Snoman R. Dance Music Manual: Tools, Toys, and Techniques

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If you decide to use a condenser microphone rather than electromagnetic, an

electrical charge is required to provide the capacitance between the diaphragm

and back plate. This can be provided by batteries, phantom power or it may

even already have a charge retained in the diaphragm or back plate from the

manufacturer. In most instances, though, this charge is ⫹48 V D.C. phantom

power which is received through the microphone cable itself. The term phantom

power is used since you can’t ‘physically ’ see where it receives its power from

and is commonly supplied from a mixing desk or a microphone pre-ampliﬁ er.

Whichever microphone you choose the signal produced is incredibly small

(⫺ 60 dBu), so it needs to be ampliﬁ ed to an appropriate volume for record-

ing using a pre-amp. These are relatively simple in design and will perform just

two functions: supply the microphone with power, if required, and amplify the

incoming signal. Unsurprisingly, there is a huge range of pre-amps to choose

from and can range in price from £100 to £6000 and above, depending on the

design and parameters they have on offer.

If at all possible, though, you should aim for a pre-amp that uses valves in its design

as these add warmth to the signal that’s archetypal of all genres of dance, but if this

isn’t feasible (due to the higher price tag) then you can record using a solid-state

design and feed the results into a valve compressor or valve emulation plug-in.

In an ideal situation you should use a microphone pre-amp rather than a mix-

ing desk because the circuitry in a pre-amp is speciﬁ cally manufactured for the

purpose rather than an ‘added extra ’ as it is in most mixing desks (which as

a consequence are prone to a much higher noise ﬂ oor).

RECORDING PREPARATION

While it is important to have a good microphone and pre-amp combination

the most common problem doesn’t actually come from the equipment used

but from a poor vocal technique. Indeed, as long as the equipment isn’t truly

‘ bargain basement ’ and the microphone is placed thoughtfully, it’s perfectly

possible to attain respectable results. The only real secret to capturing a great

performance is to ensure that you have nothing but a great performance going

into the microphone. If you settle for anything less at this stage, no amount of

effects or editing you apply later are going to make it sound any better.

With this in mind perhaps the most obvious start is to ensure that the vocal-

ist has attended at least six to eight singing lessons. Anyone can sing, but not

everyone can sing well! While very few vocalists will admit that they need any

form of voice training – their gift is natural of course – every professional vocal-

ist on the circuit has attended lessons with a voice trainer or a singing teacher,

or both. Which lessons they should attend will depend on the vocalist, but

if they have trouble singing in the correct key, breathing properly or holding

notes, then they should see a voice trainer. If, however, they can sing fairly well

then they may beneﬁ t from attending lessons with a singing teacher as they’ll

teach them how to perform a song with depth, emotion and feeling.

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It’s doubtful that you’ll be able to ﬁ nd a teacher who specializes in house or

rap or any other dance-related genres (in fact, you may have difﬁ culty ﬁ nding

one who has actually ever heard of them) as most will specialize in classical

performances or musicals, but the genre is unimportant. Simply attending sing-

ing lessons will help the vocalist learn the techniques every professional vocal-

ist will use and this can then be applied to any form of music.

Provided that the vocalist is capable of delivering a good performance (which

is much more difﬁ cult than it sounds), the location can also have a signiﬁ cant

effect on the quality of the end result. No one is going to perform well in a clini-

cal environment with bright ﬂ uorescent lighting. Apart from the fact that ﬂ uo-

rescent lighting is prone to introducing hum into a recording, it’s difﬁ cult for a

performer to concentrate in such a ‘scientiﬁ c ’ environment. Ask yourself if you

could perform your best sitting in a dentist’s chair. Instead, vocalists produce a

much more energetic and passionate performance if the room has a welcoming

feel, and this means using bulbs that give off a warm glow.

The temperature of the room is also important and ideally you should look

towards maintaining a temperature of around 22 °C (approximately 72 °F). Any

colder and the performer’s vocal chords may tense up.

If the environment is suitable, the next consideration is the foldback mix.

Essentially, this is the complete mix plus the vocalist’s microphone signal

returned to a pair of headphones for the performer to perform along to. It is

vital that this foldback mix is complete and not simply a ‘rough draft ’, though,

since if you play an unﬁ nished or badly mixed track back for them to perform

to, they may ﬁ nd it difﬁ cult to determine the pitch, the vocal tone they should

use or to move closer/further away from the microphone so that they can bal-

ance their voice with the current mix. If, on the other hand, the track has been

well mixed and engineered, the performer will not only ﬁ nd it much easier to

pitch but will also want to make an extra effort to match the quality of what’s

already down.

Usually, the foldback mix is fed from tape, minidisk, DAT or CD to head-

phones with the computer or dedicated hard disk recording the resulting

vocals, but whatever the conﬁ guration, the balance between the instruments

and the performer’s voice is critical. More often than not, a mix that is either

too loud or quiet in respect to the microphone’s output is responsible for poor

timing, dynamics and intonation, so you should spend plenty of time ensuring

that both mix and vocals are at the appropriate volume.

The headphones used to play the foldback mix should offer plenty of isola-

tion to prevent any spill encroaching onto the vocal recording. Consequently,

open headphones are not suitable as they leak sound, but equally closed head-

phones aren’t suitable either. Even though these will not leak any sound, the

closed design surrounds the ears and creates a rise in bass frequencies. Because

of this, headphones with a semi-open design are the best, but you should also

ensure that they are tight enough on the head so that they don’t fall off!

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Some professional vocalists will not want to listen to the full mix and instead

prefer to listen to just the drum track with a single-pitched instrument sitting

on top as this can help them to keep better timing and intonation. Always take

the effort to check exactly what the vocalists want and no matter how difﬁ cult

some of their requests or suggestions may be, try to comply. If they are happy,

they’re more likely to produce a great performance, but if the vocalists don’t

ask for reverb on the foldback vocals, apply it anyway.

Reverb can play a key role in helping a singer to pitch correctly plus it also invari-

ably makes them sound much better, which in turn, helps them to feel better

about their own voice. This only needs to be lightly applied and, typically, a

square room setting with a short tail of 5 ms is usually enough. Alongside this

reverb, some engineers also choose to compress the vocal track for the perform-

er’s foldback, although whether this is a good idea or not is under constant

debate. From a personal point of view, I ﬁ nd that an uncompressed foldback mix

tends to persuade the vocalists to control their own dynamics which invariably

sounds much more natural than having a compressor do it.

RECORDING TECHNIQUES

Typically, for most genres of dance, with the possible exception of rap, the

preferred choice of microphone is a condenser with a large diaphragm, such

as the AKG C3000. This is generally accepted as giving the best overall warm

response that’s characteristic of most genres but any large diaphragm will suf-

ﬁ ce provided that the frequency response is not too ﬂ at. Note that some large

diaphragm models will deliberately employ peaks in the mid-range to make

vocals appear clearer but this can sometimes accentuate sibilance with some

female vocalists. Sibilance is the result of over emphasized ‘S’ sounds which

can create unwanted hissing in the vocal track.

Additionally, some mics may also roll off any frequencies below 170 Hz to pre-

vent the microphone from picking up any rumble that may work its way up

the stand, but rolling off this high can sometimes result in the vocals appearing

too weak or ‘thin’ which can be difﬁ cult to widen later. It’s therefore preferable

to use a microphone that doesn’t roll off above 120 –150 Hz and to use it in

conjunction with a quality pre-amp. Usually these microphones employ a ﬁ lter

in the signal path allowing you to manually deﬁ ne the frequency to roll-off.

The positioning of the microphone depends entirely on the style of perfor-

mance and the performer but generally it should be positioned away from any

walls, but not in the centre of a room. Any condenser microphone picks up

both the direct sound from the vocalist and the sound from the surrounding

ambience of the room. Thus, if the microphone is positioned in the centre of

the room or too close to a wall, the reﬂ ections can create phase cancellations

making the vocals appear thin, phased or too heavy. It should also be mounted

on a ﬁ xed stand and situated so that the bottom of the housing is in level with

the performer’s nose (with their back straight!). This will ensure a good posture

while also helping to avoid heavy plosive popping or breath noises.

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Plosive popping is perhaps the most common problem when recording vocals

and is a result of the high-velocity bursts of air that are created when we say

or sing words containing the letters P, B or T. These create short, sharp bursts

of air that force the microphone’s diaphragm to its extremes of movement,

which results in a popping sound. These can be incredibly difﬁ cult to remove

at a later stage so you need to remove the possibility of them appearing during

the recording by using a ‘pop shield ’ positioned between the vocalist and mic.

These consist of a circular frame approximately 6 –8⬙ in diameter that is covered

with a ﬁ ne nylon mesh and are available as free standing units or with a short

gooseneck for attaching to the microphone stand. By placing these pop shields

approximately 5 cm (about 2 ⬙) from the microphone, any sudden blasts of air

are diffused, preventing them from reaching the diaphragm.

Although pop shields are available commercially, many artists make their own

from metal coat hangers or embroiders ’ hoops and their girlfriend’s/wive’s

nylon stockings. Provided that the frame is large enough to act as a pop shield,

the nylon can be stretched over the ring which can then be held in position

next to the microphone with some stiff wire.

If you are experiencing constant plosive problems, it is better to attend a series

of lessons with a professional singing teacher. This will not only help in learn-

ing how to reduce the emphasis on plosive sounds but also contribute to pre-

venting any sibilance. This latter effect can sometimes be removed by placing

a thin EQ cut somewhere between 5 and 7 kHz or by using a professional de-

esser. These are frequency-dependent compressors which operate at frequencies

between 2 and 16 kHz. Using these, it’s possible to boost the EQ on vocals to

make them appear brighter and the de-esser will jump in to prevent them from

becoming too harsh.

As for the distance between mouth and microphone, ideally it should be

placed approximately 20 –30 cm (8 –12⬙) away from the mouth of the vocalist.

At this distance, the voice tends to sound more natural, plus any small move-

ments on the vocalist behalf will not create any serious changes in the record-

ing level. Naturally, keeping this microphone to mouth distance can be difﬁ cult

to achieve, especially if the vocalist is used to performing in live conditions or

is a little over excited.

In these situations, vocalists tend to edge even closer to the microphone as they

continue the performance, and if they get too close, it will not only boost the

lower frequencies but also create deposits of condensation on the diaphragm,

which reduces its sensitivity. Since microphones are high-impedance devices,

using them in a cold room or having the vocalist stand too close to them can

introduce condensation onto the diaphragm. If this happens, the sensitivity of

the mic will fall sharply and crackles or pops can start to appear in the recording.

Subsequently, it’s prudent to ensure that any capacitor mics are at room tem-

perature before they’re used, and it’s also worthwhile making sure that the

room isn’t too cold. If condensation does form on the capsule, the only solu-

tion is to put them in a warm place for a few hours.

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Obviously, prevention is always better than cure, so to prevent the vocalist from

getting too close to the mic it’s sensible to position a pop shield 10 cm (approx-

imately 4 ⬙) away from the microphone. This is the preferred approach to plac-

ing the microphone above the singer’s mouth and angling the mic downwards.

While some engineers believe that this approach ensures a ‘ﬁ xed ’ distance from

the mouth to the mic while also helping the vocalist straighten their back to

improve breathing and projection; if vocalists are forced to raise their chins,

the throat becomes tense which can severely affect the performance.

If, however, the genre demands a more up-front vocal sound that’s typical of

commercial pop (and trance, house), then it’s worthwhile reducing the pop

shield to mic distance to just 2 ⬙ and have the performer almost pressing their

lips to the shield while singing. You may have to reinforce the pop shield with

this approach by stretching another stocking over it but this close positioning

will take advantage of the proximity effect. This creates an artiﬁ cial rise in the

bass frequencies which can make the vocals appear warmer, more up front and

in your face. Occasionally, this approach can also increase the chance of plo-

sives, but if this happens, turning the microphone slightly off axis from the

performer can help to prevent them from occurring.

Once the mic has been set up and positioned correctly, it’s prudent to insert a

compressor between the pre-amp and recording device. Some pre-amps have

a built-in compressor dedicated for this function, but if not, you will need to

use an additional hardware unit to control the dynamics. The human voice

has an incredibly wide range of dynamics and these will need to be put under

some control to prevent any prominent parts clipping the recording.

Notably, some professional vocalists will use their own form of compression

by backing away from the microphone on louder sections and moving closer

in quieter parts, but nevertheless, even in these circumstances it is still prudent

to use a compressor just in case. A single uncontrolled clip can easily destroy

an otherwise great performance! This must be set carefully, however, as once

recorded you cannot undo the results later, so you should set the compressor

to squash only the very loudest parts of the signal.

Ideally, the compressor should be analogue and employ valves as the second-

order harmonic distortion they introduce is typical of the vocal sound of the

genres, but if this is not possible, then you can use a solid-state compressor and

compress them after recording with a valve emulation plug-in. A good starting

point for recording compression is to set a threshold of ⫺ 12 dB with a 3:1 ratio

and a fast attack and moderately fast release. Then, once the vocalist has started

to practice, reduce the threshold so that the reduction meters are only lit on the

strongest part of the performance.

These compression settings can also be applied to rap music, but generally

speaking, this genre beneﬁ ts more from using a dynamic microphone such as

the Shure SM58, to capture the performance. Also, rather than mounting the

mic on a stand better results can occur if the vocalist holds the mic. This not

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only captures the slight nasal quality synonymous to most rap music but also

allows the rapper to move freely. Much of rap music relies on the different vocal

tones that are produced by the rapper changing their position from upright to

bowing down, in effect ‘compressing’ their abdomen to produce lower tones. If

this technique is used, though, ensure that the vocalists keep their hand clear

of the top of the microphone since obstructing this will severely change the

tonal character of the vocals. Also try to ensure that the microphone is not held

too far away from the mouth. Most dynamic microphones will roll off all fre-

quencies below 150 Hz to prevent the proximity effect, but if the vocalist has it

too far away, then this can result in a severe reduction in bass frequencies. In

general, a dynamic microphone should be approximately 10 –20 cm (approxi-

mately 4 –8⬙) away from the mouth.

This is the usual distance that most vocalists will use naturally, but if you

have a loud foldback mix with a bass cut, they’ll tend to hold it closer to their

mouths to compensate for the lack in mix presence so it’s vital that the mix

is bass accurate before adding vocals. It’s also worth noting that, due to the

design, these mics have a diminished frequency response and can be quite easy

to overload if placed too close to the mouth. This can result in light distortion

in the higher mid-frequencies, so to prevent this it may be prudent to feed the

pre-amps output into an EQ unit and then feed the results into the side chain

of the compressor at the problematic frequencies.

With the equipment set-up to record, the vocalist/rapper will, or should, need

an hour to warm up their voice to peak performance. Most professional vocal-

ists will have their own routine to warm up, and many prefer to do this in pri-

vate, so it may be necessary to arrange some private space for them. If they are

inexperienced they may insist that they do not need to warm up, and in this

instance, you should charm them into it by asking them to sing a number of

popular songs that they enjoy while you ‘set up the recording levels … ’

During this time, you should listen out for any signs that the performer has

poor intonation or is straining and if so, ask them to take a break and relax. If

they need a drink, fruit juices are better than water, tea or coffee as these can

dry the throat, but you should avoid any citrus drinks. From personal expe-

rience, two teaspoons of honey with one teaspoon of glycerine mixed with

a 100 ml of warm water provides excellent lubrication and helps to keep the

throat moist, but persuading the vocalist to drink it can be another matter alto-

gether. Alternatively, Sprite (the soft drink) seems to help, but avoid letting

them drink too much as the sugar can settle at the back of the throat. Failing

that, sucking lozenges such as Lockets with Honey before the performance can

help with the lubrication.

Once the vocalists have warmed up, their voice should be at peak performance

and they should be able to achieve depth and fullness of sound. It’s at this

point that you want them to belt out the track with as much emotion as possi-

ble, from beginning to end. As difﬁ cult as it may be, you should avoid stopping

the vocalists at any mistakes apart from the most severe intonation problems

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and ask them to continue the song despite any mistakes as you’ll be recording

more takes later.

Unequivocally, there is no music today that is completed in just one pass and

even the most professional artists will make three or four passes, so keep things

light and friendly and do not put any pressure on the performer to get the take

right in one.

It’s also worthwhile ensuring that the vocalists know the lines off hand without

having to read them off a sheet of paper. Encourage them to learn the lines and

if they forget them, ask them to have fun and improvise. The occasional ‘lah’

or ‘ooh’ can help to enhance the performance and may actually sound better

than the original line, plus if they know the words, they are likely to sound

more energetic and lively than a droll reading. More importantly, though, lyric

sheets can have an adverse effect on the recording as the vocals will reﬂ ect from

the paper, which can create a slight phase in the recording. This has often been

responsible for numerous scratched heads as the engineer tries to ﬁ gure out

why the vocals sound so strange.

In some situations the performer may insist they have lyric sheets to hand. If

this is the case, position the lyric sheets behind the microphone and slightly

off axis so that the possibility of phase problems is reduced.

Once this ﬁ rst performance has been recorded, listen back to the recording

and try to identify any problems such as very poor intonation, the inability to

hold high notes, uneasiness and tenseness, phasing effects or too much bass

presence. If the microphone has been placed correctly, there shouldn’t be any

phasing or bass problems, but if there are, then you’ll need to reconsider the

microphone’s placement. If there is too much bass presence, ask the performer

to move further away from the microphone, while if there are phasing prob-

lems, move the microphone closer, or further away from the wall.

Severe intonation problems, the inability to hold high notes, uneasiness or

tenseness, on the other hand, are a little more difﬁ cult to resolve as they reside

in the psychological state of the performer and no amount of equipment, no

matter how good, will turn a poor or uninspiring performance into a great

one. Instead, you’ll need to look at the monitoring environment and your own

communication skills.

Assuming that the vocalist can actually sing in tune, the most common reason

for poor intonation comes from the performer’s monitoring environment or

a poor overall mix. As previously touched upon, they will most probably mon-

itor the mix through headphones and this can result in an increase in bass fre-

quencies or difﬁ culty in comprehending the psychological acoustic coupling.

If the headphones are tight ﬁ tting on the performer’s head, there will be an

increase in bass frequencies and it is difﬁ cult to perceive pitch in low-frequency

waveforms which can force the performer to loose intonation. This problem

can usually be identiﬁ ed by the vocalist ‘involuntarily ’ moving further away

from the microphone and singing louder as this reduces the bass presence in

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their voice on the feedback mix. To prevent this, it’s worth placing a wide cut

of a few dB at 100 –300 Hz (where the bass usually resides) or increasing the

volume of a higher pitched instrument that the vocalist can pitch to.

Psychological acoustic coupling is less of a problem with experienced perform-

ers but is a result of the singer’s vocal chords vibrating their ear drums along

with all the bones in the ear cavity – the reason why you sound different when

you listen to a recording of yourself. When you place a pair of headphones

on the vocalists, their ‘natural’ environment is upset, which can make it dif-

ﬁ cult for them to pitch correctly. In this instance, it’s worth muting the vocals

returned in the foldback mix to see if this makes a difference, but if not, it may

be worth muting one side of the headphone feed so that they can hear them-

selves naturally in one ear. Some of the higher priced mixing desks and head-

phone distribution amps offer a kill switch to terminate one of the headphones

stereo channels for this purpose, but if this option isn’t available, you’ll need to

purchase a single channel headphone, manufacture a mono converter or ask

the vocalist to move one of the phones to uncover their ear.

Of course, if the monitoring volume is quite high, this latter solution can result

in the foldback mix spilling out of the unused earpiece and working its way

onto the recording. However, as long as this isn’t ridiculously loud, a little over-

spill isn’t too much of a problem as it will be masked by the other instruments.

Indeed, even professional artists such as Moby, Britney Spears, Madonna and

Michael Jackson have overspill present on some of their individual vocal tracks

and it’s something you’ll undoubtedly have to deal with if you have the chance

to remix a professional artist.

Some vocalists simply can’t perform wearing headphones so you need a way

of playing the mix back without recording any spill. The best way to accom-

plish this it to place both monitors 90 cm apart and 90 cm from the rear of

the microphone. Following this, reverse the wires (i.e. the polarity) of the

left speaker and then feed both monitors with a mono signal. This will allow

the performer to hear the mix but the phase of the speakers will match at the

microphone, in effect, cancelling out the sound.

If the problem is an inability to hold high notes or a tense or uneasy voice,

then this is the result of a nervous performer not breathing deeply enough and

this can only be resolved through tact, plenty of encouragement and excel-

lent communication skills. Vocalists feel more exposed than anyone else in

a studio so they constantly require plenty of positive support and plenty of

compliments after they’ve completed a take. This also means that eye contact

throughout is absolutely essential, but refrain from staring at the vocalist with

a blank expression – try to keep an encouraging smile on your face. This can

give a vocalist a massive conﬁ dence boost which will pull through into the

recording. More importantly, though, do not swamp the vocalist with techno

babble, or try to impress them by giving them a technical run through of what

you plan to do. If the vocalist has too many technical comments to think about

it can ruin the performance.

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EDITING VOCALS

Once you have the ﬁ rst ‘tonally’ correct, emotionally charged take recorded,

there will undoubtedly be a few mistakes throughout that will need repairing

or replacing. At this stage, before you send the vocalist home, you should ask

them to perform the ‘dodgy’ parts again. It isn’t advisable to ask them to per-

form the whole take again as it may exhaust their energy before they reach the

part that needs to be replaced, so it’s a better idea to punch in and out on the

parts that need it.

Essentially this means that you need to make it clear to the performer which

parts you want to re-record and these should be entire lines, not single words.

Also, the vocalist should perform the lines before and after the faulty part to

prevent a cold start and ensure that the same breathing pattern as the original

take is more or less maintained.

Above all, remember that very, very few vocalists today can perform a perfect take

in one go and it certainly isn’t unusual for a producer to record as many as eight

takes of different parts to later ‘comp’ (engineer speak for compiling not com-

pressing) various takes together to produce the ﬁ nal, perfect, vocal track. This is

where you need to be willing to spend as much time as required to ensure that

the vocal track is the best it can be. In some cases, you may even have to recall

the vocalist to re-perform some lines and this can often result in a different tone

of voice, but it is better to have a slightly different vocal tone than have a poorly

sung line. Although ideally you should have ensured that you had enough

to work with originally, re-recording some vocal parts at a different time isn’t

unusual and even professional recording studios do this from time to time.

If problems do occur later and it isn’t possible to recall the vocalist, then

you’ll have no choice but to use a series of studio processors. This approach

should always be viewed as the very last option but can range from cross-fading

individual words together, using pitch correction software such as Antares

Auto-Tune, harmonizing, double tracking, applying chorus, ﬂ ange or reverb

to thicken out thin vocals, time stretching some parts while time compressing

others to reconstructing the entire vocals word for word in an audio sequencer

or editor. This may all seem a little excessive but it is quite normal for a pro-

ducer to spend days and even weeks editing a vocal track to achieve perfection.

If you are experiencing severe problems with intonation, you should look at

using a different vocalist and try not to rely too much on pitch correction soft-

ware. While these are adept at correcting the odd out of tune words they do

not work as well when applied to an entire vocal line, phrase or chorus section.

Although many like to believe that ‘manufactured’ bands are incapable of hold-

ing a single note and rely entirely on pitch correction software, disappointingly,

they can actually sing quite well (if chosen for looks alone they’ll certainly have

attended a series of singing lessons!). Any ‘good’ singer will naturally bend

and modulate notes with vibrat and if a vocal line, phrase or chorus section is

particularly slow during the bend, the intonation unit can become confused

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and attempt to correct it. This can result in it bending the note when it doesn’t

require it, bend it in the wrong direction altogether or quickly jump to the next

note rather than keep the bend. All of these side-effects can produce a synthetic

unnatural sound that you would usually want to avoid, although of late the

‘ fake’ pitching has come to the fore in music since it was used by Cher’s pro-

ducer on ‘Believe ’.

VOCAL EFFECTS

When it comes to dance music, it isn’t extraordinary to apply various process-

ing to the vocals to make them different. As previously touched upon, we’ve

all heard the human voice naturally since the day we were born so any effects

that make them different will inevitably attract attention – so long as the effect

isn’t clich é. In fact, with dance music it’s quite usual to treat vocals as any other

instrument and heavily EQ or affect them to make them prominent and hope-

fully grab attention. Naturally, there is no deﬁ nitive method to affecting vocals

and it all depends on the overall effect you want to achieve. As Cher’s producer

has proved, experimentation is the real key to affecting the human voice and

you certainly shouldn’t be afraid of trying out new ideas to see what you can

come up with. Having said that, there are some vocal effects that are still in

wide use throughout the genres and knowing how to achieve these may help

aid you to further experimentation.

COMMERCIAL VOCALS

Possibly the ﬁ rst effect to achieve is the archetypal contemporary up-front

sound that’s typical of most commercial pop songs and of late, trance.

Although much of this is acquired at the recording stage by positioning the

vocalist closer to the microphone, effects can be used to help widen it across

the image and add some depth if it’s required. Stereo-widening effects are not

used for this as you’re working with a mono source to begin with and record-

ing the vocals in stereo is not only difﬁ cult, requiring two microphones, but it

will rarely produce the right results. Instead a much better way is to employ a

very subtle chorus or ﬂ ange as a send, not insert effect. By then setting the effect

rate as slow as possible you can send the vocals to the effect by the required

amount, thus keeping the stability of the vocals while also applying enough of

an effect to spread it across the stereo image. There are no universal settings for

this as it depends entirely on the vocals that have been recorded, but a good

starting point is 80% unaffected with a 20% effect.

An alternative method to this is to double track the vocals by copying them

onto a second track before applying a pitch-shift effect to both. This, obviously,

should be applied as an insert effect, otherwise you will experience a strange

phased effect, but by setting one channel to pitch up by 2 –5 cents and the other

Cher’s ‘Believe ’ track did not use an intonation programme but the Digitech Talk-Box to

acquire the effect.