Future projects

[Annoying Twit]

I've noted with interest the PF tributes here.

At present I'm working on developing skills in various areas, but particularly in using modern pitch correction software on vocals. Which nowdays allows a lot finer tuning of vocals than just fixing pitch. If there was some future project, by which time my skills may be more refined, then I'm wondering if there would be an opportunity for me to "contribute". Or would the kind of people who work on projects such as this have a basic theoretical dislike of pitch correction, even if applied subtly?

[filthyfish]

I've noted with interest the PF tributes here.

At present I'm working on developing skills in various areas, but particularly in using modern pitch correction software on vocals. Which nowdays allows a lot finer tuning of vocals than just fixing pitch. If there was some future project, by which time my skills may be more refined, then I'm wondering if there would be an opportunity for me to "contribute". Or would the kind of people who work on projects such as this have a basic theoretical dislike of pitch correction, even if applied subtly?

What software are you using? I have three different ones and find them hillarious to muck about with.
I am of the opinion that if you cant sing it in tune, let someone who can sing it, I am a little sick of all these singers who sound the same, perfect "tuned" voices, all with synced vibrato, and zero character.

[Annoying Twit]

What software are you using? I have three different ones and find them hillarious to muck about with.
I am of the opinion that if you cant sing it in tune, let someone who can sing it, I am a little sick of all these singers who sound the same, perfect "tuned" voices, all with synced vibrato, and zero character.

I'm mainly using the Melodyne software, though I did try out the Antares Auto-Tune too. They are very different pieces of software. The more I use Melodyne, the more I think that learning to use the software has a much larger learning curve than you'd expect. The classic "the more you know the more you know that you don't know". Pitch correction software has come on leaps and bounds and has grown in power, but as is often the case, the learning curve went up dramatically as well.

The stereotypical robotic overtuned voice like on Busted records is what happened with primitive software, or what happens if the pitch-correction is done by someone who hasn't learnt to use the software properly. It's relatively easy to cut out any variation in pitch and get the Cher effect, much harder to improve the singing (in more than just pitch) while retaining or even enhancing the character. (And I'm not joking about enhancing the character of the voice). It can be done. But that requires someone who really knows what they are doing. What I need to work on is being able to do that for every phase and note by knowing what to do, rather than only getting it right occasionally partially or wholly through luck.

I can see your reasons for saying that if you can't sing it, get someone who can to do it. But for myself, I'd like to be able to write and record songs, but don't have a professional quality voice. So I can't see the hurt in using software to do the voice. After all, people use compression, delay, eq and other effects to modify voices and make them sound better. Why is pitch correction (and fixing of dynamics, timing, etc.) so different?

[filthyfish]

I can see your reasons for saying that if you can't sing it, get someone who can to do it. But for myself, I'd like to be able to write and record songs, but don't have a professional quality voice. So I can't see the hurt in using software to do the voice. After all, people use compression, delay, eq and other effects to modify voices and make them sound better. Why is pitch correction (and fixing of dynamics, timing, etc.) so different?

Ive used Melodyne, and it's a copy of the software included in Magix Samplitude, which I add is far superior, Antares, is good if you sync it to a midi track.

I see your point about using other effects, but those you mention are for dynamic and ambiance, not to actually correct the tuning, compression and rev and delay are used to slot the track applied to into the mix compression mostly used to even hi and low input either pre or post and often happens naturally with the mechanical process of the Mic picking up the signal and turning it into an electrical one, not to fix something done badly. So its very different IMO, sampling and slicing, I would equate to pitch correction and go happily with Dance and Trance. Its signal manipulation rather than effecting.

[mosespa]

I'm with filthyfish on the idea that if you can't sing it, either get someone who can or keep doing the vocal take until you nail it.

Mind you, this is coming from a guy who puts demos on myspace with first pass vocal tracks, flaws and all.

After all, aren't Rock singers supposed to be out of tune?

[Annoying Twit]

Ive used Melodyne, and it's a copy of the software included in Magix Samplitude, which I add is far superior, Antares, is good if you sync it to a midi track.

Antares has a number of capabilities not in Melodyne, such as the ability to draw pitch curves, etc. (At least I haven't found these in Melodyne yet). I think in the long term Antares will be the more powerful software, but the learning curve is even steeper. I don't think anyone would disagree if I say that it takes 5 minutes to learn how to draw the pitch curves, but it's infinitely harder to be able to draw pitch curves that sound good, and/or to match the tremolo/portamento that you want.

But I'm not sure I agree that Samplitude is far superior to Melodyne. I don't have Samplitude, but have quickly revised the online manual. Not completely of course since it is 600 pages long. I am aware of the object editing in samplitude, but didn't think you had as many controls over pitch as you have in Melodyne. There is the ability in Samplitude to move objects up and down in pitch, but I could not find functions to fine-tune the amount and type of pitch variation within notes. Nor could I see any functions to manage transitions in pitch. Even in my current "learning" state, I'm aware that both of these are vital. Also when adjusting rhythm and timing, it's useful for the software to be able to adjust surrounding notes, so that as one gets longer the next gets shorter. I couldn't see this function in Samplitude, when an object is extended it may overlap the next object. It's possible to correct timing object by object of course, but far more time consuming. In the pitch-shifting/time-stretching object editing dialog, I couldn't see any "target pitch", meaning that you'd have to know how much to move the object up and down in pitch to correct it. There is also no sign that I can see of any way of displaying the pitch contour of objects, which again I find vital when editing the waveform. There is a visualisation mode called "tuner", but the manual only has a picture of it, without explaining what it does.

I'm using Melodyne as that's what we have at work, not chosen by me. If one of the cheaper versions of Samplitude did have pitch correction capabilities better than Melodyne, then I'd consider buying one for home use. So I'd greatly appreciate your comments on the above.

I see your point about using other effects, but those you mention are for dynamic and ambiance, not to actually correct the tuning, compression and rev and delay are used to slot the track applied to into the mix compression mostly used to even hi and low input either pre or post and often happens naturally with the mechanical process of the Mic picking up the signal and turning it into an electrical one, not to fix something done badly. So its very different IMO, sampling and slicing, I would equate to pitch correction and go happily with Dance and Trance. Its signal manipulation rather than effecting.

Yes, I understand the roles of the other effects, but I can't see that the reasons you give justify compression, rev, delay, eq, as "OK", while pitch correction is "not OK". Some people may say that rev, delay, eq, cannot significantly improve the basic performance, so there is less reduction in the necessary skill of the performer. Or that rev, eq, delay, comp, could be used live, which proper pitch correction is an off-line process.

But, I think it's then useful to compare pitch correction to recording many takes of a vocal, and then editing together all the best bits. What results is a single performance better.

Personally I think there is a great deal of prejudice against pitch correction. Partially because people can only really hear it when it's done wrong, it's been frequently massively over-used, the technology is still developing, and there's a degree of "guilt by association", it's been typically used by, ahem, "less respected" acts.

As for the "if you can't sing it, get someone who can". Well, surely that should apply to Roger Waters Seriously though, among more respected songwriters there's a culture by which less than perfect vocal performances are accepted by fans because they'd prefer to hear the songwriter themself sing the song. And for individuals at home (say), hiring professional singers is not really an option.

[filthyfish]

I am sure you will have plenty of work with your expertise in using this kind of software, but look at it like this, If you buy something that is supposed to be painted by,for example, Cezanne, and you are unaware that it was completed and improved by one of his employees, because he was either too lazy, busy, or not talented enough to get it right and his name added value to the product. Would you still buy it? For me it a moral thing. I just like a recording to be a thing of art, not Mathematics, which it is fast becoming. Although there are plenty of us out there trying to champion that idea.

I cant in all conscience say yeah thats a good enough take, i'll fix it later.
I have Produced stuff for some fairly well know artists over the years, and have always insisted they do it again, if its not up to parr, thats what i was paid to do, and I have never resorted to fixing a vocal take, although sometimes its tempting.

[bpmolder]

This has turned into a very nice, informative discussion. I can't really add anything to the points that have already been made besides:

I believe that great vocal takes were possible before pitch correction software, therefore, great vocal takes have been possible after the inception of such software. I use the comping method. I will record about 10 vocal takes and edit them together to get the best overall performance.

Pitch correction is good if used subtly but I'd much rather prefer to do a vocal take over before resorting to pitch correction. Depending on the software you use, it can leave artifacts and effect the overall mix.

I have Antares Autotune on my system and I have never used it. Not because I believe I am superior to such things, just that I have not yet seen a need. I keep it for the above mentioned reason, to experiment with freaky vocal effects. I look forward to seeing exactly what that software can do one of these days when I have the time to, as the British say, muck about with it.

Any production work I have done has been just as filthyfish has said. If it isn't good enough, do it again. I have been known to make exceptions when people were struggling as musicians and needed help getting a demo together. Then, I would edit parts to put them in rhythm, but that would be it. A lot of people would say that even that is going to far, but I try to help people out as long as it is within reason and as long as the person is really trying their best but really can't get it.

It's part of a producer's job to make an artist sound as good as possible and sometimes there may be a need to stretch the definition of that. It's totally subjective though. A lot of purists will say that the takes should be done as perfectly as possible then comped together pre-mix. Other, more modern producers and techs consider it to be perfectly acceptable to stretch mediocre performances and polish turds.

The fact is, part of the decline of modern music, in addition to the loudness wars, is due to performances being digitally enhanced, corrected and polished for an album release. It produces a decent sounding product but the true art and performance is lost. That person ends up lip syncing the parts and/or singing to a backing music track that is coming out of the walls somewhere and being covered up by background dancers shaking their asses.

Like everything else in our history, technological advances have not just provided us with a way to do something quickly and easily but have also caused skills to deteriorate significantly, making us more and more dependent on that technology. The same thing is happening in music with pitch correction and over-compression.

[Annoying Twit]

I can't follow all this up fully point by point. Sadly I've been working.

I should point out that audio production is tangential to my job, I'm not a professional producer or engineer.

But returning to the topic at hand. I would agree that, if a singer is capable of getting it right, getting them to do more takes is the best solution. Even if the take is going to be pitch-corrected, the better the source material, the better the result. Basically, recording many takes is one tool that an engineer can use. Pitch correction is another. The producers and engineers should choose methods according to which best achieve their aims. And I personally do not think of pitch correction as a method of avoiding work, but as a production technique in itself. Sometimes, it's the tool for the job.

The example of Cezanne painting may not be a good analogy. Most great masters had painting studios where a large number of assistants would help them finish paintings, and much of a painting may not have been done by the credited artists. So many or most paintings you see in galleries already may have had "assistance". I don't have a problem with this as I'm sure that the artist would have made sure that their artistic vision was implemented the way they wanted it.

Reliance on technology is not new. I remember speaking to a classical singing tutor who bemoaned that modern day microphones and amplification made it possible for singers to be heard even if they didn't train their voices to produce opera levels of volume, and that this was somehow cheating. Today we think nothing of using microphones in concert, but from a different perspective, that's also cheating. As technology progresses, it becomes part of our lives, and the same applies to music.

I don't agree that introducing pitch correction detracts from the art. Certainly in my own case, and I would guess the same would apply to others, the in-tune version of the vocal was my artistic intention. So pitch correction may possibly be able to get me closer to my "artistic" intention than I would have been otherwise. With software, as well as "smoothing things out", you can roughen them up if you want to. It's a matter of what you want to do. Yesterday I did an experiment where I recorded a cover version of Kraftwerk's "The Model" (note crafty choice of song). At the end I did some robotic harmonies, which I didn't even arrange properly. Even though they sounded "bad", I thought they matched the song quite well, and actually worked in context.

Finally (all I've got time for), I also disagree that if you buy an album by X, it should be just by X. The whole point of having any piece of musical, recording, or production equipment is to be able to do things that you couldn't do without it, or at least do them quicker and easier. The same applies to having a human producer. The band hires a producer to be able to do things they couldn't do without that producer, to make them sound better than they could by themselves. Various equipment and recording techniques are used, mostly with the final aim of improving the product. If pitch correction is used properly (which I can't do reliably yet), which implies not using it when it shouldn't be used, then it can improve the final product. Clearly if it is overused to produce a lifeless result, then it hasn't been used properly, as it would have been better not to use it in that task, or at least to use it differently. Does anyone think that pitch correction can never be used to enhance a recording?

As for pitch-correction contributing to the decline of modern music, well, perhaps that may be true, due to the way it is frequently mis-used. But I don't think anyone thinks that the cat is ever going back into the bag. I think it's more likely to continue improving as more and more technology (e.g. artificial intelligence) is thrown at the problem. But there is already technology, singing to backing tapes, that allows non-singers to sing in concert. And even before pitch correction, there were methods to help less talented singers. I met an engineer who worked with an extremely well-known boy band. And he described to me the techniques used early on in their career. Quite interesting, including using professional singers who could mimic the tone of the boy band member. They would then mix in the two voices to get a better sounding voice, which still sounded like the intended vocalist. Cheating?

One thing that encourages me to learn more about pitch correction is that the kind of people who would really put the effort into learning to use it properly and apply it appropriately are also the kind of people who would not consider doing so. Hence if I could aspire to become truly skilled at it, there may be little competition

[2066]

After all, aren't Rock singers supposed to be out of tune?

I remember seeing this documentary of all those musicians making that "We Are The World" thingy. Neil Young does a take of his vocal and David Foster says something like, "You were a little off on one note" or something, and Neil says "that's my style, man"

[filthyfish]

Good points and I have an answer, which is my opinion.

Correcting the pitch for me is not an option. When I record or produce a "band" not a Karaoke singer or singers ( I will leave that to those with no soul ) I want to present an accurate impression of the band playing live, in one take, if they cant do that, then they have to come back when they can. I dont want to go and see a band then find out that they cant sing live, or play in time, without ghost musos, off stage and that has happened

As i said I am sure you will find lots of work, but I dont expect i would find it very thrilling.

[mosespa]

This is just me, but I think that the point of a recording is to present something MORE than a representation of what a band sounds like live.

Like Hendrix said (and I'm paraphrasing, here,) "An album and a live performance are two different things. If you want to hear the album, go home and listen to the album...if you want to hear the live band, go out and see the live band."

An album is, to me, more like a painting or a sculpture...it's a canvas upon which to let your imagination run wild; an opportunity to create sounds that may not be able to be recreated live.

The Beatles couldn't have done Strawberry Fields Forever or Tomorrow Never Knows live...doesn't at all change the fact that they're great songs and great recordings.

But...that's just me.

Now, everything I've said may sound like I'm gonna be behind pitch correction on vocals...I'm only behind it in cases where that "artificial" sound is what's called for. That "Believe" effect has it's place and it's proper usage...but to me, fixing bad notes is not what it's for.

That's what retakes are for.

[Annoying Twit]

There are some artists who deliberately record albums which are close to or exactly as they sound live. And some create intricately arranged and produced albums that could never be played live in anything like their recorded form. I think there's room for both types of artists. I'd agree that there are albums or artists where it would never be a good idea to apply pitch correction, either because they are skilled enough to get the performance as they want it by themselves or because they record music where it would just be inappropriate. I could never imagine Bob Dylan using pitch correction on his vocals, and it actually working.

Brian Eno said that one reason why he returned to recording vocal albums was because new technologies allowed him to shape his voice, and disassociate it from himself. (Or something like that, as with most things Eno it's best to read closer to the original source: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/oct05/a ... ianeno.htm). I'm not sure what voice shaping "technologies" he used, but some of them sound like some sort of pitch modification is involved. I don't think what BE is doing here is artistically invalid, and for anyone following a similar bent, major modifications to the voice is clearly the target, way more than just subtle improvements.

I'd agree with mosespa about live performance and the album being different things. For some artists at least. For a live performance I want to hear everything live. I don't feel the same about albums. In some cases I want to hear a good album, and am not fussy about the means to that end. There are bands (don't want to cause arguments by naming them) whose albums I look forward to, but whom I would no longer go to see live, because I don't like their live act. If they stopped producing albums because of some new law saying that they can't release them if they can't do it live, then that would be a great loss IMHO. There are other artists, again I won't name them, who won't sing on their own albums any more as they have no confidence in their voice. If they decided that they could release vocals again because they can be "fixed", then I'd be happy about it. There's room for all sorts of music in this world, and different rules apply to different music by different people at different times.

[filthyfish]

A.T. you have answered your Initial question, in not so many words, PF and bands that are in a similar genre have always, as far as i can think have always tried to perform a good representation of the Studio work, which is why it took (in the latter shows) 20 odd musicians on stage to do it, and why not. Gilmours voice is sometimes not in tune live, and of course neither is Rogs.
So although in essence, I agree that a live show and a studio recording can be different things, I believe that in most cases, its because the band cannot achieve the same as in studio.

I agree with Mossy.

[Annoying Twit]

I think the original question was answered some time ago. But as threads do, this one had morphed into a more general discussion of the philosophical issues concerning pitch correction.

Continuing the more philosophical trend, let's imagine this scenario. Someone plays you a track that you've never heard before. You listen to it, and like it. Later on, someone plays you a "remixed" version. The only difference is that the singing voice does not sound so good. They then tell you that the first had considerable "work" (including pitch correction) done on the voice. Does this make the second version now better than the first, even though without that knowledge, you would have preferred the first?