What are True Peaks? Introduction You’re probably already familiar with peak meters. They’re built into every DAW, and they help you see when your mix is clipping. “Clipping” happens when your mix is too loud—the music’s volume gets pushed past its limit, and the loudest parts are chopped ...

How To Mix Piano Introduction Mixing the piano correctly can be a challenging task. Achieving a great piano tone is crucial for your music, especially if the piano is the main instrument. Whether you’re working with a real piano or a virtual one, the mixing process is almost the same. A ...

Tips For Mastering Hip Hop Introduction Hip-hop is a unique genre. Not only does it include a wide range of sub-genres, making it both advanced and diverse, but it also features elements rarely found in other types of music. These elements—like the focus on spoken word that has evolved ...

What Is a Vocoder? Introduction The vocoder began as a way to compress the human voice for transmission through undersea cables. It has a long and fascinating history, including use during World War Two as a tool for cryptography, before it went on to give Kraftwerk and Afrika Bambaataa ...

Mid/Side Mixing Introduction Today, music mixing is louder, wider, and clearer than ever before. Advances in music production software have greatly improved the overall quality of music. These improvements have led to new techniques that take full advantage of powerful, modern software. One ...

What Is Audio Limiter Introduction The simplest way to explain a limiter is that it’s a device that stops any audio—whether it’s digital or an electrical signal—from going above a certain volume. While it can work at any volume level, it’s mainly used at the highest allowed amplitude to ...

How to Make LoFi Music Introduction As digital technology keeps advancing and gives us endless possibilities in music, there’s one thing that never changes: the reaction. Musicians and producers often push back against the high-tech world—give us high-quality WAV files, and we crave vinyl; ...

What is Signal Flow Introduction Understanding where the audio signal is right now, and where it’s headed next, is a key part of working on a large-format mixing console. All those knobs and buttons become much less intimidating when you know what’s generating the signal, what it’s ...

Mixing in Mono Introduction Have you ever finished mixing and mastering your track, felt great about the final result, only to play it on your phone and suddenly it sounds off or just plain bad? This is a common problem for music producers, and luckily, there’s a simple and often-overlooked ...

Flanger vs Phaser vs Chorus Introduction The time we live in right now is fantastic for guitar players. Not too long ago, most guitarists only had a few overdrive pedals, maybe a distortion or two, and a reverb. Today, things are very different. While there are many unique-sounding audio ...

What is a Mix Bus? Introduction A mix bus is a way to send or “route” several audio tracks to a specific destination. Some common places to route audio include aux sends, subgroups, and your main left/right (L/R) mix. You can route your chosen channels or audio to the bus you want (Aux Send, ...

Delay Mixing Tips! Introduction Using delays in your mix is a great way to add depth and width to a track—when used thoughtfully and in the right circumstances. Below, we’ll share some of our top tips and tricks for using delays while mixing your tracks, but remember, these techniques can be ...