| I have been asked several times how do you get | | | | way everything works together and sounds consistent. |
| those great vocal tracks. After the trial and error of | | | | We don't cut and paste vocal sections because we |
| engineering for many years, this is what we have | | | | believe that singing the parts live gives the vocal a |
| found to work for us. | | | | more natural, musical sound with an organic feeling. |
| Setup: | | | | We're not trying to invent something new we're trying |
| First after listening to the singer we look through our | | | | to capture the vocal at its best and natural state. |
| microphone selection and choose 5 or 6 that we think | | | | Equalization: |
| would work well with their voice. Than we setup these | | | | We do have certain occasions that we have to use |
| microphones and go through the process of them | | | | equalization when we record. But we try not to use |
| singing though each microphone and each preamp, until | | | | any equalization when we're recording the vocals, as |
| we find the combination that brings out the quality of | | | | we find it works better for us if we rather spend our |
| their individual voice. Once we find the combination of | | | | time setting up the proper placement of the |
| microphone and preamp, we go though all the | | | | microphones. If we need equalization to fix a problem |
| compressors until we find the one that tightens up the | | | | we can than find the right equalizer with the proper |
| track and colors the vocal that produces the sound | | | | transparency and color without affecting the track. |
| we are looking for. | | | | Doubling Vocals: |
| Of course recording a good singer in an acoustically | | | | We than double or triple the vocal track which thickens |
| great sounding room with quality microphones and | | | | it up. We're not talking duplicating, which only makes |
| excellent microphone placement, all plays a major part | | | | the vocal louder not thicker. But we're suggesting |
| in creating a great vocal track. Matching these items | | | | recording 2 or 3 takes which will always be a hair |
| can make or break a CD as the vocal usually sits out | | | | different no matter what you do, but they must be |
| in the front of the mix | | | | very similar to one another; this makes the vocal |
| Punching In: | | | | tracks to have a slight delay in them and thickens it up, |
| Now on the subject of using 15 takes and choosing | | | | making it sound full and rich. |
| parts from each one to make one good vocal track | | | | These are techniques that should be done with an |
| doesn't really work well, because you have different | | | | engineer in a professional studio so that the results of |
| feelings, emotions, attitude, timing etc. on every track | | | | the vocal will come out to be world class. One of the |
| you sing. We found that singing the song till you get a | | | | advantages of using a professional studio is having a |
| take that has life and emotion in it, and only than punch | | | | large assortment of microphones and equipment, and |
| in the spots that need to be fixed, gives you a bigger | | | | good rooms that gives an artist every opportunity to |
| and better sounding vocal with the same feelings and | | | | capture a great performance and produce a quality |
| tone quality throughout the whole vocal track. This | | | | CD. |