From: rath@binah.cc.brandeis.edu
Subject: Re: MultiTrackin!
Reply-To: rath@binah.cc.brandeis.edu
Organization: Brandeis University
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 15:01:34 GMT

In article <14i9liINNa2f@network.ucsd.edu>, mbreen@sdacs.ucsd.edu (Michael Breen) writes:
>In article <1992Jul21.013640.21100@uniwa.uwa.edu.au> cday@tartarus.uwa.edu.au (Craig Day) writes:
>>quick rundown. Another thing ... 4 tracks makes for only 4 musical
>>elements right? - so how do I record a bass 2 guitar tracks, drums and a
>>singer????? - not enuff room???
>>
>>	Craig!
>>	Email:day_c@kultarr.cs.uwa.oz.au
>
>(lots of stuff deleted from above message)
>I'm posting this, 'cause I'm sure there's lots I won't say, but:
>
>No, I've heard a four track can (theoretically) record up to 16 parts.
>Record tracks 1-4, 'ping-pong' them down to track 1, then record tracks 2-4,
>down to track 2, record 3 and 4, down to 3, finally track 4.  That's 10.
>I think the way to get more is to keep ping-ponging away.  You lose the
>ability to re-mix this way.  Can anybody correct me on this?  I know it's
>not right.  I have a 4-track and have never tried this, but I hope to use
>a similiar technique soon to record a bunch of drums, ping-pong them to one
>channel, then add bass, git, vocals, horns using similiar ping-ponging.  How
>do I do this without losing clarity?
>
>
>Michael K. Breen
>singing and philosophizing
>(and bracing for a true lesson in 4-track multi-tracking...)


I have recorded up to about thirteen tracks with passable results 
for fun/demos--college stations will play the stuff, for whatever that's 
worth...

I record tracks 1-3 as cleanly as possible, and sometimes I begin with a dummy
track which has the basic frame of the song on rhythm guit and a drum beat, in 
which case you can then lay down three more tracks.  Then life gets tricky.
yoou have to decide where in the mix, both speaker-wise and volume wis that you
want the instruments that you have recorded so far.  then you record the 
fourth track, over the dummy track, if you had one, mixed perfectly with 
the other three tracks, giving you four channels recorded onto one, and leaving
three more to repeat the process with.

For mono, you don't have to plan as carefully on channel placement, 
but if you blow a level, you might not realize it until you are mixing
in later tracks, at which point it is too late--you have to mess with eq
and stuuf as best you can because say that bass drum is too loud, but
the bass guitar is not out front enough--oh, well ya gotta either live
with it, or start over.  For stereo, its best to use a flow chart of some sort.
I will usually record the basss and the basic drum soundsagainst a dummy 
track first, because these instruments don't pan well from one channel to 
another.  Think of two other things that you would not mind
having glued to the center of the mix (ie mono) for the other two tracks, 
or else treat your ponging like two- two tracks and go for an extra generation
in order to get the stereo separation.  
here's a flow chart from one song to give you an idea:

channel 1		2		3		4
bass&snare 	|dummy guit&vocal|	percussion	bass guit
	\	 ----------------	 /		 /
	 \__\	ch 1,3&4 plus	  /_____/_______________/
	    /	bckg vocs.a	  \			____new____
			|				dummy guit&voc
bckg vocs b		|				|____________|
	\_______________|_____________\ ch 1 plus
			|	      / lead guit
			|			\_______\ch 3 plus
			|				/ percussion
bckg vocs c		|					|
	\_______________|____________\ ch 1 plus		|
			|	     / rhythm guit		|
lead vocals		|		|			|
____|___________________|_______________|_______________________|_____
ch 1			2		3		4
lead vocals	bass&snare,		bckng voc c,	bckng vocs b,
		bass guit, 		rhythm guit	lead guit,
		percussion, 				percussion
		bckg vocs a


that's ten tracks, with two of then going to three generations.
during the mix to stereo, I glued track 2 pretty much to the middle,
leaving the lead vocs, rhythm guit and lead guit manipulable as to stereo 
placement.  a side effect is that the bckng vocs and percussion
attached to the guitars follow the guitars around in the mix, 
but these are all things that are down in the mix a bit--thta's
why there are so many backking voc tracks and percussions.  It worked out
pretty well, but I mixed the drums too loud in reference to the bass when 
ponging everything into ch 2.  I was able to fix this a bit by 
notching the snare out on my eq, but it was at the expense of the tone
that I had carefuuly tweaked before.
There's my  two tracks worth.
Rich.
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