Mix Your Own Tracks and Learn the Essentials of Cubase

Gain an overview of how to approach mixing drums by focusing on specific elements one at a time, to build up a solid foundation for a great mix.

Let's talk about "style".  Deciding on the music style at the beginning of the mixing phase will help us stay focused as we progress with our mix.  Defining the stylistic personality of our mix will keep us on track to making a great mix.

I'll introduce my preferred 3-plugin FX chain for drum mixing.  Then, I'll show you how to quickly duplicate this helpful FX chain onto all the drum tracks quickly and easily.

I'll explain how to ensure that your computer's full resources are being used by Cubase (so that you can have a better workflow).  I'll also explain how latency and buffer size are related to troubleshooting playback problems (audio dropouts).

We'll discuss how a gate is used in our reusable FX chain.  This is the first step in making our drum mix sound clear, crisp and articulate!  

In this lecture, I'll outline 2 principles for setting the correct compression settings on any sound.  Compression can be hard to learn and hard to hear by ear!  But, my 2 principles of good compression (based on perceived "closeness" and timbre) will make you a pro at using a compressor right away!

I'll walk you through applying EQ to the kick drum.  We'll use frequency spectrum monitoring tools built in to Cubase in order to gain insights into the right EQ settings.

Watch this hands on lesson and see how gating, EQ and compression can be set correctly on the snare recording from our stems collection.

Watch this hands on lesson and see how gating, EQ and compression can be set correctly on both the open and closed high hat.  I'll also demonstrate how inserts can be dragged to a different order.  Plus, we'll apply RMS compression and duplicate insert values from one channel to another using the Mix Console.

I'll demonstrate looping the cabasa region of our mix and copying the high hat inserts to the cabasa channel.  We'll see how the cabasa's unique frequency spectrum offers us an opportunity to feature it in the upper midrange.

The congas channel contains a new frequency range that we haven't seen before.  I'll demonstrate that sometimes very dramatic changes to an individual track can make it sit perfectly in the mix.  We'll use our compression to manage midrange and make the congas "pop".

Gain perspective on the unique challenges related to mixing instruments and harmony.  This lesson will provide an overview that will clarify what we'll do in this section of the course.

In this example, we are are going to organize our percussion tracks and start mixing the Fender rhodes track.  The goal here is to help the organic sound of a rhodes blend with the digital FM pad.

This lesson demonstrates using compression to change the timbre of a synth pad.  We also discover that we can help high-frequency percussive elements (high hat and cabs) gain clarity by scooping out a "space" for them in our harmonically rich pad sound.

This lesson introduces the Cubase Instrument Channel - a useful tool that combines MIDI with a virtual instrument.  This lesson is a step-by-step walk through for setting up an instrument channel.  We also talk about snapping audio events to other events to synchronize timing perfectly!

Recording your own audio into Cubase requires proper setup of an audio interface.  This lesson will explain how to use the Studio Setup and Studio Audio Connections to ensure that your audio interface is configured correctly for recording audio directly into Cubase.

This lesson demonstrates how to add a new audio track and configure it to record audio from you audio interface.  You can see how to properly record an audio event (which we'll use in future lessons for editing).  You can download my recording and import it into Cubase or you can record your own using these steps.

Watch how easy it is to trim an audio event to match our tempo "grid" by altering its start and end times.  

The next step is to edit our trimmed audio event and use crossfades in order to make sure that our timing is perfect.  After our edits are complete, I'll demonstrate how to replace our edits in the project with a freshly rendered (and time-corrected) audio event that we can pitch correct easily

In this lesson, you'll see how easy pitch correction is with Cubase's VariAudio feature.  This is one of the most valuable tools that Cubase includes.  It can be used to correct timing and pitch and we'll focus on its pitch-correction features here.

Watch how I create a 3-part vocal pad by duplicating our recording an using VariAudio to re-pitch each one to match chord tones from the chords in our main harmony.  This lesson includes a simple discussion of basic harmonic theory and triads.

Learn how to use send FX to add reverb and delay FX to multiple tracks easily.

Gain an overview of how to mix down our demo track by uniting topics throughout the course.  Here, we begin to create our "rough mix".

Mixing with faders is our first stop on the road to a "rough mix".  Learn how to set a loop with hotkeys and learn my preferred approach to setting good levels on each instrument.  I'll also show you how to link multiple channels for quicker mixing.

Learn how to use panning correctly to make more room in your mix.  This is a hands on lesson that demonstrates exactly how panning *should* be used to provide balance and depth to your mix.

Automation is a powerful tool that has the power to elevate every mix if used correctly.  This lesson demonstrates how Cubase can record automation based on your manual actions within the program.  This is the easiest way to implement complex automation based on "feel".

There are cases where recorded automation is NOT the best solution.  In the last lesson, we saw how powerful Cubase's automation record feature is, but this lesson demonstrates a simple way to manually apply automation that would be very difficult to record perfectly.

Watch this hands on demonstration of automating our delay FX.  We'll turn it on to create a cool effect on the last note of our composition.  This method of automating plugin parameters offers incredible potential - limited only by our creativity!

At this point in the course, we've demonstrated many, many powerful tools!  In this lesson, we'll encapsulate what we've learned by summarizing a broader outlook on mixing - based on the analogy of a conversation.  This is a great way to think about and understand a great mix.

Learn how to use the built-in side-chain capabilities within the Cubase compressor that we've been using throughout the course.  This lesson demonstrates a method for making the kick and synth bass "gel" better.

This lesson talks about why you'd want to test your mix in mono.  Learn what phase cancellation is and why it can suck the life out of an otherwise great mix!

Gain an overview of which tools we'll use to complete our final mix - by using multiband compression, stereo widening, levels and dithering.

Many of my studio clients wondered if Cubase was a pro-grade tool and I often had to defend it against Pro Tools.  In this lecture, I wanted to mention why Cubase was my choice in the studio  - even though my formal training was actually on Pro Tools!

Multiband compression is widely misunderstood.  Multiband is not an EQ or simply a compressor - its both!  This lesson will demonstrate how to use it to manage a balance across our frequency.  

Mid-side processing is setup differently in different DAWs.  Cubase requires some workarounds to configure the correct routing for Mid-Side processing, but it can offer a great mixing enhancement.  This hands on lesson contains a demo project and demonstrates how to setup Mid-Side routing on your own.

This lesson demonstrates the use of a free VST 3 plugin and how to apply simple Mid-Side EQ processing.  I'll also talk about the potential dangers of exaggerated Mid-Side processing.  This lesson will be easiest to follow if you're starting with the Mid-Side configuration from the last lesson (you can also download the project from the last lesson for a quick start).

Let's talk about loudness, preventing clipping and how to prepare your mix for a mastering engineer.

Now that we've completed our mix, let's look at our export options and understand the cababilities and prerequisites for bouncing out the right kind of finished file format.

Cubase has a very rich set of tools for creating hotkey combinations.  But, there are also many default hotkeys that we used all the time in this course.  In this lesson, I'll review all the hotkeys that I've settled on after years of working in the studio with Cubase.

Cubase (and any DAW or software) should be configured to use your computer's full power.  That way you're getting the most out of it!  In this lesson, I'll demonstrate a handful of valuable ways to get more power and smoother operation out of Cubase.

This bonus lecture is designed to enrich your learning experience and provide some new avenues of learning, if you're interested in learning more!  Coupon codes, link to musicprotest.com/cubase-students, links to articles, cubase project templates, Cubase Challenge outline (post link, invite feedback).