 Vocal Balancing [message #320358] |
Wed, 07 May 2008 06:25  |
 Lenny Wehrle
Messages: 7
Registered: May 2008 |
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Hope I'm in the right forum, this is my first "post" (question. I play in a duo, male/female. I use backing tracks I've either purchased on-line or made on my own. They're mp3 files. When we play live, since it's just the two of us, NO sound man, I can't seem to get the balance correct between the live vocals and the backing track. Here's my setup: The tracks are loaded in my laptop, (Dell Inspiron, Windows XP), played through Windows Media Player. THere's about 150 of them. Sent through and M-Audio interface into a Yamaha EMX 6 channel mixer/amp combo, into (depending on the room size), either 2 Yamaha Club 15's or 12's. I have ALL reverb and effects turned OFF on the input channel for the tracks, but turned on, to some extent, for the vocals. Since I'm only hearing this through my monitors, I can't seem to get the vocals and tracks to sound as one, sometimes it sounds "karaoke". I need to get the blend correct. Any ideas??? thanks for any help. Lenny Wehrle
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| Re: Vocal Balancing [message #320370 is a reply to message #320358 ] |
Wed, 07 May 2008 07:29  |
E. Lee Dickinson
Messages: 962
Registered: February 2007
Location: Richmond, VA |
Has No Life |
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Lenny, that's a tough one. Even on the radio, you hear plenty of songs where the mix didn't come together and it was quite obvious the vocal was recorded separately from the music. Now, ALL songs are recorded this way, but not all of them sound like it.
The first thing is to make sure all your tracks are normalized. If the volume changes from track to track, you're not going to have much luck maintaining a consistent mix.
The next thing is to consider applying some of the same effects to your track as to your voice, trying to bring it all together. That said, poorly applied reverb leads exactly where you don't want it to: Karaoke sound.
Next think is to consider some compression on the overall mix to squish the vocals and tracks together. Our ears are used to hearing tons of compression on the radio, but be a little more stingy on stage: a nuanced, dynamic performance is part of what makes live music more enjoyable than burying your head in an ipod.
Next would be to use some monitors. First, you'll be able to better monitor your mix. Second, a little bit of track bleed into your vocal mic, again, can add to that 'live' sound.
Getting a mix to 'come together' is the real talent of mixing live. Hooking things up, controlling feedback, operating the gear, balancing levels.. those are all fairly mechanical. Getting to the point where it sounds cohesive and blended, that's the real hard part.
E. Lee Dickinson
Advanced Visual Production Inc.
sound - lighting - video - design
www.avpric.com
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| Re: Vocal Balancing [message #320451 is a reply to message #320443 ] |
Wed, 07 May 2008 11:10 |
Dick Rees
Messages: 1744
Registered: September 2007
Location: St Paul, MN |
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IpodsItunes do indeed have a normalizing feature. That would be step one in sorting things out.....having a consistent level from your playback device.
While there is no way to restore dynamics to the backing tracks it may be possible to help balance things out between the live and recorded material with creative use of compression.
1. Slight compression of the live vocals will help in achieving a sound more similar to the backing tracks.
2. Using reverb to match the ambience as closely as possible between the two material sources should help.
3. This is the kicker: you could (with the assistance of a knowledgeable sound person) use ever so slight compression of the recorded material triggered by a side chain input from the live vocals to "duck" the backing tracks a couple of dB thereby faking dynamics in the backing tracks.
That's about as automated as I can figure it. You will need professional assistance to get the most out of it right away, but I'm pretty certain that this will get you close to what you want.
DR
St Paul
[Updated on: Wed, 07 May 2008 11:11]
Neo-Luddite, Rocket Surgeon
Irrationality drives me crazy!!!
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| Re: Vocal Balancing [message #320640 is a reply to message #320358 ] |
Wed, 07 May 2008 18:13 |
John Chiara
Messages: 1190
Registered: April 2004
Location: Troy, NY |
Has No Life |
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The most common situation I see is that the tracks are not loud enough. If you listen to recordings of the songs you play the vocals are not huge and way on top like most small live setups...especially they do not have the low end hump that proximity effect gives you when you get on the mic. I would carve out an EQ "hole" in the tracks and make sure the mix is full..and fit the vocals in around that. Of course the other common problem is that the tracks are all over the place in level/eq/dynamics and then you need some sort of a mastering process for them..an Aphex Compellor works pretty good for this and is easy to use.
"mix is a verb, not a noun"
John A. Chiara aka. Blind Johnny
Albany Audio Associates Inc.
Troy, NY
518-961-0069 - cell
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| Re: Vocal Balancing [message #320818 is a reply to message #320358 ] |
Thu, 08 May 2008 09:29 |
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Scott Smith
Messages: 1188
Registered: May 2005
Location: South Florida |
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I use Winamp Classic for my playback tracks. Even with tracks normalized, there can still be huge perceived volume differences. With this program, there are many plugins that can compress and normalize output. There are AGC options as well. Some of these work extremely well. With winamp, one of the features is playback levels and "auto eq" settings can be saved for each individual song. Once set, the saved settings are automatic (for each individual song) when the song comes up in the playlist (this applies to eq and preamp level tweaks as well). There are also options for manual playback (one song at at time), or automatic.
As mentioned, you may want to experiment with a real dedicated compressor, but some AGC may be in order.
Edit: With winamp, there is another nice feature..."gap killer". Based on db threashold settings, it will eliminate gaps or silence at the beginning or end of tracks (particularly a problem with karaoke tracks). It doesn't care if it's 8 seconds, or 8 minutes of silence...it's GONE!
[Updated on: Thu, 08 May 2008 09:32]
"Percussive Maintenance" - Bang on it until it works!
Scott Smith, South Florida
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| Re: Vocal Balancing [message #320831 is a reply to message #320818 ] |
Thu, 08 May 2008 10:31 |
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Scott MacAuley
Messages: 394
Registered: March 2006
Location: West Palm Beach Florida m... |
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You could try a leveler like radio stations use on the computer output, or a decent compressor. A leveler will basically keep all material at a target level. Basically an AGC. That will solve the most annoying problem, different track levels without having to prep every track all the time.
Tweak the backing track eq at the mixer for a little more bass and highs to compensate for the MP3 losses, and possibly a slight cut in the mids (if not already there)to create a hole for your vocals to sit in. You are probably trying to make the vocals clear over the track with volume rather than percieved volume. Adding a touch of the same vocal reverb to the track might for now help as well.
Compression on the vocals is a must to get it to sound right.
While not correct, you can lean on the compressor such that your lowest singing goes through with almost no compression and everything else gets compressed. If you are not loud you can get away with it. I do that for Bon Jovi songs..LOL
I've stopped using my Vocal rack (preamp, comp, eq, harmonizer, delay and a reverb) and have been using a Vocal 300 most of the time. I like the ability to set a reverb base level, and then a max swell level that is controlled by the foot pedal. Very nice for adding swelled reverb on sustained notes like the studios do.
The ability to create a few different vocal "sounds" is great for cover material. The key is to be subtle when tweaking.
I have 3 main vocal presets I use, as well as one distortion and one "radio" tone. The three main presets only differ in what is controlled by the pedal and the settings for the pedal driven effect are. One is reverb, the next is a long delay, the third is 5th below pitch (max volume is quite low). The processing artifacts through the box would help you sound closer to the tracs as well. I have not played with the 400 yet but it looks like it has better more realistic compressor controls than the 300. You can get that Huge sound. You can also midi control the other singers unit if necessary to change presets.
I may have missed it but are you playing instruments as well?
[Updated on: Thu, 08 May 2008 10:40]
Screamers Audio Services
www.screamersusa.com
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| Re: Vocal Balancing [message #320932 is a reply to message #320488 ] |
Thu, 08 May 2008 14:11 |
Patrick Tracy
Messages: 1239
Registered: February 2006
Location: Boulder, CO |
Has No Life |
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Lenny,
There are two kinds of normalizing, peak and RMS. Most basic audio software that I know of uses the peak type. You need the RMS type. Peak normalization simply turns up the volume until the peaks of the song are at or just below maximum. Some tracks are "peakier" than others and will sound quieter when peak normalized.
RMS normalizing will better even out the volume as you hear it. A good RMS normalization process should have a relatively transparent peak limiter. You also have to be able to measure the RMS level somehow so you know how much to change it. Sony Sound Forge can measure peak and RMS levels and it has a dynamics processor called Wave Hammer which can boost the level as needed, automatically knocking down peaks. Other audio editors have similar functions, for example Cool Edit's analysis tools and Hard Limit.
That process does further compress the backing tracks so some compression on vocals could really help. Try to find a way to compress them in the mains but not in the monitors. Splitting the vocals to two channels each is one way. Really good mic technique may reduce or eliminate the need for vocal compression.
http://home.earthlink.net/~patrickgtracy
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| Re: Vocal Balancing [message #320962 is a reply to message #320358 ] |
Thu, 08 May 2008 15:54 |
SteveKirby
Messages: 1325
Registered: October 2007
Location: Santa Cruz |
Has No Life |
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A couple of ideas.
You can run your backing tracks though a mastering program. With this you can not only normalize the levels, but to an extent you can get them to sound more similar. I happen to love Izotrope Ozone. It has a four band compressor that lets you vary the dynamics separately in different frequency ranges. Playing around with this a bit, you'll find that you can leave the upper overtones less processed and keep the "life" to the sound, and compress things in the middle a bit to make them even while compressing the bottom a bit more. You can get a very tight and even bottom end without the rest of the music pumping in and out. As much as exciters get lambasted here for live sound use, I find the multi band exciter in Ozone very handy for fattening up the bottom or adding a bit of sparkle to the top without mucking up most of the sound when mastering recordings. You may want to look into some recording forums for more hints on mastering.
I'm not sure what you're running in your monitors but it's kind of hard to have your singing coming out of the wedges and the music only coming out of the mains. Or, if you try to put a lot of the music into the wedges, it's difficult to discriminate your voice in all the mush.
Your current system won't support it, but you may want to investigate having the backing playing though a separate system on stage with you. Even just a keyboard amp or powered PA speaker split off the laptop will make it sound more realistic and band like. Especially if you're trying to play live instruments along with the backings. Note that on large stages, it's not uncommon for there to be multiple sets of monitors in front of the lead singer. Some with the instruments in them, and some with just their vocals.
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Re: Vocal Balancing