Mixing Invercargill City Big Band

While mixing the songs, I had checked the phase of each mic to make sure there was no phase cancellation issue and a limiter to make sure the songs' integrated LUFS is approximately -16LUFS. I also left around 3 seconds at the end of each song to let the listener subside from the previous song and get ready for the next one. I hope that the listener would listen the album according to the order.

Mixing the Big Band, is the hardest part of making the album.

Firstly, is because I couldn't really find any other reference band/track while I was mixing. The Big Band is special, it isn't just the brass section, but also one woodwind instrument among them. On top of that the amount of the instruments are not balanced:

2 Alto Saxophones

2 Tenor Saxophones

1 Baritone Saxophone

3 Trumpets

and 1 Flute.

Besides, there are 1 Guitar, 1 Keyboard, drums and 1 vocalist. The drums don't play traditional Jazz beats as the band mostly plays pop songs.

During mixing, I was struggling to find the balance of the whole band. One of the reasons was because the microphone placements weren't perfect on the recording day. The other reason is because there was serious drum bleed in every of the stereo microphone. Therefore, when I tried to bring up the brass section's direct sound, I would bring up the room sound of the drums as well. This put me in a dilemma of either having a very 'roomy' drums sound or having a very quiet brass section in the mix. Besides, the conductor of the band needed to stand in front of the band but not facing the microphones as she needed to play her part as well. This led to the problem of adjusting the depth of the mix even more challenging.

Another headache was that there were too many instruments with shared frequency ranges. It made the whole mix cluttered and noisy. It would be better if they had a Bass Guitar instead of a Electric Guitar, since they have a keyboardist as well. But I'm pleased that it has a lot of warmth in the tone of the Electric Guitar, it kind of sits where a Bass Guitar would be in a mix and it actually compensates the hollowness of low frequencies in the mix.

As I was mixing, I was thinking maybe I should've placed Michelle (the lead vocalist) in the auditorium as well. Because in the mix, Michelle's vocal is quite prominent and it doesn't have the natural room sound as in the Auditorium. I think this is something worth experimenting with next time.

Volume Automation was being used in most of the Big Band's tracks.