?? on Recording Vocal Harmony

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Smokepole

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Are there any techniques or ideas you guys use when doing harmony alone?

When I record three-part harmony myself, it seems like it lacks something. It's too similar. It's tight and the intonation is good but it needs something and I don't even know how to describe what it lacks.

Maybe it will sound better when I switch over to mixdown mode and begin to pan. Any suggestions for a basic guideline to panning a lead with 2 backups.

Thanks
Joe
 
depends on the style but something you might try is a pitch shift effect on the harmony or one of the harmony around .5 to 2 cents diffrence would be a good start
 
ways you can create contrast when doing your own harmonies:

• put the background vox in a different ambient space (reverb) than the lead

•roll of the low end on the background parts (EQ)

•pan them towards the sides, leave the lead in center

•sing some of the backgrounds with a different "voice", e.g. falsetto, more breathy, etc.
 
Great stuff, I am just about to bump the two background vocals to a stereo track, so I will use those ideas.

doulos I don't think I have that capability in my deck but I appreciate the response. I'm a real rookie
 
Tex, can you elaborate a little? Would that mean 10-12db on the RNC? Would you do it by raising the ratio or just lowering the threshhold or other? Thanks
 
Formants

If you have a pitch-corrector or harmonizer that allows formant adjustment (sometimes called gender bending :D ) Try running the harmony parts through this without changing the pitch, just the formants. Sounds a lot more like 'real' back-up singers.

Scott
 
depending on what kind of music 3 part harmony is not unheard of but emphasis/phrasing on the prominent or VERB word might give you that ooomph: example

Leave the 3 part harmony, emphasis on the key word

Wont let you "GET AWAY''
my love for you 'WILL STAY"

granted reverb, eq and all will make your background sound nice
but your cheating yourself if it doesnt sound correct in it's original state, get it right NATURALLY first ((less eq'ing))

I stack 8 harmonies at a time, the lowest is 4, I believe in the mathmatical formation of 2's- plus panning would sound broader especially with eq or little verb.

my 2 cents
 
If you are using tape, record it with slight changes in pitch shift. Also useful if the backing vocals are one or two notes too high in pitch. :)
 
Smokepole said:
Tex, can you elaborate a little? Would that mean 10-12db on the RNC? Would you do it by raising the ratio or just lowering the threshhold or other? Thanks
Click to expand...

Either way it just depends on the track. Remember that lowering the threshold determines how much of the sound will be compressed (lower = more) and the ratio determines how hard you are going to compress the audio that the threshold grabs.

Anything above 10:1 ratio is pretty severe and adjust the threshold to taste. The threshold will change dramatically with every track so there is no real recomended setting. That is usually the last adjustment I make when compressing.

Slow attack = more high end transients but higher peaks
Fast attack = smoother overall but possibly dull sound
Slow release = smooth and consistent
Fast release = tight and punchy with audible 'breathing' if applied to harshly
 
Great thread guys,

From yesterday to today the vocals have improved drastically. I wish I had a way to post the song so I could get even more feedback. Unfortunately this computer is so old it won't even recognize software to convert to MP3. I ran into this problem over at guitar.com and ran out of options.

Bottom line is that they are way better.

While you're reading this maybe you could answer another question for me. I'm recording on a Roland VS840EX. When in mixdown mode, I come across a page that says "effects panning".

Is there any logic to this? Like for instance if you pan a vocal left 20, do you try to pan the reverb effect right? I'm not really sure what I'm trying to achieve.
 
Smokepole,

I don't know the answer to your question, however, either try the Roland section of this BBS or try the guys & gal's on www.vsplanet.com bbs under the VS840 section may be able to assist you with the 840 question.

Porter
 
If you are adding effects to your vocal that is panned left, then your effect will be on that vocal. Where ever you vocal or instrument is, that's where your effect will be added.

It doesnt go: Vocal to left --- effect to right : It's all together

now if you have a pan Vocal LEFT, Vocal RIGHT, then add EFFECTS: REVERB, FLANG, STEREO, TREMELO whatever, they would be added to each pan, considering you SET the effect the same on each VOCAL. simple

Dont make this stuff harder than what it is, it's very simple
 
[email]mstudio1224@aol.com[/email] said:
If you are adding effects to your vocal that is panned left, then your effect will be on that vocal. Where ever you vocal or instrument is, that's where your effect will be added.

It doesnt go: Vocal to left --- effect to right : It's all together

now if you have a pan Vocal LEFT, Vocal RIGHT, then add EFFECTS: REVERB, FLANG, STEREO, TREMELO whatever, they would be added to each pan, considering you SET the effect the same on each VOCAL. simple

Dont make this stuff harder than what it is, it's very simple
Click to expand...

It may be very simple. But it may not be correct.

I use effects panned to the opposite side of the dry signal all the time. As a matter of fact, it's one of my favorite tricks. Say you have a sax panned slightly left - now you add a short single delay panned to the right - you get the effect of creating a wall on the right that the sound is bouncing off - it's very three dimensional and can be extremely effective in the right context. Can work really well on vocals, percussion, etc. as well.

Hope I'm not violating any "laws"! I'm still on probation for putting my compressor after my EQ!
 
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