The Big Day Part Two: The Mix
Hi everyone! In this post, we’re going to explore how I mixed and edited this track. Going to use some standard plugins, EQ, Compressors, all that jazz. If that Music Production stuff interests you, keep reading!
Check out this version of the mix, so you have a good base line when reading on.
The Edit
First of all, I have to make sure that all the instruments are ready to be mixed. So that means checking every, single, little, detail.
One of the biggest things here is timings. As you might be aware by now, all of my instruments are sampled from various vendors, Spitfire Audio, EastWest and Native Instruments. All of these companies have different libraries, recorded slightly differently and this presents some issues. Each sample has an attack time, which is the amount of time it takes for the sample to play once the note is triggered.
So, using the click, the metronome within Logic (my Digital Audio Workstation) I start checking the timing of every single note of every single instrument and adjusting the start time of each note so that the attack is in time.
One of the other editing points is making sure that MIDI automation is all adjusted and sounding as natural as possible. So again, that means going through all of the instruments with modulation and fine-tuning these performance parts.
And then the other thing. Making sure that instruments like the brass or choirs are realistic. This just means adjusting some note lengths and performances, to make them sound like they were played by someone who needs to breathe occasionally.
Finally let’s talk Mixing
We’ve talked about various aspects of mixing before in other blog posts (don’t forget to check those out!) but let’s recap.
There are many types of mixing or reasons for mixing your music but let’s stick to two that I always use. The first of which is corrective mixing. This means going in and fixing issues. That might an oddly high shrill sounding Violin part that just stands out in a bad way in the mix. Or it might be a Concert Bass Drum, that is really thick and boomish and causing a lot of issues in the mix.
The other way of mixing is creative mixing. This could be anything, from applying effects to a track, like an [SPOILER ALERT] Shaker with an Echo to add realism to the sound or simply adding reverb to a string section to make them work better together and sound like they’re actually in a room or hall.
So how did I mix this track?
Plain and Simple. A combination of both the above types of mixing. The primary thing I did with this track, given that it was a subtle, relatively understated track, at least compared to my other work, shaped the different instruments and sections to fit better together.
The image you have a jigsaw puzzle. The pieces are usually designed to fit together but what if you have a piece that happens to be a little scuffed up around the edges or got a bit warped and now it feels like you’re forcing it to fit properly.
The same is true of mixing music. You write the music, arrange, and orchestrate all the parts so that they fit together well and work with each other in a nice 20th century English polite way. But for whatever reason, some things are clashing in the frequency spectrum and the overall mix.
What do we do when this happens?
We shape the mix. The most common way of doing this is using EQ. EQ’s are Equalizer plugins, that are designed to boost and cut the volume of certain parts of the frequency content of the sound. Stripped down explanation I know.
Let’s look at the Choirs
There were Choirs in this track, subtle and textural. They weren’t providing any lyrical content, just a nice texture under the 3rd Act. Give it another listen, and you’ll hear them.
N.B. When you’re done reading my coming explanation, have a good look at the image, it’s high resolution and you can open it in LightBox so it’s really easy to look at small details.
If we think about a Choir, we have humans singing. That is kind of the core idea, right? The human voice sits comfortably in what we music nuts call the mid-range of the frequency spectrum. So, I cut everything below 120hz by 3-5 decibels. Sounds drastic but a lot of these frequencies are not absolutely necessary for this instrument and a lot of other instruments have their fundamental frequency content in this area, so to let this instrument embody some of this area would be selfish right? Not to mention messy and lead to a duller mix.
I then boosted the frequencies around 4khz by 2-3dB. The thing to remember when you’re applying these kinds of mixing techniques is to listen to what it does to the sound WITHIN the mix. It might sound great in isolation but if it doesn’t work in the mix, what was the point?
Violins
While writing this track, I acquired access to some awesome new string libraries from Komplete Ultimate. I used these, to include some string harmonics. Harmonics are a performance method, or articulation in the world of orchestration and have very dramatic effects for such a subtle sound on its own.
So, when applying EQ to the Violin Harmonics, I applied a large cut to the lower frequencies by applying a High Pass Filter to the frequencies below 284hz.
N.B. A High Pass Filter is a type of EQ mixing that simply means allowing the High frequencies to Pass through while Filtering the lower frequencies out.
I also boosted the High Mid Frequencies above 2khz by 2.9dB. This just brings some of the characteristics of the Violin Harmonics in to focus a bit more. Again, shaping the sound.
Next, the Cellos
Now again I cut the frequencies in the lower end of the spectrum, but where before I cut below 250 for the Choirs, I cut below 60hz instead. The reason for this, is that Cello’s fundamental harmonics, their most prominent frequency content, is naturally lower. So, to cut the same frequencies as before, would severely undermine the sound of the Cellos.
Reverb
As I have previously mentioned, Reverb is a common mixing tool, and it is quite useful when dealing with sampled instruments. Each sample library, whether it is Spitfire’s, EastWest’s or Native Instruments’ libraries, tends to come with a pre-activated and pre-mixed reverb. Presumably they do this so that when you audition the sound, you have a better sense of how the instrument would have sounded if it were real or a live performance.
Anyway, to place several different libraries in the same environment, so that the mix sounds more realistic is the ultimate goal and this can be accomplished by clever use of Reverb.
The string section in this track was a big and important part of the composition and to glue the individual instruments and libraries together, use of a single combining Reverb helps to achieve a more realistic sound.
Shaping the Bass
Now the Underboss is literally the under bass. It’s the instrument I use to fill in the frequency spectrum in the lower end of the frequency spectrum. This adds warmth to the track, so it’s quite useful to do this. The characteristics of the instrument though, have harmonics in much of the spectrum, so cutting the unnecessary frequencies of the instrument so the instrument better serves its purpose.
Now let’s talk about Percussion.
Let’s start with the Snares. The snares in the second section of this tract or Act 2. Again, with the shaping the sound, I applied a High Pass to the lower, sub-bass frequencies under 78hz. Additionally, I applied a Low Pass Filter at around 9.2khz, because the Snare was ringing in the higher frequencies.
Shake, Shake, Shake.
The thing with sample instruments is, they’re super useful but sometimes they’re really obviously samples and not live performances. A trick I learned from the awesome Nick Murray, was to use an Echo FX plugin to make the sampled instrument sound more realistic when repeating notes, rather than doubling the number of notes to achieve the same sound.
Basically, if you play two MIDI notes, one after the other, to simulate the sound of the shaker instrument being used, it doesn’t sound real. If you apply an Echo to the sound instead, it makes it sound like the instrument is actually shaking.
Pianos
The pianos in this track were a fundamental part of the track. I used two of them, one to provide a strong musical foundation for the track, the other to provide a soft emotional end to the track in the form of the tail.
Let’s talk about the Steinway
I used a Steinway Grand Piano for the majority of this track and it again needed to be shaped to fit the track better. The thing with pianos is, they cover a wide array of the frequency spectrum as they cover several octaves. But there is still some unnecessary frequency content in certain areas.
I applied a High Pass Filter to the 207hz and below range, just to clean up the low end a bit, make room for the cellos and even the Double Basses. It’s only a small tweak but it makes a big difference.
The second Piano was a Sampled piano called The Giant from Native Instruments. Now I applied a High Pass Filter again, but I cut frequencies lower in the spectrum than that clashed with the deep bass booms I had playing to emphasis the final parts of the track. This is shaping the piano to fit better with the other instruments in the section.
And that’s it. There of course were other things that always happen during Editing and Mixing but these were the essential parts that I wanted to cover in this post.
If you have any questions about anything I have covered in this post, or other thins you would like to know more about, please drop a comment below and let me know what you’re interested in. You never know, if you let me know what you’re interested, I could talk about it in detail with the next track.
As ever, thank you for reading and listening to my music. If you want to give yourself some awesome karma or just make yourself feel good, share this blog post, comment down below and let me know you liked it.
Stay tuned for the next post coming soon, on how I went about Mastering the track, another technical but interesting aspect of composing music.