The best practice to record vocals is to record it dry. But most vocal artists are at their best when some effects are added that they can monitor while recording. It gives you a sense of being with the song when the effects are added. Recording dry vocals would obviously sound seperated from the underlying
music track.

Basically you can record the audio with the effects while tracking or just monitor the effects and record it dry.

To Monitor & Record Vocals with effects onto an Audio Track :-
Put the mic (input) into an Aux track and add the necessary effects. Bus it over to an Audio track & record enable the tracks. Turn the fader/slider down on the Audio track, as you don’t want to hear the sound from both Aux Track & the Audio Track. You can just monitor the Aux track with its effects. This way you will hear vocals with effects & also be able to record it simultaneously onto the Audio Track.

To Monitor Vocals with effects but ONLY Record Dry Vocals onto an Audio Track :-
Now, If you don’t want to record the effects, then run the mic(input) to both the Aux & the Audio Track, instead of bussing from the Aux to the Audio Track. This way you can still monitor through the Aux Track but ONLY record dry through the audio track, which serves the purpose to hear the effect while recording but not actually record them. You also don’t have to about auto input monioring using this method coz all of the monitoring is through the Aux Track & auto input monioring doesn’t affect the Aux Tracks. But make sure you turn the Audio Track faders down or you’ll be double feeding the stereo bus.

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In an analogue world, adding compression during recording is a good idea coz it helps to even out the signal levels and also maintains a very good signal-to-noise ratio. Vocals are basically audio tracks and compressing while recording vocals has to be done with real care, as it’s not easy to reverse the effects of overcompression.

So compressing in the digital domain while recording will have no audible benefits over doing this same processing in the mix down. With that said, its probably best left to handle compression during the mixing stage than tweaking at the tracking stage itself.

So the best suggestion would be to not do any compression on vocals while recording and its always advisable to add compression only during the mix down.

Well, at least cases, a little compression could be added during recording, only if the recording vocalist(s) finds it comfortable to produce good results.

I hope this post helps you to create great music from your home studio. Please do pass on your comments and feedback and pls also subscribe to this home studio blog site, to get automatic updates about Music Production Tutorials videos on Editing, Mixing, Mastering techniques using industry products like Pro Toools 8, Reason 4, Reason 5 & Record 1.5

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The upgraded Dr. Octo Rex loop player loads eight REX loops into one player and lets you switch between them on the fly. This makes arranging a breeze – load the drum loops into one player, the guitars into another and use the sequencer to select what loop to play in a pattern-like fashion.

With eight loops to switch between, the new loop player also comes ready for the experimental minded. Set the player to retrig the loops on the beat, on the bar or on the 16th note. Or program the loops manually like in the original rex player.

For each of the eight loops, the new rex player also comes with an expanded set of per-slice settings. Set pan, pitch, filter frequency and level, reverse slices, use multiple outputs, create alternating groups of slices and much more.

BLOCKS

Many musicians tend to think of music in terms like intro, verse, chorus, breakdown, buildup and so on. With the new Blocks mode in Reason 5 and Record 1.5, your sequencer does too.

Blocks lets you sequence your songs using a more pattern-based approach, with the segments of your song as individual building blocks to be laid out in your arrangement.

Start by creating the discrete parts of your song in blocks mode. When you are ready to start building your song, just switch back to song mode and draw in what blocks should play in the dedicated pattern lane. Use one block for the verse and one for the chorus — or build your song around a single 8-bar loop.

Blocks provide a very fast way of creating a musical structure for your song. But the options don’t end there. With the basic arrangement laid out, you can see the contents of the blocks and create variations and mute individual parts, or add further musical elements in song mode.

A typical use for Blocks is to create your backing track in blocks and then use the song mode sequencer to record vocals or instrumental performances. For music based around a single looped section, one repeated block with automation and mutes of individual tracks added in song mode makes arranging a breeze.

You never have to commit to using either mode – you are free to move back and forth between Blocks and Song mode, and any changes you make in your Blocks will instantly be manifested in all instances of that Block. Need some tambourine on that chorus? Add it, and there will be tambourine whenever the chorus block is playing.

Neptune Pitch Adjuster

Getting a vocal performance right means so much more than hitting the right notes at the right time. Sometimes you get that almost perfect performance with perfect feel and presence, but the singer might have missed a few notes. That’s when Neptune can save the day. Neptune is an advanced pitch adjuster, audio transposer and voice synth for Record 1.5.

As a pitch adjuster, Neptune will fine tune the pitch of an audio track to help getting your vocal performances just right. Neptune will fix the flat notes with an unbelievable audio quality . You can select a root key and a scale that you want the adjuster to use, or create a scale that fits your song. And, yes. By cranking the pitch adjustment settings to the max, you can get that effect sound too.

Neptune is also a natural sounding audio transposer. This is a great help if you ever needed to change the key of a song that’s already been recorded.

Perhaps the most creative-sparking function in Neptune is the voice synth. Play your MIDI keyboard and Neptune will create new harmonies from your vocal tracks in real time, or use it without the original voice to completely change the melody of the song. Endless creative options!

Live Sampling

Remember the time when samples were something you sampled and not loaded from your hard drive? When a sampler was a machine that could record samples, not just play them back.

As samplers became software instead of machines, they came to rely on external sample editing software for recording and editing the samples and the art of spur-of-the-moment creative sampling was pretty much lost. Now we are bringing it back to Reason 5 with its live sampling input.

All sample players in Reason are now samplers. Just hook up a sound source to the rack’s sampling input and you are ready to start sampling. Use a mic, a turntable, an instrument or the entire Reason mix.

Kong Drum Designer

Analog synthesis, physical modeling, sampling, REX loops, support sound generators, effects, flexible routing, multiple hit types and more. The Kong Drum Designer is not your regular drum module. It’s the drum module focused on letting you get exactly that drum sound you’re after.

Kong has 16 pads and 16 drums. Build your drum sounds based on any of the nine different drum modules. Flavor the sound with 11 support generators and effects. Program automation, create alternating groups and let Reason’s powerful sequencer control the beat.

Reason 5 ships with a sound bank with a generous supply of kits for Kong across a wide variety of styles.

I hope this post helps you to create great music from your home studio. Please do pass on your comments and feedback and pls also subscribe to this home studio blog site, to get automatic updates about Music Production Tutorials videos on Editing, Mixing, Mastering techniques using industry products like Pro Toools 8, Reason 4, Reason 5 & Record 1.5

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1. Send your vocal tracks to two mono aux sends.

2. The first Aux send has an EQ with a high pass set around 6-8khz, and a compressor set with a low threshold and fast attack and release. Mix that back in with the vocal to add a bit of air.High frequencies are attenuated as they travel through the air much faster than lower frequencies, so anything you want to sound “in your face” needs extra high end.

3. The second Aux send is for a plate reverb with as many early reflections as possible. The idea here is to get the vocal to sound as wide as possible. You want to avoid a vocal that images to a single point. The vocal needs to be wide to sound close and clear. The thumb rule is, the wider it is, it sounds closer to the listener and skinny sounds are farther away.

4. Later, you can always adapt your vocals to add any special effects. Normally I use 3 reverbs (small, medium and long) and a plate verb for the vocals.

Have fun recording/mixing your vocals.

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