How Do You Mix Harmonies?

[brandondrury]

Alright, I've got a solid handle on this whole recording thing these days, but I have no clue to how to handle the mixing of harmonies. I've gotten good sounds at one time or another for just about every instrument, but I can't say that I've ever gotten vocals blending with harmonies to ever sound remotely pleasing.

I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. Any general tips?

Brandon

[eboria]

I do all my own vocals, so it may be a little easier for me, but there are hundreds of little tricks I use. Generally though, I roll off some of the low end on the background vocals to help the lead stand out more. Also, I sometimes double the vocals for a chorusy, James Taylor kind of effect. In certain situations I've even placed the mic across the room and recorded the same vocals a few times to simulate a crowd in a big room. Of course, panning is important to add space and definition. When mixing harmonies, I've often found that although you ideally want every voice to be heard distinctly, sometimes one or two voices get pulled back just a touch so you get a hint of that voice, like harmonics on a guitar. In fact, think of harmonies as guitar chords. There is a root note that you want to stand out, and the others are there to build the chord.

Of course, it all depends on the style you're shooting for. If you're doing strait up Crosby, Stills, & Nash three-part harmonies, you want each voice spaced equally (10 O'clock, 12 O'clock, 2 O'clock), with justy enough compression on each voice so that they're all even (although sometimes it's cool to let one of the voices overshadow the others for a word or two).
Also, I usually bus the backing vocals to one stereo output and apply EQ to them all at once instead of individually, then add a touch more compression to the vocal mix so that they don't over-power the lead.

Hope that helps

[brandondrury]

Thanks. I was hoping for some new, revolutionary trick that I had never though of before. (Those are getting more and more rare as time goes on, unfortunately).

Brandon

[thowmas]

If i'm going for that big wide rock harmony sound, i'll most definitley roll off below 150, and maybe cut 10db or more on anything upto around 250, so i end up with a really thin sounding vocal track. rolling off above 10k can really help to put them more in the background; our ears think things are further away when there is less top end, so this can come in really handy when you want to place things a bit more distantly in a mix. may also cut around 500-1k if it calls for it, to make space for guitars and other stuff.

i'll also really compress them, and pan pretty wide if theyre doubled up.

i like to use a stereo widener on them too and perhaps a TINY bit of chorus - gives them a smooth and big/wide sounding set of harmonies. also add a couple db more reverb than on the main vocals.

you should end up with a pretty fat, wide sounding set of vocal harmonies

check out my studio page (link below) where theres an exact example of this on 1 of the tracks up there... listen to Dry Rise - 'Extraordinary Day' (it's my band...) and theres nice wide vocal harmonies on the chorus and bridge. i remember i had about 8 plugins running through the vocal harmony tracks but the things i mentioned above were definitley used. if you want, i can go have a look at the logic project and tell you exactly what i had running through them

check that track out here:
MySpace.com - Dalton Studios - B’ton/E’bourne/Bexhill/Hastings, UK - Alternative / Rock / Metal - www.myspace.com/daltonstudios

[lolzgreg]

Originally Posted by thowmas

check out my studio page (link below) where theres an exact example of this on 1 of the tracks up there... listen to Dry Rise - 'Extraordinary Day' (it's my band...)

Dude your band is really good, but your drummer can't keep time for the life of him and it takes away from the music a lot! No personal offense to your drummer, but its really true. The tempo varies a lot on the drums throughout the verses, especially. You have quite an ear and hand at recording/production and it's time to find a drummer that can play in time!

-Greg

And the harmonies sound good!

[thowmas]

Originally Posted by lolgreg

Dude your band is really good, but your drummer can't keep time for the life of him and it takes away from the music a lot! No personal offense to your drummer, but its really true. The tempo varies a lot on the drums throughout the verses, especially. You have quite an ear and hand at recording/production and it's time to find a drummer that can play in time!

-Greg

And the harmonies sound good!

Hey man haha thanks, glad you like my production work..
But that's really funny, because, I am the drummer and the drums are perfectly in time HAHAA! I presume you are listening to the wrong track on there? It's only the first track that is my band, the others are other bands i have recorded....which DO have out of time drumming on them!
But i can 100% assure you the drums on my bands track are in time, they were recorded bang on to a click and were fully edited on the grid in Logic so every hit is bang on. So I am a bit confused as to why the drums sound out of time?

Good times!

tom

[lolzgreg]

Originally Posted by thowmas

Hey man haha thanks, glad you like my production work..
But that's really funny, because, I am the drummer and the drums are perfectly in time HAHAA! I presume you are listening to the wrong track on there? It's only the first track that is my band, the others are other bands i have recorded....which DO have out of time drumming on them!
But i can 100% assure you the drums on my bands track are in time, they were recorded bang on to a click and were fully edited on the grid in Logic so every hit is bang on. So I am a bit confused as to why the drums sound out of time?

Good times!

tom

Then is it the rest of your band playing out of time with you?

There's definitely a timing issue in this song that distracted me. It seems like all the non drum instruments are playing in time with one another, and that the drums are doing their own thing. Its possible that everyone else was rushing/slowing down but theres definitely SOMETHING. Timing is my biggest pet peeve, so I know I'm catching something. It isnt throughout the whole song, just parts.

-Greg

[thowmas]

Originally Posted by lolgreg

Then is it the rest of your band playing out of time with you?

There's definitely a timing issue in this song that distracted me. It seems like all the non drum instruments are playing in time with one another, and that the drums are doing their own thing. Its possible that everyone else was rushing/slowing down but theres definitely SOMETHING. Timing is my biggest pet peeve, so I know I'm catching something. It isnt throughout the whole song, just parts.

-Greg

Thats really weird. Maybe when I was editing the drums, i screwed up the position of a kick or snare when i was sliding it, as it was the first time id tried doing this on a recording. but thats the only thing i can really think of. I probably wouldnt notice if it was because ive listened to the track so many times whilst mixing that its hard to make critical judgements like that. But im glad you've pointed that out, i will check through all the different instruments and see if i can find the problem!

[lolzgreg]

You know I wouldn't be yanking at your ear for no reason, especially cause what I'm outlining takes away from a work that I think is very good quality wise.

-Greg

p.s. Rely on your ears and not mathematics! You really seem to know what you're doing (or at least your mixes say that )

[thowmas]

Originally Posted by lolgreg

You know I wouldn't be yanking at your ear for no reason, especially cause what I'm outlining takes away from a work that I think is very good quality wise.

-Greg

p.s. Rely on your ears and not mathematics! You really seem to know what you're doing (or at least your mixes say that )

Turns out there were a few kicks out of place in the verse....
From where i'd been sliding and chopping up every drum hit, i slid a couple to the wrong place. I am VERY glad you pointed it out, because if you did, im sure others will aswell. It's just when you spend a lot of time mixing a track, i guess it becomes hard to notice things like that...you get used to hearing how it sounds, be it in or slightly out of time. And just for the record, it was a mistake in my mixing, not my drumming....d'oh! Maybe i wont edit the drums next time!

But yeah, nice one for that!
tom
MySpace.com - Dalton Studios - B’ton/E’bourne/Bexhill/Hastings, UK - Alternative / Rock / Metal - www.myspace.com/daltonstudios