Audio Recording

I received an inquiry from a reader pertaining to mixing vocals in Audacity software:

I am recording right now on my ipad (multi-track DAW)/blue yeti microphone which his very convenient when I am not home. I am new and I have no clue how to mix vocals. the vocals produced are dry and obviously it needs to be mixed to sound professional.Any tips how to do this easily and sound like a pro. I noticed that the voice needs to sound more icy/wet than dry and more crystallize. I know for a fact recording the instruments and vocals separately. I don’t really know if i make sense. My recording sounds like it was just recorded infront of the computer… I don’t know if I am even making sense here. My hobby is just to record vocals. I heard these techniques are needed very much to mix the vocals [properly- EQ and compressor.
Sorry for being not recording literate. I just know how to record and sing not produce a well mixed pro sound CD>lol. My question might have been answered somewhere else on your site, but please guide me. I need your help and I hope I wont have a hard time mixing it in Audacity or soundforge 10 which I also have. I want to use reverb but not too much, just like the sounds in POP vocals.

My reply: Congratulations you made some progress in your recording hobby. Getting started in recording is often difficult. Now you have manage to record some vocals in you personal studio; OK let’s sort the main issue you have faced in your vocal mixing session.

I already wrote some tips about mixing vocals properly. Although those tips are inclined more to engineers that are using Windows based DAW such as Adobe Audition; it can hard to implement for those using open source recording software such as Audacity. Some principles outlined on that article can also be implemented on other recording software with some technical adjustments and approaches.

Assuming you will be using Audacity, below are my suggested steps on how to mix vocals using this software:

Step1: Load up all the tracks that are to be mixed in Audacity. These includes other instruments not only vocals (example, guitar, drums, keyboards, etc). Of course if you are just recording acapella, then you will load only one track. But I think you are mixing a multi-track recording so that will include other instruments as well.

For details about how to load up all the tracks in Audacity in preparation for a mixing session, you can read this audacity mixing tutorial with some illustration to load up all the tracks to be mixed.

Step2: Assuming you will focus on vocals mixing and that you finalized the vocal recording; first remove the unnecessary breathing noise. In raw recording of vocals, it includes some breathing noise. You can remove it that so that your vocal tracks will sound cleaner. Please refer to my vocal mixing tips for some guides on how to remove this noise.

Step3: The next thing is to apply some EQ (equalization) to the vocal tracks. Since Audacity does not have any built in parametric equalizer. You can implement the following EQ suggestions for vocals:

Cut 200 Hz (high pass filter)= -6dB
Boost 3000Hz Q = 1 = 3dB
Boost 15000Hz Q = 1 = 3dB

Using the tips discussed in this tutorial: Audacity parametric equalizer: , and Applying parametric equalizer settings using Audacity.

This is the only process which I think can be a little tricky to do. But I recommend to read those references provided very carefully. And do not forget to backup your original recording before applying any effects (including EQ) in Audacity.

Step4: It’s time to apply some compression. You can go to Effect – Compressor, then apply the vocal compression settings :

Attack time- 5 ms
Release time- 50ms
Threshold- -10dB
Compression ratio – 5:1

For details, you can refer to this tutorial on audio compression tips , since Audacity compressor won’t go as little as 5 ms, you can approximate the settings used by the compressor as shown in the screen shot here:

To implement reverb in Audacity, I will write a separate article that will be published on the next tutorial.