I’m not going to go too heavy on this. It’s a bit of a dark art and, until you’re really practiced with mixing, I would recommend outsourcing to a mastering engineer or service such as LandR or Emastered.
What I will say is that mastering is that final polish to your music… oh, and it’s also what makes it loud! Having your output channel at a million dB will just come out and sound like farts. Keep a good amount of headroom and the mastering process will get that track cranked!
Say you have a great mix going; it has decent headroom, transients are punching out nicely, everything is cutting through nicely and sounds clear, and you’re happy with the environment the track sits in. You’re really happy with all of these things and think “that’s as good as I’ll get it… but it still doesn’t quite sound radio ready”.
Let’s look at how mastering can help.
A large part of the process is compression. Remember when we examined compression; the main idea was that we were squashing a wave down and, upon turning it up again, we revealed a higher level of detail. Mastering starts like this.
Keep in mind that your track is now nicely mixed, so we’re not in danger of just smashing it to bits by adding compression. All of the elements (transients, EQ, reverb etc…) are no longer fighting one another for space so, upon squashing the track, all of the details will subsequently amplify in the right order.
Now we can achieve a commercial volume level.
Mastering will then look at adding some shine to the track. This is done using a combination of harmonic enhancement, stereo imaging, gain saturation, and attenuating compression levels across different EQ bands.
Lastly, the track will then be ‘limited’. This applies a ceiling to the track, ensuring it can’t jump past a certain volume. Why? Because if your track goes past 0.0dB it will distort and all your hard work will be ruined!
Check out some examples of the difference between some raw, mixed, and mastered tracks here:
https://www.albertstebbingsmusic.com/producer
Thanks for taking time to read. See you in the next series!
About PIVODIO™ Coach Albert S.
Albert S. is a composer, producer, pianist, and guitar player based in St Albans, UK. He began playing the piano at the age of five and picked up the guitar when he was 11.
In addition to performing live, he is currently composing music for synchronization projects such as advert jingles and is preparing for his first film score in Autumn 2023. His client portfolio to date includes Once Upon a Time Agency, Altitude Film Studios, Monkey Shoulder Whisky, and BrambleTyne Games.
His skills encompass composition, writing, arranging, mixing and production, mastering preparation, improvisation on piano and guitar, advanced guitar techniques, and providing guitar tone ideas.
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