface with the computer. It has a USB connection. I am attempting to record vocals with channel 1 on the mixer with AUX 1 out to computer. I am trying to monitor the backing track from the computer with the USB return. My headphones are plugged into the monitor circuit on the mixer. I only have a master bus assigned in my DAW. Do I need to use a separate bus for the backing track output to the mixer? At this time, I do not have a dedicated recording sound card in my computer. My master bus is assigned out to the USB mixer. Input to the vocal channel is from the USB mixer. I am trying so very hard to learn how to record. It has been daunting. I really appreciate your help. I will try to get it right. Jack
 
Hmmm....OK
I just grabbed the block diagram for the zed10, which is nearly the same :)
It looks like there's a switch for toggling between what gets sent to the USB out and another switch which prioritises what goes to the phones & monitor out.
I'm taking a guess here, but it looks like if you set playback input priority to playback and aux-fx switch for USB recording priority then maybe that will break the connection between the audio coming back from the computer via the USB cable and the audio you're sending to the computer via the Aux send dial?

...wild stab in the dark but I hope it works!

Dags
 
...further investigation has turned up the block diagram of the ZED 12FX.
The USB connect is only a 2 track (ie stereo) device.

I think that setting priority switch 'Aux 1-2' for the send to USB will enable the vocals to be sent to the computer via USB using the pre-fade Aux1 send knob. (Make sure the Aux1 master knob is set at about 12 o'clock as well)
Setting the 'USB return' priority switch for monitoring via headphones will allow you hear what is being sent from the computer via USB.
Hopefully this configuration will have the mixer will break the signal path between what is coming back out of the computer and what you're trying to send to the record-armed channel.

Best wishes!
Dags
 
Sorry Dude

After 70 views and no replys I thought I'd posted in the wrong place. Just trying to learn and get some help.
 
Hey Dags

A bit of success (I think). Understanding that the ZED mixer interfaces with the computer in 2 track helped. I listened to playback on AUX1 and recorded vocals on AUX2. I also used mono channels in the DAW. This worked well for my click track as well. Hopefully, a little more work will give me the stereo mix that I am looking for. I sure appreciate your time and advice.
 
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