Hey, YoungProdigy here. I'm pretty confident in my ability to actually write music. But when it comes to mixing; there's still more room for improvement with my music. I've read a few articles on mixing; but they pretty much just say "Listen to other songs".

None of them really seem to cover how high or how low instruments should be.

Are there any really good tutorials on mixing? Particularly when it comes to orchestral music?

None of them really seem to cover how high or how low instruments should be.

You won't really find anything specific for instrument volume levels as that will be dependent on the track and the instruments you want to highlight. Mixing is really about finding a balance between the various instruments in your track and making sure they work together and not against each other. Because of that you won't find hard set rules about how to EQ a cello or how to compress a bass; those settings will be entirely dependent on how they need to sound in that track. You can find articles on how to use tools like EQs and Compressors functionally, but actually applying them to a track and making them work artistically just takes time and practice.

None of them really seem to cover how high or how low instruments should be.

You won't really find anything specific for instrument volume levels as that will be dependent on the track and the instruments you want to highlight. Mixing is really about finding a balance between the various instruments in your track and making sure they work together and not against each other. Because of that you won't find hard set rules about how to EQ a cello or how to compress a bass; those settings will be entirely dependent on how they need to sound in that track. You can find articles on how to use tools like EQs and Compressors functionally, but actually applying them to a track and making them work artistically just takes time and practice.

Yeah, I guess for instrument balance I could just listen to other songs. The main thing is though; is that I'll read everything in those articles, but when I try to mix it still sounds crappy. I guess I'm just looking for an article that will tell me how to get that perfect mix. A mix where no instrument is too loud or too soft; but everything is perfect.

Mixing isn't about setting all the dials and leaving them where they are for that perfect mix, things move, you need to control things a little and move them around so they get focus or defocused in the mix. The final mix may sound more static than that, but that is the art - to produce something that is glued together well.

The excercises we were given in audio engineering were how to not only disect pieces of music but also training our ears to identify frequencies. You can think of these excercises as practicing your scales and techniques so when you play your instrument, your fingers go to the right places at the right pressures to create the piece of music. So to must you train your ears and mind to understand and hear things - once you really start analyzing things you will not only learn from other people's mixes, but also identify areas in your own mixes where you can improve.

A good way to learn how to mix is to study a similar track to one you are trying to create - break it down into a square as a cross section of a cube from the top down. Closest face to you is front of the mix, left, right.

From this, analyze your reference track and figure out

1. Positioning of instrument in stereo field. (L/R)

2. Tone of the individual instrument (color) - bright, dull, thin, thick.

3. Loudness of each instrument.

4. Depth of the instrument (wet/dry reverb)

5. Draw directional arrows when things move around in the mix.

You can then take this visual diagram and start to apply it to the similar piece of music you are trying to mix.

Practice using a 24band EQ on your favorite piece of music. Listen to those - boost them by 3 or 6db - Have someone else do this or automate in your DAW and see if you can hear those frequencies correctly. Training your ears to hear frequencies really helps with mixing and pinpointing issues and analyzing other pieces of music.

There's a great book out there called Mixing With Your Mind which has some fantastic easy to understand analogies and techniques for mixing.

Most of the tools - compression, eq, reverb to shape your instruments into the mix will just be a lot of practice. Took me many many years to fully understand how various compressors worked and how to use those to shape things like snares, kicks, hats..etc. I'm still learning, and you always keep learning - mixing is definitely one of those life long things and as you practice you will learn how to mix better over time. I have been mixing now for over 10 years and still learning, practicing!

Hello YoungProdigy,

Mixing aside, if the instruments in your songs aren't balanced, and you're not sure how low or high they should sound; you really wanna brush up on your orchestration. No amount of mixing is gonna make a badly orchestrated song sound great. The art of orchestration is all about finding the right balance for your instruments, and choosing what instruments in what register play what parts.

Possibly the best work on orchestration is Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov's Principles of Orchestration, which is in the public domain. You can find a great version with modern annotations and examples here: http://www.northernsounds.com/forum/forumdisplay.php/77-Principles-of-Orchestration-On-line.

Cheers,

Chris

Here are some more resources:

- http://music.tutsplus.com/categories/mixing-mastering

- http://www.scorbit.org/category/mixing-2/

- http://www.greatnorthernaudio.com/sfx_outline.html (On sound effects rather than music, but the theory is relevant.)