CD Mastering and Audio Mastering

You just recorded your first album, demo, or single and you're having mixed emotions, feeling extremely proud and enthusiastic, perhaps a little nervous, maybe even lost. Is it ready to be duplicated or replicated and passed on to the various radio stations, record labels, or music producers? Probably not! First ask yourself whether or not your new studio mixed CD sounds great or pretty good. If you answered pretty good, that will not cut it in the competitive world of the music industry. If you answered great, what are you measuring it against? How will the overall sound quality be if you just leave it alone compared to the competition? The real question should be, can my CD be made to sound any better? So now what?

The next step should be to locate someone who can professionally master your new CD/pre-master (see the article An Introduction to CD Mastering). How do you choose a professional CD mastering engineer that you can trust and not spend a fortune on? Well I'll spell it out for you, Discmasters. Discmasters should be the first people you contact. You will get a professional CD mastering engineer with 20+ years of experience, that provides top-notch friendly service that will take your CD to the next level. Their quality is bar none and very affordable.

You may be asking yourself why would I need someone to master my new CD after spending all that time, effort and money at the recording studio? It sounded great in the studio, didn't it? Depending on the mastering requirements of your music (to maximize audio impact & quality) Discmasters can offer you a free test master evaluation which will allow them to give you an accurate price quote. This also allows you to 'HEAR' the final mastering result and quality BEFORE you make any final decisions on mastering.

Mistakes happen during recording that create clicking, ticking, popping, humming, and other various background noises, that mixing can't fix. You need a cd mastering engineer to fix these and other problems. Once the CD mastering engineer is finished with mastering your audio CD, the final product will have the right amount of balance, a consisent level for each individual song, and those noises made during recording will be minimal if any. Now you will be saying this CD sounds great and can feel confident that this new release is ready to compete with all the big names in the music industry.

Discmasters services include: Data/Digital Conversion, Multimedia Authoring & Design, A/V analysis-editing & mastering. These and other techniques give consistency and an overall cohesiveness to assure your product's success! They can also duplicate or replicate your newly mastered CD, help with graphic design, by one of their prestigious graphic design artists, and even add upc codes or spine lables for that true professional look for retail purposes. They have done work for many different companies including Columbia Records, Sony Music Group, Warner Brothers, Disney, David Gilmour, John Fogerty, numerous other major and independent recording artists just to name a few. Give them a try - You will not be disappointed!

Posted by Brian at 11:33 PM | Permalink

What's an audiophile you ask? It is simply the word to describe a person dedicated to achieving very high standards in the recording and playback of music. A professional audio mastering engineer plays a vital role in the success of a recording. They can fine tune a recording so it appeals to all audiences and this is exactly what Walt Disney strove for. His high standards, expectations, and hiring of the right people (the best cd masters), has been passed on with much evidence.

Walt Disney Records is celebrating 50 years of achieving great success with their family audio entertainment business. This company appeals to the whole family, especially toddlers, kids and teens. It's not everyday a record label comes along and can boast about such outstanding achievements. They have earned hundreds of gold, platinum. and multi-platinum awards and several releases have hit the top-selling singles and soundtracks of all time.

To help celebrate their previous achievements and this significant mark of 50 years of recording they have created a much to talk about exhibit called "Disney:The Music Behind the Magic". This exhibit will display some of what has made Walt Disney so successful in the past 80 years. The exhibit will open on November 5, 2006 at the Experience Music Project in Seattle,Washington.

Also Walt Disney Records have plans to do some re-mastering of their timeless classic soundtracks. This re-mastering project will go back to help preserve some of WDR's rich musical history. The best way to approach this project will be to use their professional mastering engineers to digitally transfer and restore the earliest of classic recordings.

Posted by Brian at 06:42 PM | Permalink

I can not imagine any musicians primary goal when having their cd mastered is to have loudness be their number one priority. The amount of time, effort, and money a musician goes through, to write and compose songs, have them recorded and put into a two-track stereo mix (the "pre-master"), and finally professionally mastered, should not be wasted on trying to sound louder than cd's from competing artists. Why would these musicians sacrifice dynamics, quality, and harmonic sweetness just to sound louder? What do they think a volume control on any stereo or playback equipment is for?

Even with technology today in regards to software ( iTunes or Windows Media Player ), that have features that calculate the perceived loudness of a CD, certain record labels persist in making their releases even louder! The ultimate goal should be to master a CD with everything balanced so the consumers listening experience is one of complete enjoyment from beginning to end, no matter what playback system they are using.

Bottom line is it seems the consumer is less critical and maybe just accustomed to the way their favorite artists are releasing their CD's these days. The best thing that any musician can do is to leave it in the trusted hands of a professional audio mastering engineer. The true quality of the music and the artists performance defines success and will ultimately make or break the album. However a true professional mastering engineer will take any musicians studio recording and fine tune it so it has clarity, good dynamics, diminished noises, relative level adjustments, and a final added polish to make the well recorded project shine.

For further information on CD mastering contact us at Discmasters-CD Duplication

Posted by Brian at 10:34 PM | Permalink

The facility used to master the CD is nearly as important as the engineer. CD mastering facilities are distinct from recording studios, and while a facility can include both recording and mastering equipment, most high-end CD mastering facilities are separate. The type of equipment used in different CD mastering facilities varies greatly. Some facilities use all analog equipment; others only use digital gear, while others have both kinds of devices.

Many CD mastering engineers think it is a good idea to use a different facility for recording and mastering. Furthermore, many believe that it is advisable for completely different people to record the CD and to master it so that the artist has different people provide feedback. It is always smart to get some fresh ears to give input that the producer and mixer of the recording may not think of. Of course, the recording artist should have a hand in all aspects of the production, from recording through mastering.

CD mastering facilities differ from recording studios in some very important ways. Mastering facilities are not usually acoustically designed in the same ways that recording studios are. For instance, mastering studios usually have large consoles and monitoring devices that would impede recording. There is usually less variance in the gear found in mastering studios.

CD mastering facilities normally have either analog or digital gear. While both types have their advocates and detractors, either type can be used to create great sounding CDs. Analog equipment is more old-fashioned, but creates warm, organic sounds. On the other hand, digital technology has begun to replace analog in most areas of production, and many people believe that recording and mastering will be completely digital in the future. Part of the reason is that digital processors and monitors are useful for making very precise adjustments and for eliminating extraneous sounds from a recording.

CD mastering facilities are state-of-the-art rooms designed to provide the best environment for hearing every aspect of a recording. An adequate mastering facility used by a knowledgeable engineer can make a good mix into a phenomenal master.
About the Author

CD Mastering Info provides detailed information on CD mastering engineers, facilities, and software, as well as online and free CD mastering. CD Mastering Info is affiliated with Original Content.

Written by: Thomas Morva

Posted by Brian at 11:52 PM | Permalink