Jake Weston

For anybody who is an avid music producer, they already understand how inherently important it is for a track to be effectively mastered when finished. Although previously a more difficult and subtle skill to learn, new technologies have made it easier for rookies to learn how to master music. The various tips below or curated from some of the top music producers in the game today in teaching newcomers how best they can master their music when they're done.

Key Takeaways:

• Mastering engineer, Mandy Parnell, recommends a review of the entire album before beginning the process of mastering.
• Mastering engineer, Jeremy Schmitt, believes a good portion of the mastering engineer's job is about fixing distorted frequencies at both ends of the spectrum.
• Other pro tips include, getting the best monitors you can and not making loudness the main recording goal.

“A mastering engineer for several decades, Mandy has mastered records for artists such as Björk, Aphex Twin and The xx from her Black Saloon Studios.”

Read more: http://www.musictech.net/2018/02/mastering-tips-pros-readers/

The loudness meter is a fairly standard piece of technology that every artist or studio operator knows and understands. However, what has not been so simple to understand has been the variety of different and, in some cases, proprietary metrics that are used to display the outputs of the meters. Fortunately, with a little bit of interpretation, most of them can be traced back to terms that we understand – like traditional RMS metrics of loudness.

Key Takeaways:

• A loudness meter is a key piece of equipment for anyone who is serious about performance or recording.
• However, there's a lot of complexity out there with respect to how today's meters display and quantify actual loudness.
• Fortunately, with a few simple tricks, one can convert the various outputs back to something more understandable, to give an intuitive feel.

“There’s a pretty simple relationship between the new LUFS measurements and the loudness measurements we’re used to, like the TT Dynamic Range Meter’s DR value, or good old RMS average levels.”

Read more: http://productionadvice.co.uk/lufs-dbfs-rms/

Having trouble remembering that specific chord you wanted? Or, maybe you just wish you had a more extensive chord collection at your fingertips. Well. Plug-in Boutique has it for you, and more.
PB's new chord assist and MIDI effect plug-in is called simply and logically, Scaler, and it features a truckload of chords, coming at you from all kinds of musicians, and all kinds of music.
If you want to have fun with this tool and use it to create fresh chord variations, there is a chord detection feature that you can use to drag and drop your MIDI data. You also have the option of routing Scaler to your preferred instrument by making use of Ableton Live. Or, you can treat it as a MIDI plug-in and put it right into the Instrument channel, in Logic.

Key Takeaways:

• The Plugin Boutique has created and released chord helper and MIDI effect plugin, called Scaler.
• Scaler offers a large repository of chords, taken from a variety of musical,genres and artists.
• Scaler can be routed directly to a specific instrument, or used instead as a MIDI plugin, and as such placed right into your instrument channel.

“In practice, the workflow of the effect takes a while to get used to, and we would have liked to see more use of colour to help differentiate chord relationships, but at this price, Scaler is a bargain way to quickly expand your chord library and also work on your knowledge at the same time.”

Read more: http://www.musictech.net/2018/02/plugin-boutique-scaler-review/

Brian Warwick is a vocal engineer pat exellence, with Grammies up the wazoo. In an interview with Jon Simmons, of iZotope, Warwick noted that though technically a mix engineer, his roots are really all about vocal recording.
He humbly noted that listeners of vocal recordings are generally most interested in the singer. So while attention to, say, a percussion loop is useful to the finished product, more time should by default go to the singer's part of the recording. He also noted the importance of spontaneity to an engineer's work in that a lot of the time recording artists will try out something brand new and totally on the fly in a recording session.

Key Takeaways:

• In his interview with izotope, Warwick expressed the opinion that the vocals were the most important part of a recording project.
• The ability to be spontaneous can be important to a recording engineer, as vocalists will come up with variations heretofore untried that they want to try furingvthe session.
• An early mentor of Warsaw was Mitch Benoff, who still teaches at Berklee School of Music.

“Warwick has had a hand in eight GRAMMY-winning albums, 12 GRAMMY-nominated albums, and 14 RIAA-certified platinum and gold records.”

Read more: https://www.izotope.com/en/community/blog/artist-stories/2018/02/recording-vocals-tips-from-grammy-winning-engineer-brian-warwick.html

Eve Audio is a great way to set up something for a larger party. You really may want to rock out with somes like Sleep In A Fire or listen to a slow jam from Michael Martin Murphy as you want to hear more from Wildfire.
The idea of adjusting the volume on this type of sound system is going to become quite easy. It just as easy as changing the volume on Alexa, or some of the other great gadgets out there.

Key Takeaways:

• The Eve Audio SC203 are high-quality, competitive monitors sure to please even the most discerning audiophiles.
• These small speakers pack a big punch – providing high-quality sound throughout the entire audio spectrum.
• If you don't prefer going with Eve Audio, there are also a host of comparable products from other big brands.

“Eve’s diminutive SC203 has been designed to offer superior sound in locations where space is limited.”

Read more: http://www.musictech.net/2018/02/eve-audio-sc203-review/