Topic: Normalizing,soft songs, and breaks between songs

[Denes]

When normalizing, do you normalize the entire set at once, or split the songs and normalize individually.  If you do individual songs, do you soften the soft songs, like bring in down a db or so?

Also, with live music, should I keep the space between songs natural, or cut out bits of silence.  I am new to posting on archive. 

I have been normalizing each song, I also keep the stuff between songs, except when they take a minute to get back onto the set.  I keep the talking or funny bits in and try to get some applause at the end of each too.

[page]

When normalizing, do you normalize the entire set at once, or split the songs and normalize individually.  If you do individual songs, do you soften the soft songs, like bring in down a db or so?

Normalize the entire set once.

Unless you get really good with audio processing, I'd advise not trying to correct softer/quieter songs. If there are major swings of more than 15db (RMS values) then I'd look at learning how compression works and apply it selectively.

Also, with live music, should I keep the space between songs natural, or cut out bits of silence.  I am new to posting on archive. 

I recommend leaving the original length and content in place. Culturally, there is a serious pet peeve in the live taping/trading world against editing out stuff just to create flow. As with all cultural norms, there are exceptions, but generally you won't find much support for editing out stuff between songs.

[cashandkerouac]

^^^agreed^^^

don't try to normalize individual tracks.  you'll get very obvious level changes from track to track, which would not be good to your ear holes. 

as for deleting (or editing) space between tracks i also prefer to leave the whole show in tact if possible.  i'll sometimes delete a portion of the encore break if it's a really long one.  in the case of a quiet acoustic show in which the crowd applause in between songs is much louder than the music, i will sometimes delete the clapping and join the tracks with fades.  it is my strong preference to control the applause levels in between tracks with an envelope filter, but (in my opinion) that doesn't always work.   

[TimeBandit]

on (semic)acoustic, like in theaters where the applause way louder i minimize volume via fader automation during the song breaks so they are like same level of the loudest part of music which appears. after that rendering this in a new file which runs through a normalization process. so applause and music fit good altogether.

[hoppedup]

If someone could write a plug-in to eliminate/reduce clapping, whistling, and chatter and offer it up as shareware, he could make tens of dollars.

[capnhook]

on (semic)acoustic, like in theaters where the applause way louder i minimize volume via fader automation during the song breaks so they are like same level of the loudest part of music which appears. after that rendering this in a new file which runs through a normalization process. so applause and music fit good altogether.

^Yep, this.  Good workflow..

[stevetoney]

^^^agreed^^^

don't try to normalize individual tracks.  you'll get very obvious level changes from track to track, which would not be good to your ear holes. 

I agree with everything stated here and would add that once you get familiar with compression, do a search on the term 'parallel compression' and you'll find an interesting discussion about a technique that can be used.  I haven't used it yet, but it's on my 'to-do' list for things to learn more about during the winter months when I'm bored with nothing to do.

That said, while I wouldn't try to 'normalize' individual tracks, I always use a sort of manual method of normalization that I think works fine.  It requires patience, but all you do it use the fade tool and level tool to transparently bring levels up and take them back down when you want them.  For example, in the case where there's an acoustic song or banter between songs that you want to bring the level up, just 'fade in' to bring the level up (might need to do the fade over a number of seconds so that the fade is transparent to the listener).  At the point where the fade- in stops, use your level tool to uniformly bring the level up the same amount as the level at the end of the fade-in.  At the end of the acoustic song, use the 'fade out' tool to take the level back to the original level.  Again, the fade should be over a number of seconds so that it's transparent.

As stated, this requires some patience if you have an entire show to do, but the technique works well and the sonic results are always more than acceptable.