so you're thinking about starting music but how does one Here are some quickfire tips to help you first things first Audacity is not your friend it's kind of trash for recording vocals and here's why maybe you're wondering how some people can get their vocals to sound just so nice and maybe you think it's all in the mix but actually it starts with you the first thing you have to know is that I don't just sit there and do one take start to finish i do hundreds but maybe not the way you think i Frankenstein my takes together here's an example of what a finished vocal looks like so here's a commission I recently worked on for a client as you can see right here there are many little sections i'll zoom in on one so you can see it better and then you can see I've crossfaded it so every little section you see is a separate vocal recording a separate take and I glued them together to get the best effect i'll let you hear what it sounds like just by itself slow down baby and now with the music slow down baby come on take a beat count 1 2 3 so what I've done here is I've sang small sections sometimes just one word or less and selected the best takes or rather the ones I liked best and put them together to create a hole and this is just something you can't do on Audacity what I recommend you use instead is something called Cakewalk it's easy and it's totally free in the comments I'll put a little guide on how to download it and how to use it i feel like I should mention something real quick i said earlier that it's not all in the mix but for some things it certainly does help a mix polishes the sound and the better the original sound the better the mix makes it it's not magic but it can elevate most songs you hear today are electronic made with electronic instruments that means that the instruments are perfect unless otherwise programmed and hit notes perfectly us as humans or human adjacent are not perfect and that's why we need pitching to match the perfect instruments if you need pitching that does not make you a bad singer that just makes you just like the rest of us so please do not let pitching discourage you in this song I'm using a plugin called Waves Realtime Tuner and as of this recording it's only $35 so I can definitely recommend that you get it here you can see what the plug-in looks like here I fill in the key i change the dials and that's it that's all you do this is what it sounds like when it's on [Music] and this is what it sounds like when I turn it off and just know that you'll be all [Music] right oh my god i'm sorry you had to witness that but I want to illustrate to you that I'm certainly nowhere near perfect if you're using Waves Realtime Tuner and your voice sounds still robotic after adjusting the dials maybe consider re-recording at the end of the day a better recording a better result have you ever been recording away and then when you stop to listen back to what you've done it sounds nothing like what you thought how well did you by chance record your take while listening to the original vocal line that's maybe why your brain does this funny thing and starts to blend the two together confusing your voices my advice is to learn the song first and then record with the instrumental only not only do you then allow yourself the space to put your own spin on it but you'll also be more accurate with the notes still feeling like it's not quite there keep one ear out of your earphones you should hear yourself clearly when recording to monitor what you truly sound like you've probably seen singers put their finger in their ear during a live performance this is the monitor themselves i want that for you too are you struggling with harmonies i know I did when I first started my biggest tip is to turn your main line off and start by practicing notes higher and lower than the original main line experiment with just one note and go from there once you feel comfortable turn the main line back on and sing the harmonies in time once it clicks it really does are you not confident in what some of the terminology means here's maybe an idea so we're back into my project and here you can see all the names that I've given to my layers you can see there's quite a lot of layers don't be scared i promise it's okay let's start with the chorus so I can give you a better idea so some of the terminology you might want to know overdubs adlibs and harmonies what's an overdub as you can see here I have an overdub left and I have an overdub right i won't bore you with the specifics but it's best to record your overdubs twice sometimes even three sometimes even more it depends on the effect that you want essentially what an overdub does is sing the main line exactly the same but when we then take those main lines and we move it in the stereo field right and left you get this beautiful full sound to kind of illustrate what I mean let me turn everything off but the main line [Music] sounds cute but it could sound better do you want to know how let's turn on the overdubs [Music] because did you hear the difference it's okay if you didn't but it gives this nice full quality now what's an adlib it's another melody a whole separate one i will now turn the adlib on so you can hear what I mean [Music] so the adlib does another melody but it adds to the whole picture so what about harmonies what are those harmonies are notes that sit in the specific chord or key that you're working in and will be higher or lower than your main line i have them all separated so I can show you specifically here's my lower harmony and just like the overdubs I recorded them twice to get a nice full effect this is what they sound like by themselves see I'm doing that simple technique here where I'm singing just one note bathe in my moonlight just one note is enough to really give depth let's hear it with the harmonies on let's go to a part where I also have high harmonies i did one here in the bridge or the pre chorus if you will [Music] and let's listen to that together it's like a little bit of spice and then here at the end everything together [Music] the last thing I want to mention in this guide is your recording environment because your surroundings matter one of the most difficult things to get rid of in a mix is room reverb at least for me in simple terms it's the echo caused by your voice when you're singing it bounces around the room and gets picked back up by your microphone now how do we fix that fill your room with lots of soft furnishings softer surfaces absorb the sounds it's especially important for the space behind your microphone essentially the space where you're directing your voice if your room's too big your ceilings are too high you can always consider the blanket technique wrapping you and your mic under a blanket to sing i really do hope that you feel like you've learned something but if you still have questions do feel free to fire away and I'll try my best to help you okay it's not as scary as you think so give it a go okay bye for now i'll do a mixing guide next time okay all right