If I wanted pro mixes in 2025, this is what I’d do [FULL BLUEPRINT]
Mastering․com・39 minutes read
To achieve professional-quality mixes, one must prioritize training their ear, developing taste, and mastering core fundamentals, with structured practice and reference tracks playing key roles in this process. By focusing on consistent learning and personal motivation, aspiring producers can significantly enhance their skills and quality of work without needing an exhaustive amount of time.
Insights
- To achieve professional-quality mixes in music production, it is essential to focus on three key areas: training your ear, developing your taste, and identifying problems in your mixes, as highlighted by experiences from students at ming.com’s audio school. This involves actively listening to mixes to diagnose issues and using structured ear training resources like SoundGym to enhance your listening skills.
- Mastering the fundamentals of mixing, including volume balance, EQ, and compression, is crucial, as these basic elements account for 80% of a mix's quality. Engaging in consistent practice and setting personal challenges, such as completing a specific number of mixes using only basic tools, can significantly accelerate skill development and lead to a professional standard in music production without relying on complex techniques.
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Recent questions
What is ear training in music?
Ear training in music refers to the process of developing the ability to identify and understand musical elements through active listening. It involves recognizing pitches, intervals, chords, and rhythms, which are essential skills for musicians and audio engineers. By training the ear, individuals can diagnose issues in their mixes, such as frequency imbalances or tonal qualities, leading to better mixing decisions. Resources like SoundGym can aid in this training by providing exercises that gamify the learning experience, making it engaging and effective. A structured ear training schedule can further enhance these skills, allowing musicians to recognize problems before they even reach for mixing tools.
How can I improve my mixing skills?
Improving mixing skills involves a combination of practice, education, and experience. First, mastering the fundamentals of mixing—such as volume balance, EQ, and compression—is crucial, as these elements account for a significant portion of a mix's quality. Engaging in continuous learning through tutorials, courses, and hands-on practice can help refine these skills. Additionally, using reference tracks can provide a benchmark for quality and help calibrate your taste. Setting personal challenges, like completing a certain number of mixes with basic tools, can reinforce discipline and accountability. Ultimately, consistent practice and a focus on core principles will lead to significant improvements in mixing abilities.
What are reference tracks in mixing?
Reference tracks are professionally mixed songs that serve as benchmarks for audio quality and mixing decisions. They help producers and engineers calibrate their taste and provide an objective standard against which to measure their own mixes. By analyzing reference tracks, one can identify specific qualities, such as frequency balance and dynamic range, that contribute to a polished sound. However, it’s important to use these tracks as a guide rather than a template; the goal is to inform your mixing decisions while maintaining your unique sound. This practice can significantly enhance the quality of your mixes and help bridge gaps in your audio production skills.
What is the importance of developing taste in music production?
Developing taste in music production is essential as it influences the decisions made during the mixing process. Taste helps producers determine what sounds are desirable or harsh, guiding choices related to EQ, effects, and overall mix balance. This skill evolves through extensive listening, analyzing various genres, and creating tracks, allowing individuals to instinctively understand their sound preferences over time. Engaging with a wide range of music and critically assessing different mixes can accelerate this development. Ultimately, a refined taste leads to more informed and creative mixing decisions, resulting in a professional-quality sound that resonates with listeners.
How can I set goals for music production?
Setting goals for music production involves identifying specific, measurable objectives that align with your aspirations in the field. A practical approach is to aim for milestones, such as completing a certain number of mixes or tracks within a set timeframe. For instance, aspiring producers might target finishing 100 songs, which encompasses writing, recording, mixing, and mastering. This aligns with the concept of the 10,000-hour rule, suggesting that consistent practice leads to skill enhancement. Additionally, understanding your personal "why" for pursuing music production can provide motivation and clarity, helping you navigate challenges and maintain passion throughout your journey. Engaging in collaborative projects can also enrich the learning experience and foster creativity.
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Summary
00:00
Mastering Mixing Skills for Professional Quality
- To achieve professional-quality mixes in 2025, focus on three core ingredients: training your ear, developing taste, and identifying problems in your mixes, as emphasized by the experiences of students at ming.com’s audio school.
- Training your ear is crucial; it involves actively listening to mixes and diagnosing issues, such as identifying frequency changes, like a 5 dB boost at 2 kHz, which can significantly alter the sound of a track.
- Utilize resources like SoundGym, which offers a free version for ear training, allowing users to gamify their progress and improve their listening skills, essential for identifying problems in mixes.
- Develop a structured ear training schedule that outlines daily practices to enhance your listening abilities, enabling you to recognize and address issues before reaching for mixing tools.
- Taste is equally important; it guides your decisions in mixing, allowing you to determine whether a frequency boost is desirable or harsh, and it evolves through extensive listening and mixing experience.
- Use reference tracks to calibrate your taste and provide an objective standard, but avoid copying them directly; instead, let them inform your mixing decisions while maintaining your unique sound.
- Understand that mixing is subjective; decisions about levels, EQ, and effects depend on personal taste and the genre of music, which can vary widely among different producers and engineers.
- Analyze your mixes against reference tracks to identify gaps in quality and determine specific steps needed to bridge those gaps, recognizing that sometimes the source material may not be sufficient to achieve the desired sound.
- For practical application, consider specific adjustments made during mixing, such as enhancing a snare sound by boosting high frequencies (5 dB at 22 kHz) and cutting harshness (7 dB in the upper mid-range) to achieve a fuller sound.
- Engage in continuous learning and practice, as the combination of trained ears and developed taste will enable you to make informed decisions in your mixing process, ultimately leading to professional-quality results.
15:12
Mastering Mixing Fundamentals for Quality Production
- The mixing process involves decisions that can affect the placement of elements in a mix, such as using effects to push the snare further back while considering the mastering process to avoid excessive transients that can consume headroom.
- Techniques like using a bit crusher can add an aggressive sound to snares, enhancing their body and excitement, a method suggested by a producer named Danne, which the speaker had not previously employed.
- Developing taste in music production requires extensive listening, analyzing, and creating tracks, which helps in instinctively understanding sound preferences over time, a process that cannot be rushed and may take years to refine.
- Mastering the fundamentals of mixing, including volume balance, EQ, and compression, is essential for achieving professional-quality mixes, with the speaker emphasizing that 80% of a mix's quality comes from these basic elements.
- The speaker highlights that advanced techniques, such as multiband compression and dynamic EQ, account for only about 5% of the mixing process, as they are used to solve specific problems that may not always be present in every mix.
- A practical approach to mastering fundamentals involves focusing on EQ, compression, and volume balancing, which can significantly improve mixing skills without getting distracted by complex plugins or tricks.
- The speaker compares learning mixing techniques to learning an instrument, stressing the importance of understanding core principles rather than just memorizing surface-level tricks, which can lead to a lack of creativity and depth in mixing.
- To truly master mixing fundamentals, one should engage in consistent practice, focusing on the frequency spectrum, volume dynamics, and the relationship between instruments, which will enhance overall music production skills.
- Setting personal challenges, such as completing a certain number of mixes using only basic tools before investing in advanced plugins or hardware, can help reinforce discipline and accountability in the learning process.
- Ultimately, achieving professional-quality mixes requires dedication to practice and a commitment to understanding the foundational elements of audio, as there are no shortcuts to mastering the craft.
29:48
Mastering Music Production in One Year
- The learning period for mastering music production can be compressed from decades to as little as one year with structured guidance, hands-on help, and mentorship, emphasizing the importance of mastering fundamentals and developing good habits.
- Malcolm Gladwell's concept of 10,000 hours to achieve expertise translates to approximately 10,000 mixes or 5,000 mastered tracks, with an average mix taking about 10 hours and mastering a track taking around 1 to 2 hours.
- Completing 100 songs, which involves writing, recording, mixing, and mastering, is a practical goal that aligns with the 10,000-hour rule, suggesting that self-producing artists should aim for this milestone to enhance their skills.
- To reach a professional standard in music production, focusing on the 20% of work that yields 80% of the results is crucial; this includes training taste, mastering fundamentals, and consistently practicing.
- Achieving a professional sound that passes the "Spotify test" does not require 10,000 hours; instead, dedicating time to complete 200 mixes in a year or finishing 20 tracks can significantly improve skills and sound quality.
- The first 2,000 hours of practice yield the most significant improvements, while the remaining 8,000 hours are needed to refine skills and achieve top-tier quality, emphasizing the importance of early, focused practice.
- Identifying a personal "why" for pursuing music production—beyond fame or money—can provide motivation and clarity, helping individuals navigate challenges and maintain passion throughout their journey.
- Engaging in the music-making process and collaborating with others can start immediately, reinforcing that the journey itself is often more fulfilling than the end goal, and focusing on this can alleviate feelings of impatience and self-doubt.
