Mastering

Spektakulatius: With last month’s mixes in the bag, our engineer was tasked with finding and working with a mastering engineer to put the finishing touches to both albums.

Audio files to accompany the article.

Remastering projects dont come much bigger than this: a team of engineers spent four years in Abbey Road studios creating the definitive Beatles collection. Here's their story...

Waveburner is bundled free with Logic Pro and offers some significant power in the mastering department. We take a look at the hidden jewel in Apple's crown.

A new business model for mastering houses allows you to submit tracks via the Web and pay on-line. Last month, we embarked on a unique test of these services. This month: the results are in...

A new business model based around the Internet promises to make professional mastering more convenient — and much more affordable. But is on-line mastering a real alternative or a false economy? We put the UK's leading services to the test.

Last month we discussed how to prepare mixes so that they are ready for the mastering engineer. This month, we look inside the mastering room during the processing of an album, to see what kind of equipment is used, and the sort of processes that are applied to finish the tracks to the required standard.

If you're looking to release a record that you have produced at home, it's a good idea to have the product professionally mastered, but it is not always obvious if a mix is adequately finished. We find out how to prepare your songs for the mastering house, and what the engineer can do for you.

Frank Zappa produced a vast amount of recorded material during his career, often pushing both his musicians and the technology of the day to extremes. The task of editing, mixing and archiving these recordings is being undertaken by his son Dweezil, with the help of some cutting-edge computing hardware.

Many home recordists hope to perfect their productions by undertaking their own mastering on their studio computer. However, few seem to achieve the classy results they're after. So how much can you realistically achieve by going it alone, and what techniques will deliver the highest-quality results?

An established studio in the USA is planning to rely on software that can be freely downloaded from the Internet. Are they crazy, or do Linux-based recording applications offer a real alternative to the established Windows and Mac packages?

Last month we showed you how to go about recording a complete (jazz) band to stereo on location. Now let's examine the ways in which you can compile and process the different takes to make up a coherent whole.

Recording and mixing an album's worth of tracks is a big enough challenge, but turning the results into a consistent-sounding CD requires specialist tools and skills. The former, at least, are now available to anyone with a Windows PC...

As one of the senior engineers at New York's famous Sterling Sound, Chris Gehringer has mastered some of the biggest hip-hop and R&B hits of recent years.

We provide some tips for making your masters sound as loud as commercial tracks, without sacrificing too much sonic quality along the way.

Twenty years after Steve Levine first produced Culture Club, he reveals how he has been using a new generation of digital tools to restore those original recordings.

Among his many credits as an engineer, producer, programmer and artist, Jon Astley is perhaps best known for his award-winning work remastering classic albums from the likes of The Who, Abba and George Harrison.

The final stage of production - turning your mixes into a finished CD - requires some specialised tools. Martin Walker runs through the options and considers how best to set up and use the necessary PC software.