Is it possible to isolate instruments/vocals in a mono recording? Canpitch correction be added to individual elements?

[[email protected]]

Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
Tune/pitch correction or other fx?

Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
has something like this reached the point of just making the right
adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?

Thanks.

[hank alrich]

> wrote:

> Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
> separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
> Tune/pitch correction or other fx?

Nope.

> Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
> has something like this reached the point of just making the right
> adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?

It's not something any of us will be doing sucessfully.

--
ha
Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam

[Chris Whealy]

wrote:
> Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
> separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
> Tune/pitch correction or other fx?
>
> Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
> has something like this reached the point of just making the right
> adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?
>
> Thanks.
>
No this is not possible. If it were, people would have disassembled the
Beatles as soon as the technology to do so was available.

Let me ask you the same question, but set in a different context, then
you should understand the situation better.
You have some red paint, some white paint and some blue paint and you
mix them together to form a kind of pinky-purple.
Can you un-mix the paint back to the original colours?

Chris W

--
The voice of ignorance speaks loud and long,
But the words of the wise are quiet and few.
---

[Scott Dorsey]

hank alrich > wrote:
> wrote:
>
>> Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
>> separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
>> Tune/pitch correction or other fx?
>
>Nope.
>
>> Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
>> has something like this reached the point of just making the right
>> adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?
>
>It's not something any of us will be doing sucessfully.

However, there are folks trying to do this. On the scale of difficulty
where 1 is a good freshman quiz question and 10 is Nobel-worthy, it's
at least a 9, though.

The human brain does separate polyphonic parts, so it ought to be
possible to do someday with a system that displays actual understanding
of music. Okay... maybe it's a 10.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Nil]

On 30 Nov 2007, Chris Whealy > wrote in
alt.music.home-studio:

> You have some red paint, some white paint and some blue paint and
> you mix them together to form a kind of pinky-purple.
> Can you un-mix the paint back to the original colours?

Or my favorite analogy: After you bake a cake, can you get the eggs
back out?

[[email protected]]

On Nov 30, 11:40 am, Nil > wrote:
> On 30 Nov 2007, Chris Whealy > wrote in
> alt.music.home-studio:
>
> > You have some red paint, some white paint and some blue paint and
> > you mix them together to form a kind of pinky-purple.
> > Can you un-mix the paint back to the original colours?
>
> Or my favorite analogy: After you bake a cake, can you get the eggs
> back out?

Thanks for the replies...
I came across this link "Model-based techniques for signal separation
of audio signals (Adaptive conversion of monophonic audio to true
multitrack)"

http://www-users.york.ac.uk/~jes1/Mono-to-Multitrack.htm

So, I guess it's still in the research phase.

[Arny Krueger]

"Chris Whealy" > wrote in message


> Let me ask you the same question, but set in a different
> context, then you should understand the situation better.

> You have some red paint, some white paint and some blue
> paint and you mix them together to form a kind of
> pinky-purple.

> Can you un-mix the paint back to the original colours?

Sure, just examine the paint, molecule by molecule, and take advantage of
the fact that different pigments are different chemicals. This is probably
possible today, but very time-consuming.

[Arny Krueger]

"Nil" > wrote in
message
> On 30 Nov 2007, Chris Whealy > wrote
> in alt.music.home-studio:
>
>> You have some red paint, some white paint and some blue
>> paint and you mix them together to form a kind of
>> pinky-purple.
>> Can you un-mix the paint back to the original colours?
>
> Or my favorite analogy: After you bake a cake, can you
> get the eggs back out?

Only if you don't mix the batter very well. ;-)

[hank alrich]

Scott Dorsey > wrote:

> hank alrich > wrote:
> > wrote:
> >
> >> Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
> >> separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
> >> Tune/pitch correction or other fx?
> >
> >Nope.
> >
> >> Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
> >> has something like this reached the point of just making the right
> >> adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?
> >
> >It's not something any of us will be doing sucessfully.
>
> However, there are folks trying to do this. On the scale of difficulty
> where 1 is a good freshman quiz question and 10 is Nobel-worthy, it's
> at least a 9, though.
>
> The human brain does separate polyphonic parts, so it ought to be
> possible to do someday with a system that displays actual understanding
> of music. Okay... maybe it's a 10.
> --scott

Maybe even an 11. <g>

--
ha
Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam

[Michael]

hank alrich wrote:

> Scott Dorsey > wrote:
>
>> hank alrich > wrote:
>>> > wrote:
>>>
>>>> Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
>>>> separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply
>>>> Auto- Tune/pitch correction or other fx?
>>>
>>> Nope.
>>>
>>>> Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
>>>> has something like this reached the point of just making the right
>>>> adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?
>>>
>>> It's not something any of us will be doing sucessfully.
>>
>> However, there are folks trying to do this. On the scale of
>> difficulty where 1 is a good freshman quiz question and 10 is
>> Nobel-worthy, it's at least a 9, though.
>>
>> The human brain does separate polyphonic parts, so it ought to be
>> possible to do someday with a system that displays actual
>> understanding of music. Okay... maybe it's a 10.
>> --scott
>
> Maybe even an 11. <g>

So... if 10 is Nobel-worthy, then 11 must be God-like. :-)

[Travis Garrison]

On Nov 30, 9:30 am, wrote:
> Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
> separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
> Tune/pitch correction or other fx?
>
> Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
> has something like this reached the point of just making the right
> adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?
>
> Thanks.

As others have mentioned, this is not a trivial process - certainly
nothing commercially available can accomplish this task. However,
this sort of audio extraction has been a research topic for the past
couple of years, with some promising results.

At the International Computer Music conference in Miami a few years
back, I recall attending a paper session discussing this exact topic.
The researchers took on the task of separating out the two instruments
from a Mozart piano/violin duet. As this was a piece with a readily-
available score, the researchers knew in advance which pitches and
rhythms were present in each instrumental part. The extraction was a
matter of synchronizing a MIDI score with the audio recording, and
using that as a guide to perform selective FFT bin extraction. In
this case, separating the violin from the piano met with marginal
success. The difficulties lie when the two instruments occupy the
same frequency range. An FFT analysis will give you frequency content
over time, but cannot distinguish whether a certain frequency bin
originated with piano or violin.

The resulting extracted instruments were recognizable, but both
suffered from washy FFT resynthesis artifacts. But still impressive.
Give it a few more years and I'm sure someone will crack this problem.

Travis Garrison

[Mark]

On Nov 30, 12:59 pm, Travis Garrison > wrote:
> On Nov 30, 9:30 am, wrote:
>
> > Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
> > separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
> > Tune/pitch correction or other fx?
>
> > Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
> > has something like this reached the point of just making the right
> > adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?
>
> > Thanks.
>
> As others have mentioned, this is not a trivial process - certainly
> nothing commercially available can accomplish this task. However,
> this sort of audio extraction has been a research topic for the past
> couple of years, with some promising results.
>
> At the International Computer Music conference in Miami a few years
> back, I recall attending a paper session discussing this exact topic.
> The researchers took on the task of separating out the two instruments
> from a Mozart piano/violin duet. As this was a piece with a readily-
> available score, the researchers knew in advance which pitches and
> rhythms were present in each instrumental part. The extraction was a
> matter of synchronizing a MIDI score with the audio recording, and
> using that as a guide to perform selective FFT bin extraction. In
> this case, separating the violin from the piano met with marginal
> success. The difficulties lie when the two instruments occupy the
> same frequency range. An FFT analysis will give you frequency content
> over time, but cannot distinguish whether a certain frequency bin
> originated with piano or violin.
>
> The resulting extracted instruments were recognizable, but both
> suffered from washy FFT resynthesis artifacts. But still impressive.
> Give it a few more years and I'm sure someone will crack this problem.
>
> Travis Garrison

then we might finally be able to actually measure the real benfit of
those Monster speaker cables or paper capacitors too.. :-)

Mark

[Max Arwood]

With all the negative answers I thought I would add a positive one.....
This would be very easy. You just call up Capital and as for the price to
lease the original masters. Dump it on the computer and do what ever you
want. Unless your budget is not in that range, if not hire some really good
studio musicians.

http://www.alivenetwork.com/bandpage.asp?bandname=(Beatles)%20Fab%20Beatles
or
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=64755501

Max Arwood


> wrote in message
...
> Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
> separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
> Tune/pitch correction or other fx?
>
> Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
> has something like this reached the point of just making the right
> adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?
>
> Thanks.

[Arny Krueger]

"Travis Garrison" > wrote in
message


> At the International Computer Music conference in Miami a
> few years back, I recall attending a paper session
> discussing this exact topic. The researchers took on the
> task of separating out the two instruments from a Mozart
> piano/violin duet. As this was a piece with a readily-
> available score, the researchers knew in advance which
> pitches and rhythms were present in each instrumental
> part. The extraction was a matter of synchronizing a
> MIDI score with the audio recording, and using that as a
> guide to perform selective FFT bin extraction. In this
> case, separating the violin from the piano met with
> marginal success. The difficulties lie when the two
> instruments occupy the same frequency range. An FFT
> analysis will give you frequency content over time, but
> cannot distinguish whether a certain frequency bin
> originated with piano or violin.
>
> The resulting extracted instruments were recognizable,
> but both suffered from washy FFT resynthesis artifacts.
> But still impressive. Give it a few more years and I'm
> sure someone will crack this problem.

YOu seem to be conversant with the SOTA in this area. Has anybody come up
with software that would transcribe a recording into MIDI?

[sambodidley]

"Michael" wrote
Okay... maybe it's a 10.
>>> --scott
>>
>> Maybe even an 11. <g>
>
> So... if 10 is Nobel-worthy, then 11 must be God-like. :-)

No, more so Spinal Tap like.<g>

[Scott Dorsey]

Arny Krueger > wrote:
>
>YOu seem to be conversant with the SOTA in this area. Has anybody come up
>with software that would transcribe a recording into MIDI?

It is possible to do in a limited way. Zenph Studios has a technology
that can extract a pretty damn good piano transcription, IF given a clean
track with nothing but piano on it.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Mike Rivers]

On Nov 30, 3:28 pm, "Arny Krueger" > wrote:

> Has anybody come up
> with software that would transcribe a recording into MIDI?

Zenph Studios has a system for converting piano recordings to MIDI.
It's actually higher resolution than standard MIDI - they write data
for the fancy Yamaha Disklavier. It takes a little tweaking but the
results are quite good. They have some recordings of famous pianists
that they've re-recorded using a modern piano with good mics in a good
studio.

There was a very expensive program called Pandora, I think, that could
sort of pull out individual instruments but I don't know what ever
happened to them. Probably ran out of money.

[Chris Hornbeck]

On Fri, 30 Nov 2007 09:06:26 -0800, (hank alrich)
wrote:

>Scott Dorsey > wrote:

>> However, there are folks trying to do this. On the scale of difficulty
>> where 1 is a good freshman quiz question and 10 is Nobel-worthy, it's
>> at least a 9, though.
>>
>> The human brain does separate polyphonic parts, so it ought to be
>> possible to do someday with a system that displays actual understanding
>> of music. Okay... maybe it's a 10.
>> --scott
>
>Maybe even an 11. <g>

I can do it, but I've been sworn to secrecy. Something about
November 2008 or something, but the details are confidential.
Anyway, all I can say is that "it's a matter of them or us".
At least, that's the way it was described to me.

I'm apolitical, so that stuff doesn't bother me too much.


Much thanks, as always,

Chris Hornbeck

[Sean Conolly]

"Max Arwood" > wrote in message
et...
> With all the negative answers I thought I would add a positive one.....
> This would be very easy. You just call up Capital and as for the price to
> lease the original masters. Dump it on the computer and do what ever you
> want. Unless your budget is not in that range, if not hire some really
> good studio musicians.

Except that a lot of the old masters were also in mono. IIRC some of the
early sessions just used a single mic, with the band set up around it.

It's got me wondering, though, how much material was recorded as multi-track
to mono only, with no stereo version released. I would imagine that
multi-track recording and stereo releases followed each other fairly
closely, at least for pop music.

Sean

[videochas www.locoworks.com]

On Nov 30, 7:05�pm, "Sean Conolly" > wrote:
> "Max Arwood" > wrote in message
>
> et...
>
> > With all the negative answers I thought I would add a positive one.....
> > This would be very easy. �You just call up Capital and as for the price to
> > lease the original masters. �Dump it on the computer and do what ever you
> > want. �Unless your budget is not in that range, if not hire some really
> > good studio musicians.
>
> Except that a lot of the old masters were also in mono. IIRC some of the
> early sessions just used a single mic, with the band set up around it.
>
> It's got me wondering, though, how much material was recorded as multi-track
> to mono only, with no stereo version released. I would imagine that
> multi-track recording and stereo releases followed each other fairly
> closely, at least for pop music.
>
> Sean

In the liner notes for "The Carl Stalling Project" there is a
photograph of the Warner Brothers Orchestra in a recording session.
Two RCA 44DX microphones appear, suspended on Mole-Richardson booms,
above the museos. Since the album is stereo, I suspect that they were
each mixed to their own track. There are no spot mikes in evidence.

[Arny Krueger]

"Scott Dorsey" > wrote in message

> Arny Krueger > wrote:
>>
>> YOu seem to be conversant with the SOTA in this area.
>> Has anybody come up with software that would transcribe
>> a recording into MIDI?
>
> It is possible to do in a limited way. Zenph Studios has
> a technology that can extract a pretty damn good piano
> transcription, IF given a clean track with nothing but
> piano on it. --scott

If that's all we can do at the SOTA, then the OP's task is clearly still
mission impossible.

[Scott Dorsey]

Arny Krueger > wrote:
>"Scott Dorsey" > wrote in message

>> Arny Krueger > wrote:
>>>
>>> YOu seem to be conversant with the SOTA in this area.
>>> Has anybody come up with software that would transcribe
>>> a recording into MIDI?
>>
>> It is possible to do in a limited way. Zenph Studios has
>> a technology that can extract a pretty damn good piano
>> transcription, IF given a clean track with nothing but
>> piano on it.
>
>If that's all we can do at the SOTA, then the OP's task is clearly still
>mission impossible.

That's a lot easier to do that separating an arrangement too. But it's
also something I would never have believed possible a decade ago. Give
it another twenty or thirty years and arrangement decomposition may well
become available.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[nitpik]

"Max Arwood" > wrote in message
et...
> With all the negative answers I thought I would add a positive one.....
> This would be very easy. You just call up Capital and as for the price to
> lease the original masters. Dump it on the computer and do what ever you
> want. Unless your budget is not in that range, if not hire some really
> good studio musicians.
>
> http://www.alivenetwork.com/bandpage.asp?bandname=(Beatles)%20Fab%20Beatles
> or
> http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=64755501
>
> Max Arwood
>
>
> > wrote in message
> ...
>> Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
>> separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
>> Tune/pitch correction or other fx?
>>
>> Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
>> has something like this reached the point of just making the right
>> adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?
>>
>> Thanks.
>
>



The Beatles music was mostly mastered on a 4 track machine. They did a lot
of bouncing to get the final mix.

[Phildo]

> wrote in message
...
> Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
> separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
> Tune/pitch correction or other fx?
>
> Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
> has something like this reached the point of just making the right
> adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?

It's very high-end technology but it is now possible. Interestingly enough
my cousin was working on a project to separate individual signals from a mix
a few years ago but this was for the military. I suppose the technology is
gradually filtering its way down to us, especially given the massive
increase in computing power since his team cracked the problem.

By the way, my cousin no longer works on that project but rather spends his
time designing nuclear weapons and working on particle accelerators these
days.

Phildo

[Netmask]

> wrote in message
...
> Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
> separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
> Tune/pitch correction or other fx?
>
> Is it that it would take a lot of tech knowledge to execute this or
> has something like this reached the point of just making the right
> adjustments in a program like Cakewalk, Pro Tools, etc.?
>
> Thanks.

The mathematical problems of analysis are daunting, confounded by musical
terms that would be difficult to resolve as an algorithm. For example many
years ago I posted an example mono wav file of 2 flutes and a piano. One
flute played melody and the other an obligatio whilst the piano tinkled
away! The object was to produce a midi file (yes the old can you convert a
wavefile to midi question, so I can rip off someone else's arrangement, the
underlying motif for the question!!!). Now the problem is how do you
separate a melody from an obligatio and a piano for that matter an
instrument that has more numerical harmonics attached as one goes down the
scale in contrast to most other instruments? Then how do you assign say the
fourth harmonic of a note from one flute with the other or an orphaned
12,526Hz harmonic - who gets it?

Now if you could extract a voice buried in a symphony orchestra or rock
group, that didn't sound like it was being phoned in from Pluto the security
and other spooks would *really* be interested!! In terms of the originally
poster I think this falls into the "myth" busted category for all practical
purposes. BTW even if my original recording was stereo it still doesn't
help much... As for the Beatles tapes as others have commented they were
mostly 4 track heavily overdubbed.....

[Michael]

sambodidley wrote:

> "Michael" wrote
> Okay... maybe it's a 10.
>>>> --scott
>>>
>>> Maybe even an 11. <g>
>>
>> So... if 10 is Nobel-worthy, then 11 must be God-like. :-)
>
> No, more so Spinal Tap like.<g>

Same, same. ;-)

[Dave Emory]

Nil wrote:
> On 30 Nov 2007, Chris Whealy > wrote in
> alt.music.home-studio:
>
>> You have some red paint, some white paint and some blue paint and
>> you mix them together to form a kind of pinky-purple.
>> Can you un-mix the paint back to the original colours?
>
> Or my favorite analogy: After you bake a cake, can you get the eggs
> back out?

Feed the cake to chickens, then collect the eggs that were "converted" from
cake.

[Doc]

On Nov 30, 9:30 am, wrote:
> Is there a way that a mono recording, (i.e. the Beatles), can be
> separated to isolate separate instrument/vocals and then apply Auto-
> Tune/pitch correction or other fx?


This isn't exactly what you're talking about but I've taken a
recording where the vocalist needed a little help and bumped it up a
bit sharp in a spot or two. Since she's much more prominent than the
band and they're not doing a lot to being with, it works. What you
mostly hear is her pitch being correct relative to the notes
immediately before and after, you don't really hear any issue with the
backing instruments, certainly nothing a casual listener is going to
notice.

[hank alrich]

Dave Emory > wrote:

> Nil wrote:
> > On 30 Nov 2007, Chris Whealy > wrote in
> > alt.music.home-studio:
> >
> >> You have some red paint, some white paint and some blue paint and
> >> you mix them together to form a kind of pinky-purple.
> >> Can you un-mix the paint back to the original colours?
> >
> > Or my favorite analogy: After you bake a cake, can you get the eggs
> > back out?
>
> Feed the cake to chickens, then collect the eggs that were "converted" from
> cake.

Yeah, okay, but have you seen what happens when chickens eat music?

--
ha
Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam

[hank alrich]

Scott Dorsey > wrote:

> Give
> it another twenty or thirty years and arrangement decomposition may well
> become available.

I think that a lot of what's passing for arrangment these days certainly
will decompose completely and fairly soon, too.

--
ha
Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam

[Cyberserf]

On Nov 30, 3:28 pm, "Arny Krueger" > wrote:
> "Travis Garrison" > wrote in
>
>
>
>
>
>
> > At the International Computer Music conference in Miami a
> > few years back, I recall attending a paper session
> > discussing this exact topic. The researchers took on the
> > task of separating out the two instruments from a Mozart
> > piano/violin duet. As this was a piece with a readily-
> > available score, the researchers knew in advance which
> > pitches and rhythms were present in each instrumental
> > part. The extraction was a matter of synchronizing a
> > MIDI score with the audio recording, and using that as a
> > guide to perform selective FFT bin extraction. In this
> > case, separating the violin from the piano met with
> > marginal success. The difficulties lie when the two
> > instruments occupy the same frequency range. An FFT
> > analysis will give you frequency content over time, but
> > cannot distinguish whether a certain frequency bin
> > originated with piano or violin.
>
> > The resulting extracted instruments were recognizable,
> > but both suffered from washy FFT resynthesis artifacts.
> > But still impressive. Give it a few more years and I'm
> > sure someone will crack this problem.
>
> YOu seem to be conversant with the SOTA in this area. Has anybody come up
> with software that would transcribe a recording into MIDI?- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

Not sure if this is close to what you are referring to, but, there are
a number of WAV/MP3 to MIDI converters:

http://www.widisoft.com/
http://www.pluto.dti.ne.jp/~araki/amazingmidi/

etc...ad infinitum...obviously, the more isoloated the recording the
better the resultant transcription. A solo Guitar, piano or bass line
works well, Jethro Tull, Thick as a Brick...not so well...but still
recognizable with most of these...well, the two or three I've tried.

Cheers, CS

[Noel Bachelor]

On or about Fri, 30 Nov 2007 15:32:50 +0000, Chris Whealy allegedly wrote:

> You have some red paint, some white paint and some blue paint and you
> mix them together to form a kind of pinky-purple.
> Can you un-mix the paint back to the original colours?

Paint the wall with that paint, even if it's badly mixed and swirly.
Then take a photo of that wall, and process it with filters to obtain
colour separations. Printers have been doing that for many years.

In audio terms though, that's more akin to basic crossover filtering, not
the separation of different sources with fully overlapping spectral
ranges.

Noel Bachelor noelbachelorAT(From:_domain)
Language Recordings Inc (Darwin Australia)

[Ty Ford]

On Tue, 4 Dec 2007 03:33:52 -0500, hank alrich wrote
(in article >):

> Dave Emory > wrote:
>
>> Nil wrote:
>>> On 30 Nov 2007, Chris Whealy > wrote in
>>> alt.music.home-studio:
>>>
>>>> You have some red paint, some white paint and some blue paint and
>>>> you mix them together to form a kind of pinky-purple.
>>>> Can you un-mix the paint back to the original colours?
>>>
>>> Or my favorite analogy: After you bake a cake, can you get the eggs
>>> back out?
>>
>> Feed the cake to chickens, then collect the eggs that were "converted" from
>> cake.
>
> Yeah, okay, but have you seen what happens when chickens eat music?
>
>

Chicken ****?

(not a personal attack)

Ty Ford

--Audio Equipment Reviews Audio Production Services
Acting and Voiceover Demos http://www.tyford.com
Guitar player?:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RZJ9MptZmU

[Dec [Cluskey]]

On Dec 2, 10:27 pm, "Netmask" > wrote:
> > wrote in message
>
> ...
>
>
> > Thanks.
think this falls into the "myth" busted category for all practical
> purposes. BTW even if my original recording was stereo it still doesn't
> help much... As for the Beatles tapes as others have commented they were
> mostly 4 track heavily overdubbed.....

Hi

Perhaps this is the time to ask a question [slightly off thread].

I have noticed in the past year or so that back tracks bought from
High Quality companies in the UK are hard to distinguish from the
original chart hits. In fact, some would seem to still have a
smidgeon of the star's lead vocal on.

I am constantly asked "is there software available that will simply
remove the orginal lead vocal and leave the backing intact?" My
answer is always on the lines of some of the posters to the original
question posed here.

However, they then point me toward the 'vocal remover' FX on Behringer
mixers that have FX built in. Oddly, I have never used one.

In trying to be all knowledgable about the questions, I bought a
software pack called 'Vocal Remover' by a company called
www.Make-Your-Own-Karaoke.com. The results were unusable. The
software operates the old 'out of phase' trick to remove the middle of
the stereo.

So my questions are these:

1) Have the High End back track providers now got access to a mix
(from the record companies) of current chart tracks with the lead
vocals removed? I personally always make various mixes of tracks I
produce or appear on for TV/Live PA/Radio work. They could get these
from the record companies?

2) Is there a definitive piece of software that can intuitively remove
the lead vocal cleanly from an existing stereo release and leave a
back track with no loss of quality [I personally doubt that]

3) Looking at it the other way, I hear lots of dub mixes using just
the clean lead vocal from Chart tracks. Again, have these guys got
access to the original multi track/computer files of Kylie, J Lo etc.
from the record companies? I'm not talking of remixes commissioned by
the record companies - just normal club DJ dub mixes.

I would be glad of any insight?

Dec [Cluskey]

PS: My chart career spanned exactly the time of the Beatles
beginnings and my band were the first to use double tracking for
vocals and overdubbing on 4 track for commercial release and
charting. I cannot take the praise for this - we worked with a great
USA producer called Shel Talmy, who introduced us to the
techniques ... difficult in those days when the multi track tape
machines had to be put into sel-synch mode to overdub or 'drop in'.
Shel also produced The Who and The Kinks, Fortunes etc. As a
coincidence, I lived at 54 Boston Place in London ... The Beatles
owned and used a studio, in a converted mews house, six doors away ...
strangely, I have never seen or heard it ever mentioned! Weird.

[Mike Rivers]

On Dec 5, 10:48 am, "Dec [Cluskey]" > wrote:

> 1) Have the High End back track providers now got access to a mix
> (from the record companies) of current chart tracks with the lead
> vocals removed?

Not likely unless they're stolen or it's the record company themselves
putting out the music-minus-vocal product. Dave Martin, who used to be
a frequent contributor here, had a long term project a while back to
record "sound-alike" backing tracks. As a musician, arranger,
producer, engineer, and working member of the Nashville music studio
scene, he had access to top flite musicians and arrangers who could
chart out any pop tune, and a band assembled from appropriate players
who were available could crank it out. You'd be hard put to tell it
from the original. And it only took an afternoon to do a few songs.

Point being that if you're good enough, you don't need the original
tracks, you only need to hear the finished song. There's no assurance
(and none is necessary) that the sound-alike used exactly the same
gear, settings, and patches as the original, but the goal was to sound
enough like it so that someone could sing along and feel like they
were in the right band, and that was accomplished efficiently.

> 2) Is there a definitive piece of software that can intuitively remove
> the lead vocal cleanly from an existing stereo release and leave a
> back track with no loss of quality [I personally doubt that]

No.

> 3) Looking at it the other way, I hear lots of dub mixes using just
> the clean lead vocal from Chart tracks. Again, have these guys got
> access to the original multi track/computer files of Kylie, J Lo etc.
> from the record companies?

Usually. But if the vocal is clean with nothing behind it (or nothing
that they can't use as part of the production), producers have been
known to "sample" existing product without permission. Sometimes with
permission, too. They're not all bad.

I'm not talking of remixes commissioned by
> the record companies - just normal club DJ dub mixes.
>
> I would be glad of any insight?
>
> Dec [Cluskey]
>
> PS: My chart career spanned exactly the time of the Beatles
> beginnings and my band were the first to use double tracking for
> vocals and overdubbing on 4 track for commercial release and
> charting. I cannot take the praise for this - we worked with a great
> USA producer called Shel Talmy, who introduced us to the
> techniques ... difficult in those days when the multi track tape
> machines had to be put into sel-synch mode to overdub or 'drop in'.
> Shel also produced The Who and The Kinks, Fortunes etc. As a
> coincidence, I lived at 54 Boston Place in London ... The Beatles
> owned and used a studio, in a converted mews house, six doors away ...
> strangely, I have never seen or heard it ever mentioned! Weird.

[Sue Morton]

Speaking strictly from my own experiences and observations, in one genre of
music. I have purchased hundreds of backing trax or "minus one" recordings
over the years, of contemporary Christian songs for church use.

1. Some of these are exceptional copycats, and while it can be discerned
these are not the original musicians and/or instruments, they are very close
and fool the average listener that is not intimately familiar with the
artist recording.

2. Some of these trax are of the original musicians but another recording
session, not the one that was made 'popular'. They sound slightly different
just as the copycat trax do, and the lead vocal is completely absent. In my
opinion these are a mix without the lead vocals added in.

3. On some of these trax you can hear the faint lead vocal's reverb in the
background. If I take the original artist recording and put it through the
old remove center of stereo image trick, my results sound very similar. In
my opinion that is exactly what I purchased, perhaps tweaked up a bit better
than I have done.

4. I have purcahsed "minus one" recordings that are without a doubt the
original artist's popular recording, and the lead vocals are entirely
absent. In those instances they are often marketed as "original artist
studio mixes". These seem to be the exact same airplay mix that became
popular, but without the lead vocal, and are generally the newer songs.
When the "minus one" church trax industry recently took off like wildfire
the studios responded with a very marketable by-product.
--
Sue Morton

"Dec [Cluskey]" > wrote in message
...
> I have noticed in the past year or so that back tracks bought from
> High Quality companies in the UK are hard to distinguish from the
> original chart hits. In fact, some would seem to still have a
> smidgeon of the star's lead vocal on.

[Dec [Cluskey]]

On Dec 5, 4:04 pm, Mike Rivers > wrote:
> On Dec 5, 10:48 am, "Dec [Cluskey]" > wrote:
>
> > 1) Have the High End back track providers now got access to a mix
> > (from the record companies) of current chart tracks with the lead
> > vocals removed?
>
> Not likely unless they're stolen or it's the record company themselves
> putting out the music-minus-vocal product. Dave Martin, who used to be


Appreciated

The concept of musos copying existing chart toons is fully accepted
[much like the cheap versions of chart tracks available for Woolworths
in the 60's] ... but I still cannot accept 'back tracks' offered for
sale by companies where the original 'star' vocal track can be
'slightly' heard ... it is weird!

I appreciate your view on chart lead vocals being isolated and then
used in dub tracks but it still does not definitively answer my
question: "are these solo tracks available from the record releasing
companies?"

Dec [Cluskey]

[Dec [Cluskey]]

On Dec 5, 6:37 pm, "Sue Morton" > wrote:
> Speaking strictly from my own experiences and observations, in one genre of
> music. I have purchased hundreds of backing trax or "minus one" recordings
> over the years, of contemporary Christian songs for church use.
>
> 1. Some of these are exceptional copycats, and while it can be discerned
> these are not the original musicians and/or instruments, they are very close
> and fool the average listener that is not intimately familiar with the
> artist recording.
>
> 2. Some of these trax are of the original musicians but another recording
> session, not the one that was made 'popular'. They sound slightly different
> just as the copycat trax do, and the lead vocal is completely absent. In my
> opinion these are a mix without the lead vocals added in.
>
> 3. On some of these trax you can hear the faint lead vocal's reverb in the
> background. If I take the original artist recording and put it through the
> old remove center of stereo image trick, my results sound very similar. In
> my opinion that is exactly what I purchased, perhaps tweaked up a bit better
> than I have done.
>
> 4. I have purcahsed "minus one" recordings that are without a doubt the
> original artist's popular recording, and the lead vocals are entirely
> absent. In those instances they are often marketed as "original artist
> studio mixes". These seem to be the exact same airplay mix that became
> popular, but without the lead vocal, and are generally the newer songs.
> When the "minus one" church trax industry recently took off like wildfire
> the studios responded with a very marketable by-product.
> --
> Sue Morton
>
> "Dec [Cluskey]" > wrote in message
>
> ...
>
>
>
> > I have noticed in the past year or so that back tracks bought from
> > High Quality companies in the UK are hard to distinguish from the
> > original chart hits. In fact, some would seem to still have a
> > smidgeon of the star's lead vocal on.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

Your point (4) would seem to point to the fact that UK record
companies seem to make 'back track' versions available?

There was a small period in the 80's where the second track on a CD
would be the back track with the lead vocal missing. This practice
has been dropped, but perhaps, the record companies make this service
available to interested parties? As they may do to dub artists when
they require just the original lead vocals with no backing?

Dec [Cluskey]

[Laurence Payne]

On Fri, 7 Dec 2007 18:20:30 -0800 (PST), "Dec [Cluskey]"
> wrote:

>
>The concept of musos copying existing chart toons is fully accepted
>[much like the cheap versions of chart tracks available for Woolworths
>in the 60's] ... but I still cannot accept 'back tracks' offered for
>sale by companies where the original 'star' vocal track can be
>'slightly' heard ... it is weird!
>
>I appreciate your view on chart lead vocals being isolated and then
>used in dub tracks but it still does not definitively answer my
>question: "are these solo tracks available from the record releasing
>companies?"

I guess you're in as good a position as anyone to use your contacts
and find out for us. Would you, please?

[Dec [Cluskey]]

On Dec 8, 11:49 am, Laurence Payne <NOSPAMlpayne1ATdsl.pipex.com>
wrote:
> On Fri, 7 Dec 2007 18:20:30 -0800 (PST), "Dec [Cluskey]"
>
> >used in dub tracks but it still does not definitively answer my
> >question: "are these solo tracks available from the record releasing
> >companies?"
>
> I guess you're in as good a position as anyone to use your contacts
> and find out for us. Would you, please?

Laurence ....

I have tried, trust me! I hate not having the full information on a
subject.

I either get a blank look ["don't understand what you are getting at,
Dec"] .... or a simple ["I don't know"].

Yet when I listen to a live dub show on UK Radio1, particularly the
'black' and Ragga major shows, I hear soloed voices from current chart
hits with mental rhythm tracks added.

Perhaps it depends on the importance of the dub DJ ... if he is a huge
name then the record companies would let him have any solo tracks he
wants ... that is my personal take on it. I reckon those DJs are
simply not going to give away their secrets?

Dec [Cluskey]

[Laurence Payne]

On Sat, 8 Dec 2007 08:57:36 -0800 (PST), "Dec [Cluskey]"
> wrote:

>
>Yet when I listen to a live dub show on UK Radio1, particularly the
>'black' and Ragga major shows, I hear soloed voices from current chart
>hits with mental rhythm tracks added.
>
>Perhaps it depends on the importance of the dub DJ ... if he is a huge
>name then the record companies would let him have any solo tracks he
>wants ... that is my personal take on it. I reckon those DJs are
>simply not going to give away their secrets?

Maybe. But generally there are far fewer conspiricies, fewer
"secrets" than people like to imagine :-)

[mcsteve]

"Laurence Payne" wrote:
> "Dec [Cluskey]" wrote:
>>Yet when I listen to a live dub show on UK Radio1, particularly the
>>'black' and Ragga major shows, I hear soloed voices from current chart
>>hits with mental rhythm tracks added.
>>
>>Perhaps it depends on the importance of the dub DJ ... if he is a huge
>>name then the record companies would let him have any solo tracks he
>>wants ... that is my personal take on it. I reckon those DJs are
>>simply not going to give away their secrets?
>>

> Maybe. But generally there are far fewer conspiricies, fewer
> "secrets" than people like to imagine :-)
>

Not that difficult if you're a working DJ. When I was a club jock,
I got service from two record pools, plus I would buy 12" singles
from some very good sources in NYC. More often than not, a 12"
DJ single had at least 4, and sometimes as many as 6, mixes
on one disc. There would typically be an 'a capella' mix included.
I'd do my own 'on-the-fly' remixes by having two copies of the same
record, and mixing back and forth between the different versions.
Easy enough to layer the a capella mix over the instrumental version.

These days, taking that same a capella mix and creating a whole new backing
track with computer based gear is pretty damn easy.

(not cross-posted to alt.audio.pro.live-sound, as this has nothing to do
with pro live sound)


--
Steve <snip> McQ

[Sue Morton]

Hi Dec,

>>>> Your point (4) would seem to point to the fact that UK record

Are you referring to my post? If so, I didn't mention any studios. In fact
the only trax I've purchased have been done here in the US, so I couldn't
say one way or the other about UK studios anyhow. Perhaps you were
referring to the OP's post and not my #4...?
--
Sue Morton

"Dec [Cluskey]" > wrote in message
...
>> On Dec 5, 6:37 pm, "Sue Morton" > wrote:
>> 4. I have purcahsed "minus one" recordings that are without a doubt the
>> original artist's popular recording, and the lead vocals are entirely
>> absent. In those instances they are often marketed as "original artist
>> studio mixes". These seem to be the exact same airplay mix that became
>> popular, but without the lead vocal, and are generally the newer songs.
>> When the "minus one" church trax industry recently took off like wildfire
>> the studios responded with a very marketable by-product.
>> --
>> Sue Morton
>>
>> "Dec [Cluskey]" > wrote in message
>>
>> ...
>>
>>
>>
>> > I have noticed in the past year or so that back tracks bought from
>> > High Quality companies in the UK are hard to distinguish from the
>> > original chart hits. In fact, some would seem to still have a
>> > smidgeon of the star's lead vocal on.- Hide quoted text -
>>
>> - Show quoted text -
>
> Your point (4) would seem to point to the fact that UK record
> companies seem to make 'back track' versions available?
>
> There was a small period in the 80's where the second track on a CD
> would be the back track with the lead vocal missing. This practice
> has been dropped, but perhaps, the record companies make this service
> available to interested parties? As they may do to dub artists when
> they require just the original lead vocals with no backing?
>
> Dec [Cluskey]

[Phildo]

"Dec [Cluskey]" > wrote in message
...
> The concept of musos copying existing chart toons is fully accepted
> [much like the cheap versions of chart tracks available for Woolworths
> in the 60's] ...

Little bit of trivia for you - those Woolworths records and their ilk was
actually how Elton John got started in the music industry and he appears on
quite a few of them.

I still have loads of them up in the loft which I haven't played for at
least 25 years.

Phildo