zbd1960 Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 As a rule I don't listen to what is loosely called 'pop' music... Some years ago I was on holiday in the Greek islands and I stopped at the bar on the way back from a walk to pick up a bottle of water. The bar was empty and there was a big screen playing music videos. A well-known 'girl band' was on with one of their main numbers. This would have been around early 2000s. The volume was up and this is not something I would have really ever listened to. I was shocked at how badly out of tune it was - excruciatingly so in places. At the time, I was singing with various sizes of choirs and singing in concerts from local churches, to the odd cathedral to big concert hall (all as an unpaid amateur). If we'd have sung that poorly, we'd have been embarrassed and given a rocket by the MD... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wateroftyne Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 4 minutes ago, BigRedX said: Some harsh truths: The vast majority of commercial recordings made in the past 20 years will have had some degree of pitch correction applied to at least one of the parts. I doubt this will be a surprise to anyone on BC… Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigRedX Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 (edited) 33 minutes ago, wateroftyne said: I doubt this will be a surprise to anyone on BC… Really? Didn't sound like it from some of the comments on here. Edited May 9, 2021 by BigRedX 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Downunderwonder Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 Just checking in on the NZ version of The Masked Singer. Holy cow the auto tune is helping out. Judges wowed. Meh. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
leftybassman392 Posted May 9, 2021 Author Share Posted May 9, 2021 (edited) On 09/05/2021 at 04:02, wateroftyne said: No, the old way was to sing it right in the first place (or drop in… but still sing it right.) Yes of course, you're right about the drop-in. I've been spending too much time editing the spoken word lately. Sorry about that. Edited accordingly. Be that as it may, you've still adulterated the original vocal. You could argue that at least it's still the singer singing the note, but the point has already been made by me and several others that note manipulation in commercial recordings is so common as to be ubiquitous, and if done well is completely transparent to the listener with no artefacts to give the game away (and it's still the singer singing). Easier for the singer; easier for the engineer; easier for everybody. If it could be done digitally to the point where nobody could tell the difference, is there any reason beyond personal pride not to do it? ETA: As a bit of an afterthought, if you really are lucky enough to work with singers who never, ever, get anything wrong then you are fortunate indeed. Not a dig by the way; I've worked with some very talented singers, but IME everybody messes up once in a while. Edited May 10, 2021 by leftybassman392 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
leftybassman392 Posted May 9, 2021 Author Share Posted May 9, 2021 (edited) Time for a bit of light relief I think... Technically it's a thread hijack, but then again it's my thread, so WTF! Pretty sure there's no pitch correction here... Edited May 9, 2021 by leftybassman392 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
diskwave Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 A rant. Pitch correction has nothing to do with what makes great music....sorry but it really is BS. I mean what does it mean exactly if ur voice sounds like a micro managed robot? Did Motown, Philly Soul or any of the other greats from yesteryear use this nonsense?.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
leftybassman392 Posted May 9, 2021 Author Share Posted May 9, 2021 (edited) ...aaand we're back to business. Edited May 9, 2021 by leftybassman392 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
diskwave Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 13 hours ago, wateroftyne said: Just sing it right in the first place. Lazy buggers. Absolutely, or how about this for a crazy radical idea. Maybe sign artists that have talent and who can actually sing....I know way out huh? Still it may catch on...well see. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cato Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 2 minutes ago, greavesbass said: Did Motown, Philly Soul or any of the other greats from yesteryear use this nonsense?.... They didn't use pitch correct but I'd bet they used overdubs where the artist went out of tune. There's in an interesting piece here about how Motown recorded their vocals. https://www.musicradar.com/tuition/tech/how-to-record-motown-influenced-soul-vocals-432250 There's a fair bit more to it than just a singer and a microphone going straight onto tape. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Munurmunuh Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 9 minutes ago, greavesbass said: Maybe sign artists that have talent and who can actually sing....I know way out huh? The producer leans back in his control room chair and thinks, either I can hire an okay singer and tart things up with this software I've already paid for.... or I can shell out for real talent, and spend time capturing them at their very best.... gosh this is a tricky one.... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
leftybassman392 Posted May 9, 2021 Author Share Posted May 9, 2021 6 minutes ago, Ricky Rioli said: The producer leans back in his control room chair and thinks, either I can hire an okay singer and tart things up with this software I've already paid for.... or I can shell out for real talent, and spend time capturing them at their very best.... gosh this is a tricky one.... Sorry bud, but with the best will in the world I have absolutely no idea what point you're making here. On one level I admire your passion, but the reality of modern recording is that pitch correction gets used all the time in a wide variety of situations; a point that has already been made several times by several people. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dad3353 Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 59 minutes ago, leftybassman392 said: Time for a bit of light relief I think... Technically it's a thread hijack, but then again it's my thread, so WTF! Pretty sure there's no pitch correction here... ... I'm more interested in watching how they each react to the rhythm. All sorts of foot-tapping. The 'bone man has his own notion..! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dad3353 Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 There's different 'levels' of singer (and other musicians...), depending on genre. A rap artist would get short shrift at an operatic audition, and vice versa. There's not a lot of DB players here that work in symphonic orchestras, but do well as blue-grass players. What is suitable, or even required, of a pop artist is not the same as a jazz artist, or folk. It's not much cop to compare, still less judge, their respective merits and foibles. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wateroftyne Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 4 minutes ago, Dad3353 said: There's different 'levels' of singer (and other musicians...), depending on genre. A rap artist would get short shrift at an operatic audition, and vice versa. There's not a lot of DB players here that work in symphonic orchestras, but do well as blue-grass players. What is suitable, or even required, of a pop artist is not the same as a jazz artist, or folk. It's not much cop to compare, still less judge, their respective merits and foibles. It’s a shame when the likes of Alison Krause become obsessed with it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dad3353 Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 2 minutes ago, wateroftyne said: It’s a shame when the likes of Alison Krause become obsessed with it. Never heard her, or of her. I rather think Janis Joplin would have sneered at the notion, and I'm pretty certain Grace Slick never used pitch correction. Joni Mitchell neither; there are some very 'interesting' high-note reaches on a few tracks. It's all up to the artist and the producers, really, and the final decision is whether anyone will buy the stuff produced. The rest is all just talk and bluster. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wateroftyne Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 It’ll take you two seconds to Google her…! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neilp Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 On 08/05/2021 at 00:06, leftybassman392 said: This topic has come up a number of times in various threads that I've been involved in recently. Perhaps we should have a proper argument conversation about it. For the benefit of anybody who has recently arrived here from Mars, pitch correction is a studio effect that functions to massage vocals slightly to ensure correct pitching of notes. It's best known as a way of correcting slightly off-pitch vocals, but it can and regularly does work with all manner of pitched notes from pretty much any tuned instrument. Additionally, current versions are capable of numerous other functions - and uses - but we may or may not get round to talking about them here. Correcting pitch is what it does; it cannot compensate for dull or lifeless singing. Even within it's stated brief, there are limits to what it can deal with and still produce something of musical value; despite what I suspect many believe, it cannot be used as a get-out-of-jail-free card for any old tosh that's fed into it. There's more to being a good singer than (near) pitch-perfect note production. Many in and around the music industry have a very negative view of it's use, and it's not hard to find such commentary from a variety of industry sources. I don't doubt we'll see some links from time to time. Be that as it may, pitch correction has for many years been a ubiquitous studio technique that is in very widespread use: in truth you'll struggle to find many professional studios that don't use it on a regular basis. It's even available as a plugin on freebie DAW apps such as Garageband for Macs. At this point I'll refrain from putting my view up in any sort of detail, but suffice it to say that I don't look at it as heralding the death of 'real' music (whatever that may be) that some around here might. One caveat: I'm not here to defend pitch correction's honour. That said, I am aware that many people just don't like it. All opinions are valid in this thread, and even if I could (which of course I can't) I would make no attempt to censor opinions I don't agree with. Good arguments will speak for themselves. Over to the Basscht collective... I agree there is more to being a singer than good intonation, but there is a simple fact: If you can't sing in tune, you can't call yourself a singer. The other issue is the question of the odd slightly "pitchy" note. We accept those in live performances, and before pitch correction was available we accepted it in the studio for the sake of an otherwise gripping performance. Has it made anything "better"? Not in my opinion, any more than perfectly aligned drums and bass, with all the transients bang on the grid has. this stuff may be great for some forms of "music", but the more you remove the human element, the less musical it seems to me. Mind you, I'm one of the idiots who doesn't believe you should copy Ronnie Lane's mistakes, just because they are on the record, so what do I know!? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nail Soup Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 @leftybassman392 Thank you for a) the Tuba Skinny vid and b) the explanation of the difference between Autotune and Melodyne. I have a question about Autotune ..... if used as "set and forget" how does it handle glissando? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
diskwave Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 58 minutes ago, Ricky Rioli said: The producer leans back in his control room chair and thinks, either I can hire an okay singer and tart things up with this software I've already paid for.... or I can shell out for real talent, and spend time capturing them at their very best.... gosh this is a tricky one.... Famous quote from Pete Waterman....as if I care, but hey. " I dont need Kylie to sing she just has to get up there and look good" I rest my case. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dad3353 Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 30 minutes ago, wateroftyne said: It’ll take you two seconds to Google her…! As I did, or I'd never have known I'd not heard of her..! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dad3353 Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 9 minutes ago, Nail Soup said: ...if used as "set and forget" how does it handle glissando? Badly. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neilp Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 54 minutes ago, Dad3353 said: There's different 'levels' of singer (and other musicians...), depending on genre. A rap artist would get short shrift at an operatic audition, and vice versa. There's not a lot of DB players here that work in symphonic orchestras, but do well as blue-grass players. What is suitable, or even required, of a pop artist is not the same as a jazz artist, or folk. It's not much cop to compare, still less judge, their respective merits and foibles. I work in symphony orchestras, chamber music groups, rock bands, blues bands, soul bands and a folk trio. Out of tune is out of tune. Other technical considerations vary, I grant you, but tuning is not optional 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wateroftyne Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 13 minutes ago, Dad3353 said: As I did, or I'd never have known I'd not heard of her..! So at the time of typing, you had heard of her..? 😄 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
leftybassman392 Posted May 9, 2021 Author Share Posted May 9, 2021 1 hour ago, Dad3353 said: I'm more interested in watching how they each react to the rhythm. All sorts of foot-tapping. The 'bone man has his own notion..! I think he's brilliant! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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