For the independent artist, sounding great isn't a rarity only available to well-funded artists anymore - it is essential. Music sales may have diminished, but that doesn't mean that recorded music is going away any time soon. Far from it. More music is being consumed on more devices by more listeners than ever before in history! Musicians are making their music available on internet and satellite radio, online music streaming services such as Pandora, Spotify, Rdio, Deezer, and YouTube, selling on direct-to-fan sites such as CD Baby, Bandcamp, and ReverbNation, and still pushing sales through ‘traditional' online retailers such as iTunes and Amazon MP3. Simply put, there is no excuse for an artist to release sub-par recordings. For some people, audio engineers are still an enigma. To others, they are ‘evil' manipulators of sound, creating fake, auto-tuned, machines out of terrible artists. This, however, is far from fact. Every record, no matter the type, gets touched by a recording engineer, mixing engineer, and mastering engineer. The recording engineer utilizes many of microphones and technique to accurately capture and record the artist's performance as it happens in the recording studio. The mix engineer takes all of the separate audio tracks and crafts the music to sound convincing and convey the song's emotion. He sets the right levels, panning, equalization, compression, and adds creative effects where possible to enhance the artist's vision. Finally, the mastering engineer uses special gear and highly trained ears in an acoustically accurate room to subtly polish and prepare the music for final release and ensure the recording translates to a variety of playback systems. "While many audio techniques can enhance the final production, we engineers are not magicians and can't replace a poor performance or terrible recording," says Scott of Virtual Mix Engineer. Recordings are more often used as promotional vessel for musicians. The most income these days is in converts, publishing, film and TV placements, and merchandise. When a fan connects with an artist's music, they'll listen to their music, tweet, and share the music with their friends. The fans want to help the artist and buy tickets to their shows, purchase apparel, and follow and interact with the band through social media. As the group grows in popularity, their music may be chosen for sync placements in movies and TV, which not only provides great exposure, it also pays very well. To make it to this stage however, it all starts with a great song and convincing recording. The rise of do-it-yourself recording has led to more bands releasing music than ever before. With a powerful laptop, some mics, a digital audio workstation, and a little knowledge, anyone can create and distribute music. One area where many artists fall short is failing to recognize their weaknesses in audio engineering. An experienced engineer has the right gear, but most importantly the skills to make a production reach its full potential. Though it can be hard for an artist, letting go and trusting your engineer will take your recordings to the next level and help you stand out from the masses. Fans are instantly attracted to a well-written and performed song that sounds like a hit. Spend a good amount of time in pre-production, ensuring your composition and arrangement are as solid as possible. Then and only then, get into the best studio you can afford to record your tracks. Hire a local or online mix engineer within your budget whose work and personality you connect with, and tweak the mix until you're satisfied. Finally, send the songs off to mastering for that final touch. Once your recording is finished, you can get the music into multiple outlets and into the ears of your listeners and fans. Scott Horton is the epitome of today's cutting-edge mixing engineer/producer/songwriter. He has worked with countless music groups the world over in all musical genres ranging from Pop, Pop-Rock, Hip-Hop,RnB, Urban and more. His online mixing and mastering service, Virtual Mix Engineer, delivers artists and record labels with great sounding mixes which make impressions that count. Get in touch with Scott at http://www.virtualmixengineer.com
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