In mixing session, it is important to correctly pan guitar in the mix. Panning is all about assigning a location in the stereo field with left to right user perspective (including center).
Read this introductory guide on panning instruments in a mix. Inappropriate panning can result to mud or unrealistic guitar sound.
Overview of guitar panning in the mix
The main objective of panning is to give a mix a realistic stereo image as if the listener of would be listening to a performing live band on stage.
If you have been to live concerts; the guitarist are mostly found on the left and right side of the stage (live PA speakers are also located on that side). The live sound engineers do all pan the guitar performance on both left and right.
It is why you always hear the guitar sound far from the center and usually located in the left and right of the stereo field. The same concept when you are NOT mixing for live sound but mixing guitars for a recording project.
Guitars are either panned to the left and right of the stereo mix. And for details, they are either panned:
a.)Hard left
b.)Hard right
c.) Mid left
d.) Mid Right
“Hard” pan setting values are usually 85% to 100%. Mid pan settings are usually 50% to 85%. Most DAW software allows you to easily assign panning settings.
To make an effective panning settings (which handles the left to right location of your tracks), you should consider the front and back audio mixing techniques.
Front and back are usually enhanced using effects such as reverb, EQ and compression. Make sure that when you are panning guitars, you should also consider its front and back aspect in the mix.
You can picture out using the diagram below:
Guitar panning settings and the concept of “MIRROR”
Numerically the center is assigned as “0” while the rightmost part of the channel is assigned as +100 and leftmost part channel as -100. In some DAW the polarity sign might be opposite.
For example, if you assigned a certain musical instrument at panning setting of “0”, it means that you have assigned that instrument in the center of the stereo. In other DAW, it uses percentage. So 0% means center pan and -100% could be hard left or hard right. You need to consult with your DAW software documentations for details about its panning feature as this would be different from every software.
When panning guitars, you need to implement the concept of “mirror”, this works like this:
1.) If you only have one guitar track, you should pan them equally in either left or right at the same panning setting value but in opposite.
For example, if you start panning a guitar on LEFT 85%, then you should make a copy of that guitar and put it on the RIGHT 85%. This will ensure stereo balance of your guitar tracks.
2 Responses
Hi Randy, you can panned the guitar solo on the center of the mix. Take note it depends strongly on the material, such as:
1.) When you are mixing a track with two guitar solos, it is best to panned one of them to the right while the other to the left channel of the mix.
This would produce the best guitar solo clarity and separation between these two tracks.
2.) If the track you are mixing has a guitar solo that occurs together with the lead vocals, panning the guitar to the center of the mix can drown the vocal a lot.
In this case, you might want to panned the guitar slightly off-center.
In this technique, this would let the guitar solo shine in the mix while not drowning the vocals that is also equally important as far as clarity is concerned.
3.) If the track has a lot of layered guitars-rhythm and there was guitar solo (without vocals on it). This is when the guitar solo would sound best if it would panned in the center of the mix.
Most guitar instrumentals are panned using this technique and if you listen to the works of Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, Paul Gilbert and other guitar gods, you would notice that there solo are not always panned right/left or either in the center. It depends on the material.
So very weird material like from Steve Vai has some running swirling panning effect on guitars, creating an illusion of a running guitar sound from left to right.
In summary, guitar panning is not a science but an art. Experimentation is the key for producing the best guitar sound results.
Hello, thanks for this info…You mentioned that when there’s a lead and a rhythm guitar, the lead should be -50 or +50. Should it be left like this during the guitar solo, or should the lead be panned to the center? Thanks.