We recently scoured scholarly journals, collegiate records, and data collected from self-reported social media profiles to perform a meta-analysis from various angles…
Stage presence is the core variable that determines if someone will spread the good word about your performance after the show, or tell their buddies not to bother next time you're in town. "The band was really sucking that night and I don't even like that genre of music, but man, the vocalist was the most enthusiastic and funny person ever. It's worth seeing them […]
Nothing matters more than vocals. You can get away with shoddy drums, guitar, and any other backing instrument. But vocals get all the attention, so you can't really compromise. This is especially the case if you're recording vocals for music, a podcast, audiobook narration, or voice acting. Anywhere where your voice will be the center of focus, you have to produce a flawless recording. Let […]
The amount of people that either don't know about noise gates is astounding. The number that know but won't take the time to learn how to use them is sadly astonishing. That's largely because there's no easier or better way to get huge gains in audio quality while performing live, recording, and during mixing. And gating is easily the biggest time saver during post-processing. Regardless […]
It's time and you're committed. After kicking the idea around for too long, you're finally ready to start your own band. Now what? You know you want to treat this like a real business and not a bunch of buddies hanging out casually. You don't want to join a band. You don't want to form a cover band and build someone else's brand for them. […]
At some point, no matter if you're learning to record music, be a mixing engineer, toying with your first guitar pedals, you'll be asking the question "What's the difference between gain and volume?" To the untrained mind, they seem like they're the same. They both make audio louder when you increase them. The sound of changing either might seem identical to you now, and maybe […]
It all started in 1983. If you're a music afficionado and know the sound of each decade, you'll know that there was a sudden jump from the 70's to the 80's where suddenly we stopped hearing live instruments as much. Out of the blue the pop music scene was filled with the cheesiest sounding "computer music," which progressively got better. That trend never ended, to […]
If you're a music producer of any kind then you've tried your hand at mixing. You may even be great at it. You know the ins and outs of equalization, compression, using effects on auxiliary sends, using group buses, etc. But still, once you sit back to check your mix on a couple of sets of speaker monitors and even your nice headphones, things just […]
If you're a long-time follower of LedgerNote, you know I've written a ton about mixing tricks of the trade to help you get better clarity, especially in the bottom-end of your mix. Sometimes there's only so much you can do with equalization. And that's where the concept of sidechaining comes in. It's not hard to understand or set up, though we all need that first […]
This isn't news to the old-timers. We remember the days when artists all covered each other's songs and wrote for one another. The thing is, they were all capable and proved it time and again. That's not the case today. And it seems the big wigs would like to sweep that little secret under the rug. People are becoming wise to the game though. There's […]
I've over simplified the question in the title above, but that gets to the essence of the discussion between myself and a smart gentleman, who I thank for sending in such a high quality set of questions. Thanks to all of the people writing in. We can't get back to everyone, but we're doing our best. We're performing triage over here, so the goofier the […]
My goal here is to cut through the fog and give it to you plain. We're going to define dither, talk about what it actually is in the context of digital audio (as opposed to printing images or processing video, though we'll mention this), and tell you when and how to use it. What's funny is we've all seen and heard this technique applied in […]
We received a very insightful question recently that requires some critical thinking to explain the answer. You'll enjoy this one if you like puzzles, especially as a studio engineer and/or guitarist. As always, let me thank a couple readers for their help. Frederick notified us of an error in our mp3 compression article and Pepsy supplied us with a picture we needed for another article. […]
The nerve of these people to try to convince us that THEY are the victims here... God forbid musicians find a way to reach their own fans. The State of Youtube's Claim System As everyone knows, Youtube's claim system is severely broken when it comes to music. Not a day goes by when a creator on the video streaming site isn't essentially unfairly robbed of […]
This one has been cooking for years in the background. I caught wind of it years ago and forgot about it, only to see it finally come to a head in the courts. The Background of the Dark Horse Saga In 2013, Katy Perry releases a song "Dark Horse" that features an instrumental and a rap verse by Juicy J, where the final touches were […]
How many young guitarists have you known that dream of hitting it big and getting the fame, adoration, and riches? Perhaps you're one of them. The songwriting despite the writer's block, the grueling years on tour, the album and merchandise sales... that all sounds great if you really want it. But you're in for a big surprise if you think that's all it takes to […]
Many young musicians dream of being a rock star for the fame and adoration, even though it's a grueling lifestyle of non-stop touring. These starving artist types have a big surprise coming if they break into the big time, because you can make an unbelievable amount of money as one of the top 10 richest rock stars in the world. As you read this list, […]
The new data is out! You may not see huge shifts in the list of the top 10 richest country singers in the world due to some established giants, but we've dropped some artists out and added new ones. This is more interesting than the usual static list where everyone just earns more money due to investments and new businesses. And that's one of the […]
Nothing is more fun than the mid-year time when the new data comes out and we can update this list. It's not often that you see a huge shift in the list of top 10 richest rappers in the world. Usually it's the same players and their net worth moving up or down a bit based on investments. No matter how it shakes out, we […]
A friendly fellow sent in a wonderful pre-purchase question that I'm sure many other newcomers to the audio interface world are curious about too. It's a fun ride, so please read along as we learn about... Before you even read this, you can rest easy knowing it had a happy ending: "I purchased the unit. Aside from an issue where I had some latency in […]
We modern guitarists are lucky. Flanging used to be a nightmare of manipulating reel-to-reel machines, but today it can be achieved in analog or digital fashion all from a small stomp box situated at our feet. This means we can now use it during live performances, too. Most listeners couldn't tell you what the flanger effect is called, but they know it when they hear […]
Ledger Note is the leading-edge online music magazine. With our focus on education for industry professionals while at work and enjoyment at home, we never cease adding and updating our tutorials, tips & tricks, and entertainment blog. Use our passion for your benefit in the studio, at gigs, and during practice and rehearsal. Progress never stops at Ledger Note. Gear Gigs Grind Glory. Learn more about the Ledger Note Team here. See you at the top!
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