Why Mixing and Mastering are important for your Music

If you like music production you’ve probably already known about mixing and mastering and their role in music production. Even the best song would be impossible to listen to if it’s not mixed and mastered in order to meet modern industry quality standards. Mixing and mastering are very complex processes that require specially trained people called audio engineers. They tweak your song to make it sound cohesive, consistent and convey the message behind the music. It is needed to polish your song and make it sound as good as it can.

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Multi-track recording transformed the recording process. Before that, all the players had to be recorded all together and that complicated the process of recording as they had to be perfect every single time. With the introduction of multi-track recording guitarists, vocalists, drummers, could be recorded separately and their parts were combined after the recording process.

But it’s not that simple, all the tracks are recorded in different settings, each instrument has a different tone, some of the players might lag behind the rhythm. This is why we need a mixing engineer. His task is to blend all the tracks and make them sound like one piece. Obviously, the process is more complex and includes other elements such as panning, EQ, using filters e.t.c. The subject is so broad that it deserves a lot of attention. Therefore it is recommended to always seek professional help while mixing a song. Professional studios such as EKmixmaster.com can help you achieve this polished sound which is considered to be an industry quality standard. But if you want to try it yourself  here’s what you should try:

Give your channels  proper names

This one might not be so obvious but try to avoid numbering your tracks (track number 1,2 e.t.c) and give them descriptive names instead. After a couple of months, if you come back to the song,  you won’t even remember what “Track number 4” stands for. So try to name your tracks according to their substance, for example, “Lead Vocal”, “Right Lead Vocal”, “Left Lead vocal”.

Use templates for mixing and mastering

If you are new to mixing try using templates. Most of the DAWs nowadays offer convenient templates for mixing that will help you get started. Remember to assign different colors to your tracks according to the type of instrument. For example make guitars red, synths blue e.t.c).

Choose your DAW

Nowadays the market is flooded with DAWs. And choosing the one that is comfortable for you is a very important step on your journey. Pick one and study all the ins and outs of the software. As the years pass you will find the most efficient ways to get the desired result.

Mastering

After your song is recorded and mixed it needs to be mastered because mix simply merges all the tracks into one cohesive composition. Now it’s up to the mastering engineer to put some finishing touches and polish your song – and it’s ready for promotion. Mastering is all about the listening experience. The main goal of this process is to make the song sound good on any device and in any setting. A properly mixed song may sound great through your computer speakers. But once you listen to it through a professional stereo system you will be surprised with the poor quality of the sound. That’s why we need mastering to make the song sound polished, clean, and professional. It’s still better to contact a professional. Without proper mixing and mastering your music may sound dull, shallow, and simply unprofessional. If you are ready to take your track to another level please contact us