First, create a premix of your existing tracks with the Export Mixdown function.This makes it very easy to do the old tape trick of changing vocal formants here’s how. The Friday tip for Jcovered how to emulate true, variable speed tape effects when working on a final stereo mix.Ī major advantage of today’s digital audio technology is that pitch and tempo can be independent, and one of Studio One’s attributes is that the audio engine retains its sound quality with reasonable pitch changes (e.g., a few semitones). This was useful for masters, because you could speed up and brighten a track by upping the speed by 2% or so. The main limitation (although it could also be an advantage in some situations) is that the tempo and pitch were interdependent-a higher pitch meant a faster speed, and a lower pitch, a slower speed. The same principle worked with other instruments, but vocals were the most popular candidates for this technique. Similarly, for a darker, warmer sound, you could transpose up, sing along with that, and transpose back down again.

If you transposed the recorder’s pitch down a little bit, recorded a vocal as you sang along with the lower pitch, and then transposed back up again on playback, the vocal formant would be higher and brighter. The most common were speeding up masters a bit to make them a little brighter and tighter, doing tape flanging, and perhaps the most popular, changing vocal formants. Back in the days of tape, when dinosaurs ruled the earth and gas station attendants checked your oil, variable-speed tape recorders allowed changing the pitch of all the tracks with a single control.

Studio one pitch shift