How To Mix Music (Part 3):

Stereo Image & Mixing Tips

heroic.academy

H
ow To Mix Music is our essential guide to becoming a
music mixing professional. In this series I explain and
teach you – musicians, producers, and aspiring mixing
engineers – how to mix music. I share our years of experience and
insight on mixing and mastering, our best mixing tips, mastering
tricks and music production strategies. Covering the necessary
preparations, tools, underlying physics and insider tips and tricks to
achieve the perfect mix and master.
The first episode covers setting yourself up to become a great
engineer. We discussed monitoring, DAWs and plugins, composition,
and stem preparing.

The second episode covers organising your mixer, setting up your

signal flow, and understanding the essential plugins (EQ, compressor,
reverb, and delay).

In this third part we will cover how to improve your stereo image and
make your mix sound wider. Also, we cover how to use the essential
plugins to mix kicks and snares, the backbone of a song.
Cheatsheet: Quickly improve your Kick and Snare

Stereo image

Whenever I help people with their mixing, I always tell them to

imagine they are mixing in a space. In this space you have three
dimensions: stereo image, frequency spectrum, and depth.

If you are unfamiliar with this principle concept, please click the big
orange button above and download the complete PDF for free. In
these seven slides you will learn how this mixing space works, and
how it helped me and many other engineers, musicians and producers
to achieve better mixing results.

Stereo image is the difference between left and right, and mid and
side. The center of the mixing space is also known as “mid”. Left and
right are also known as “sides”.

A few years back I could not understand why my mixes sounded so

narrow in comparison to the reference tracks that I was listening to
from my idols. I was using stereo-wideners and big reverbs hoping to
get a wide and big-sounding mix, but instead it sounded messy and
actually not that wide at all.

It was only after the realization of a very simple concept that I finally
understood how a stereo image actually works.
This simple concept is that people listen to music in stereo. Two
ears: one left and one right. Two speakers: one left and one right.
Two earbuds: one left and one right.

If the left speaker emits a sound louder than the right speaker, this
sound appears to come from the left, and vice versa. If both speakers
emit a sound at the same volume, this sound appears to come from
the center.

Stereo is the difference between left and right. To create a

wide sounding mix, you need to establish differences between what
sounds come from the center of the space, what sounds come from
left, and what sounds come from right.

Panning

The easiest way to achieve this is by panning.

With the panning knob you can move a sound horizontally in the
mixing space. Turn the knob to the left and the sound will appear
from the left. Turn the knob to the right and the sound will appear
from the right. Easy.

With this knowledge you can place different elements of a song at

different places in the mixing space. By doing this correctly, your mix
will sound much wider as you are now creating differences between
left and right.

We will discuss how to place all different elements of a song correctly

in the mixing space further in this article and in future episodes.

Pro Tip: Make sure that elements with low frequencies – say, all
frequencies below 100Hz – are placed in the center of the mixing
space. By keeping the sides of your mixing space clear from low
frequencies, you prevent your mix from sounding muddy.

Cheatsheet: Quickly improve your Kick and Snare

Mixing different elements of a song (part 1)

So far in this series we have covered:

 • the basic equipment and tools you need to be able to mix
music;
• tweaks in song composition for a better mix;
• the understanding of the mixing space with frequency
spectrum, stereo image and depth;
• how to organize your mixer;
• and how the essential plugins work (EQ, compressor,
reverb, delay), and how you should line these up in your
signal flow.

In other words, we covered about everything you should know before

you start mixing the actual music elements.

Below I start explaining step by step how I and my fellow mixing

engineers go about mixing different types of elements of a song.

Please note that every song is unique and each mix should be treated
accordingly. However, below we describe the universal techniques we
have found to be contributing each time to achieve a great sounding
mix.

We start by mixing the kick and the snare – the backbone of almost
any song. Let’s go!

Mixing Kicks

Placement: Kicks (or kick drums) are most often rich in low
frequencies, therefore it is natural to place the kick in the center of
the mixing space.

EQ (cut): While it heavily depends on the sound of the kick that you
want to achieve, kicks are often an important element of a song
(especially in most electronic music) and require their full frequency
range. To define its frequency range we add a high-pass filter (HPF)
at around 20Hz to 40Hz, and a low-pass filter at around 15kHz to
20kHz.
Compression: As kicks are most often rich in low frequencies, we
often compress kicks heavier than other drums. This often makes it
easier to achieve a loud master later on.

We compress kicks by 2dB to 8dB with a ratio around 4:1. For a

punchy sound, we set the attack time of the compressor right after
the attack time of the kick. This is often somewhere between 10
milliseconds and 25 milliseconds.

As the sub-tails of kicks often differ, you should play around with the
release time of the compressor and find what sounds best. However,
do make sure that the compressor is back to 0dB before the next kick
sound occurs.

EQ (boost): Boosting frequencies should be done very delicately, we

rarely boost frequencies more than 3dB.

All kicks sound different and can be in different keys, however often
the following applies: boost around 50Hz to enhance the bass of a
kick, and boost around 100Hz to enhance the punch of a kick.

Only do this if that specific kick really needs it, and if you decide to
boost, try to do this in the note frequency of the kick.

Reverb: In these parts where I share our insights on mixing

different elements of a song, I talk about reverb as an effect
throughout the track in order to create a sense of space, not as a
miscellaneous creative effect.

Also, I will mention reverb of the overall space. With this I mean the
reverb that we have setup as main reverb to create one (large) space
in the mix. We have covered this in part 2 of this series, and I will
elaborate further on this in the coming episodes.

Having that made clear, we rarely add reverb on a kick, we often find
this unnecessary and therefore resulting in a less clear mix.

If we do use reverb on a kick, we send it to the drum reverb bus

where we setup a reverb of a small room, with a short reverb tail. In
some occasions this might give certain drums more body and a more
authentic feel.
Cheatsheet: Quickly improve your Kick and Snare

Mixing Snares

Placement: As snares are often an essential part of the core beat

throughout a song, they feel most natural when placed in the center
of the mixing space.

Sometimes, however with acoustic drum kits it might be fitting to pan

the snare slightly to the left to resemble the point of view of the
drummer. If you would aim to resemble a point of view of the
audience, you would pan the snare slightly to the right.

EQ (cut): Snares often have their lowest tones somewhere between

100Hz and 400Hz. To cut away unnecessary frequencies and create
space for the kick, we set a high-pass filter (HPF) right before that
frequency.

Depending on what sound you are going for, snares generally need
their high frequencies to sound bright in the track. Therefore, we
apply a low-pass filter (LPF) at the very peak of its frequency range,
around 20kHz.

Compression: Depending on what sound we are going for, we

compress snares most often somewhere between 1dB and 6dB with a
ratio around 4:1.

The more you compress a snare, the tighter it will sound. The less you
compress a snare, the more it will breathe. Aim for the sweet spot in
the middle.

To enhance the punch of the snare, same as with the kick, you set the
attack time of the compressor right after the attack time of the snare.
This is often somewhere in between 5 milliseconds and 20
milliseconds.

It often sounds great to have a short release time of the compressor

on a snare. We find that the sweet spot is often somewhere in
between 20 milliseconds and 100 milliseconds.
EQ (boost): A great way to give snares more body and a rounder
sound, is by enhance the ringtone with a notch filter. Slowly move the
boosted notch filter through the frequency spectrum to find the
ringtone, or identify the peak with a graphic visualizer.

Reverb: Snares often come really to life with a bit of reverb. This
can be the earlier mentioned drum reverb, or it might sound great in
the general space reverb.

You could also choose to create a new reverb especially for the snare
to create a specific sound. Some large plate reverbs can sound great,
as do large reverbs without low frequencies.

Side Note: If you’re using samples for your kick and snare, there’s a
good chance they’re already pretty compressed. Be sure to take this
into account when compressing these drums. Trust your ears! If
something is sounding over-compressed, turn that compression down.

Still having trouble with your kick and snare? Check out my free Kick
& Snare cheat sheet. Here I outline easy solutions to over 15 problems
that occur when mixing kicks and snares. Make your kick’s and
snares sound rounder, brighter and more powerful. Grab my cheat
sheet here:

Cheatsheet: Quickly improve your Kick and Snare

Note Frequencies

All musical notes have a specific frequency. In that regard, assuming

the musical elements of your song are all in key, each sound will have
volume peaks at these specific frequencies.

If you want to enhance the ringtone of a snare or another element of

your song, but you have difficulties finding the ringtone (the
frequency of the note that the snare is playing) by ear in your
equalizer, here is a cheat sheet of all frequencies (in Hertz) of musical
notes.

Our Essential Guide To

That concludes this episode of
Becoming A Music Mixing Professional series.
I hope you enjoyed this one. If this article was valuable to you and
you want to give other music producers, musicians or aspiring mixing
engineers a nudge in the right direction, feel free to share the link to
our blog.

In the next episode we continue with how to mix: claps, toms,

percussions, hi-hats, crashes and bass. More detailed mixing tips, and
a step by step approach to achieving great sounding drums.

Thanks again for reading the articles and sharing the message.

I am Tim van Doorne, it’s an honour to serve you. Stay motivated

to improve your sound, every single day!