Recording, Mixing And Online Mastering, The Audio Production Processes Explained.

The first process in the music production procedure would be recording. This is when the band will arrive at the studio well rehearsed and ready to perform their songs. The recording engineer will set the recording equipment up ready so the band is captured playing their music. The engineer will use microphones and a recording console which will have the capability of controlling the recorded sounds. The mixing console will have equalizers that can shape the sound of the music nicely and ensure that it sounds clear and present. Then the engineer will set up the recorders which are often computer systems these days. He will check the levels of the recording have been optimized and then press record and cue the band to play their music. Once the recording has been made the band may wish to do some overdubs. This means layering further instruments on the music already recorded, or correcting parts that did not go well. (i.e. mistakes were made)

After recording, a mix day or week will be set where the music is mixed and balanced. Again a mixing console is often used and these can have manay audio channels on them. They look very complex to operate but once you know how to use one channel it is much easier to use the others as they are quite similar. The alternative is using software called a digital audio workstation. The sound engineer will play the music back and move the faders on the mixer to create a pleasing blend of sounds under guidance of the produce and the band themselves. Once the mixes have been tweaked to sound great they will be recorded back into a computer and the stereo files are created ready for mastering.

Mastering is the final stage of the audio production process where the mastering engineer will adjust the sounds of the mixes slightly so they will translate well across many playback systems.The music will need to sound good on widely disparate reproduction equipment such as radios, MP3 players and club P.A. systems. It is essential that the mastering studio has the highest quality equipment for making these final decisions. That will include the finest reference loudspeakers, the best anlogue equipment and the best digital equipment as well. Then the engineer will balance the perceived volumes of the tracks and commit them to a premaster disk or file format. Online mastering has meant that this critical final process is much lower in costs than ever before. The files are sent to the online studio over the internet. They are processed by the mastering engineer and then preview files are sent back. Once approved and paid for, the full masters are released to the musicians or record label.