An Easy Way to Mix Backing Vocals
(and to Make Sure They Don’t Get in The Way of Lead Vocals)
Vocals are the thing that most listeners focus on and that’s a fact. Many a times backing vocals are thrown in the mix also. While they can sound great and bring so much to the arrangement, you don’t want to get in the way of the lead vocals. Lead vocal has to be the focal point.
So how to mix backing vocals so that they both sound amazing and stay behind the lead vocals? I’ll show you just that in this video:
The easy approach to mixing backing vocals is really simple: Copy the lead vocal EQ that you have in the insert spot of the lead vocal channel and add it to you backing vocal channel also.
You want to make backing vocals a bit thinner, so cut a bit more low end with low cut filter. Also make room for lead vocals high end by cutting some highs with high cut filter. Usually around 10k upwards is great. Use the low shelf to roll down even more low end from around 200 Hz downwards.
In case you have followed my advice, you have a presence boost in your lead vocal EQ. You want to take it off from the backing vocals EQ. This will make the lead vocal pop out more than backing vocals. You can also boost some high end with high shelf to make the backing vocals sound better.
After the EQ you can use compression with fast attack and fast release. This will make sure there’s no jumping consonants or anything else that will disturb the listener’s focus. Finally, copy over the same de-esser from the lead vocal channel and lower the threshold to really control the sibilance.
By doing all this, your backing vocals should sound good and stay behind the lead vocals in the mix.
Hopefully you found this post helpful. If there’s anything you want me to cover in the future videos let me know. Send me an email or leave a comment below. Ask if there’s anything unclear or if I left something out. Cheers!
