The "Incredibly Impossible to Derail This Thread" thread | Page 920 | Fab Forum | The Beatles Bible

The first thing to realize is that with stereo, there’s not 2 channels but 3, left, center, and right.

Now what you want to put into each channel depends on the song, so let’s look at a couple of examples.

In this example, we have these instruments:

Track 1:

Acoustic guitar

Track 2:

Bass

Track 3:

Drums

Track 4:

Lead vocals

Track 5:

Overdubbed piano

Track 6:

Overdubbed tambourine

Track 7:

Guitar solo overdub

Track 8:

Guitar outro overdub

For the left channel, we’ll want to use the backing track. The center should be reserved for vocals and instruments we want to have the most attention. Finally, the right channel is for overdubs.

Here’s our stereo mix knowing this:

Left:

Acoustic guitar, bass, and drums

Center:

Lead vocals, guitar solo, and guitar outro

Right:

Piano and tambourine

In this next example, here’s a song that was recorded without any overdubs.

Track 1:

Rhythm guitar (Fender Stratocaster)

Track 2:

Lead guitar (Gibson SG)

Track 3:

Bass guitar (Fender Precision Bass)

Track 4:

Drums

Track 5:

Lead vocals

Since there’s no overdubs to push to the right, we’re going to split the backing track across both channels like so.

Left:

Fender and bass

Center:

Vocals

Right:

Gibson and drums

How about with backing vocals like so.

Track 1:

Piano

Track 2:

Acoustic guitar

Track 3:

Bass

Track 4:

Fender rhythm guitar

Track 5:

Drums

Track 6:

Lead vocals

Track 7:

Backing vocals I

Track 8:

Backing vocals II

Track 9:

Fender guitar solo overdub

Track 10:

Tambourine overdub

Track 11:

Hammond organ overdub

Track 12:

Saxophone solo overdub

Track 13:

Lead vocals double track

Track 14:

Synth strings

There’s a few ways we can do this but we’re going to do split the backing vocals between the left and right channels. By the way, since we’re working with double tracked lead vocals over here, we’re going to put each lead vocal track on a different channel to give the desired effect.

Left:

Piano

Acoustic guitar

Bass

Fender rhythm guitar

Drums

Lead vocals

Backing vocals I

Center:

Guitar solo

Sax solo

Right:

Backing vocals II

Tambourine

Hammond organ

Lead vocals double track

Synth strings

If you have a power trio to work with, stereo mixing couldn’t be easier. Take this for example.

Track 1:

Guitar

Track 2:

Bass

Track 3:

Drums

Track 4:

Lead vocals

Since this power trio consists of a guitarist/vocalist, bassist, and drummer, the mix is simple.

Left:

Bass

Center:

Lead vocals

Guitar

Right:

Drums

Each member gets his own channel.

What about if you’re mixing something like this.

Track 1:

Acoustic guitar

Track 2:

Lead vocals

Just mix it as mono.

Finally, let’s say you have a lot of instruments and want to mix for surround instead, we’ve got you covered.

Let’s take this orchestral recording as example:

Tracks 1-8:

Violin

Tracks 9-15:

Viola

Tracks 16-20:

Cello

Tracks 21-22:

Upright bass

Tracks 23-29:

Trumpet

Tracks 30-33:

French horn

Tracks 34-36:

Trombone

Track 37:

Tuba

Track 38:

Harp

Tracks 39-40:

Flute

Track 41:

Piccolo

Tracks 42-43:

Clarinet

Tracks 44-45:

Oboe

Track 46:

Bassoon

Track 47:

Saxophone

Track 48:

Drum kit

Track 49:

Steel string acoustic guitar

Track 50:

Electric guitar

Track 51:

Electric bass guitar

Track 52:

Piano

Track 53:

Conductor

Track 54:

Tambourine

Track 55:

Marimba

Track 56:

Crowd left

Track 57:

Crowd right

If we were mixing for 5.1 surround, this wouldn’t be so hard.

Front Left:

Violin

Viola

Cello

Center:

Conductor

Piano

Steel string acoustic guitar

Electric guitar

Saxophone

Front Right:

Flute

Clarinet

Oboe

Bassoon

Piccolo

Rear Left:

Crowd left

Trumpet

Trombone

French Horn

Tuba

Drum kit

Rear Right:

Drum kit

Crowd right

Marimba

Harp

Tambourine

However, what if you now want to mix it for stereo, you can actually do that.

Left:

Strings

Crowd left

Left center:

Brass

Center:

Conductor

Piano

Right center:

Woodwinds

Right:

Percussion

Crowd right

By taking advantage of the rarely used left center and right center channels, you can get 5 channels out of 2 albeit an inferior experience but it works nonetheless.

Whether you’re mixing for classical, jazz, pop, rock, country, metal, or whatever other genre there is, i hope you enjoyed this long and winding post.