I’m sure you’ve noticed that there are some songs where your dancers are constantly being held back by the tempo of the song. When this happens it’s almost like there is an invisible force subtly sapping the energy out of the routine. Conversely, there are other songs where the dancers are always rushing to keep up with the beat. Adjusting the groove of the song, by even as little as 1% slower OR faster, can make a huge impact on how well your dancers perform with the music. Use the Tempo SlowMo app to dial in EXACTLY what the tempo should be for every routine you choreograph. Spin the jog wheel WHILE your dancers are performing to find the exact tempo that FEELS just right!
Tempo SlowMo is just one app that allows you to change the tempo of songs you are playing. Another one is BarreNotes.
Don’t forget to “print” a new copy of each song that you are using at the new tempo that you’ve dialed in.
More and more folks are interested in recording voice-overs of various kinds for their dance routines. Since Squirrel Trench Audio works with dance teachers and choreographers all over the world, we usually can’t come to you in order to do the recording. This means you are on your own to record your own dancers’ voices, but it’s not too hard to do that, and send us the resulting audio files.
The good news: if you have an iPhone, it’s easy to record the voice-overs that you want. Just use the (free) Voice Memo app that is built-in. Here are the tips in a nutshell, with further explanation below:
Record in a living room or bedroom; never in a dance studio
Minimize any environmental noise or sounds
Aim the bottom of the iPhone at your dancer(s), about 1.5 feet away
Record three takes of the words you want
Speak clearly, and with passion!
Record in a living room or bedroom; never in a dance studio
One of the most important aspects to getting a good recording is the room in which you record, because sound bounces off of walls, floor and ceiling. This is called reverberation, which is a form of echo. Pretty much the worst space to do a recording is inside a dance studio rehearsal room. Ideally, you want to be in a living room or bedroom when recording a voice-over. The more drapes or other fabric there is in the room, the better. Carpeting is also very helpful. Using the Voice Memo app on your iPhone, situate yourself with the iPhone, and the person(s) that you are recording, in the middle of the room, away from all the walls.
Minimize any external sound or noise
It should go without saying that you don’t want any background noise to be happening while you record your voice. Make sure no one else is talking nearby, and make sure that all sources of hum or buzz are eliminated, or as low as possible. Nearby fans, or anything else with a motor, should be turned off for the duration of the recording. Make sure the windows of the room are shut to minimize any sound coming in from the outside.
The iPhone’s mic is in the bottom of the phone; aim it at your dancer(s), about 1.5 feet away
Hold the iPhone approximately 1 to 2 feet from the person(s) speaking (1.5 feet is probably ideal). Aim the mic (which is in the bottom) at the person talking. It should be close to them, but not TOO close.
Record three takes of the words you want
Record at LEAST three “takes” of the words that you want to have. That way, I will be able to choose from the best of the resulting versions. Sometimes a word might get cut off, or the speaker trips over a word. If you have them repeat their lines three times, then I can put together the best version of the words.
Speak clearly and with passion!
While the voice talent may be reading from a paper, they should nevertheless speak their part with conviction! Speak each word clearly, and make sure that sentences are not run together. Most of all, speak the words with as much “character” and emotion that you can muster! If you are worried about being too “over the top”, that’s okay; that’s why you record several takes. Do the first take “normal”, then do take two with MORE emotion, and then in take three, let it all hang out! You can decide, after you record, which one is the best to use. In many cases, you may think you are being way over the top, but that might be exactly the right emotion to convey the message in a dynamic way.
Most of all; have a blast doing it, knowing that your words are going to be heard over a performance sound system.
When editing, cutting or mixing music yourself, don’t let the audio degrade. Be careful when you do audio editing. Sometimes I get requests to fix or clean already-edited songs, and when I hear the edit supplied, it sounds like a bunch of squirrels have gotten in and trenched the music.
There are many reasons audio can get degraded, and many different types of problems that inexperienced music cutters can create. When you put degraded music on stage, it’s really not much different than putting a dancer on stage with a tattered costume.
Here are just a few things to watch out for:
Don’t let the volume drop. You don’t want your music to be far softer than everyone else’s. Trust me, this happens.
Don’t turn up the volume either. You may not hear the distortion on your laptop or iPad, but when played on a large sound system, the distortion sounds terrible and piercing. I’ve heard this in competition a number of times as well.
Don’t make a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of an mp3, or get the audio from YouTube. People think that you can make a copy of a digital audio file, and it will never degrade. That’s true of AIFF or WAV files, where all of the audio information is retained in the file. But mp3 degrades the audio a little bit every time it’s saved. So when you make a copy of a copy it gets worse, just like a cassette (though not as dramatically worse of course). One generation of high quality mp3 is not that much worse than the original. But several copies like this, and it sounds awful compared to the original.
There are many reasons why it’s a bad idea to extract audio from YouTube.
1) It’s illegal.
2) Even pristine audio is somewhat degraded since YouTube uses mp3 encoding of any audio submitted. In many cases, it’s an mp3 of an mp3 of an mp3….. and the audio gets worse every time it’s re-encoded in this manner.
3) But if the above reasons are not enough to convince you it’s a bad idea to extract audio from a YouTube clip, then realize this: In many cases, what you are listening to on a YouTube clip is the room in which the audio was played. Even if the clip doesn’t have audience noises, like coughing, moving around in seats, and other assorted venue noise, the audio is playing back over a sound system, and being picked up by a microphone, along with all of the reverb, reflections, and echoes of the room in which the music is being played. All of these things combined downgrade the audio, sometimes a little bit, and sometimes to the point of pure garbage. But it’s never as clear as it could be. And once degraded in this way, there is no practical way to restore it, except to go back to the original source. That is why, when creating music edits and remixes for dance teachers, Squirrel Trench Audio always goes back to source audio whenever possible.
If you want GOOD, CLEAN audio, DON’T get it from YouTube!
A recent comment on a dance facebook group asked for some further explanation on the differences between CD-quality audio (lossless or uncompressed) and mp3-quality (lossy or compressed) audio.
I thought I’d share my explanation on the subject here.
Because mp3s were created when the internet was new, and slow modems were used to connect with it, they have gotten somewhat of a bad rap because early mp3s were at such low bit-rates, that they truly sounded awful. However, as bandwidth has increased rapidly over the years, it’s possible today to get high quality mp3s that are virtually indistinguishable from CD-quality audio.
The audio quality in stores like the iTunes store or Amazon mp3 store are now quite good. Not CD-quality exactly, but on virtually all sound systems that the music will be played on, no one will be able to tell the difference.
I have had the misfortune of working with some really cruddy music sources supplied to me, and once music is degraded (which I will explain more below), it can’t be returned to its original form. It would be like ripping up a costume and then trying to put it back together with duct tape – yuck. So here’s what you REALLY want to watch out for: DO NOT USE MUSIC SAVED FROM A YOUTUBE VIDEO.
CD quality is a very high standard of music quality. Even better forms of digital audio exist, but this is irrelevant for the dance world and dance purposes. Here is a list of format qualities, from fantastic to poor:
CD quality (usually stored as either AIF or WAV format)
m4a/AAC — iTunes store quality, 256k bit rate
mp3 — 256k or higher, variable bit rate – this is nearly as good as iTunes store quality. Most people on most systems won’t hear a difference between this and CD quality
mp3 — 128 k or lower bit rate—- this is where you start to hear what are often called “swirlies” especially in the high frequencies of the music.
The worst possible digital music is music that is saved as an mp3, and then saved as an mp3 again (possibly more than once). This is how audio from YouTube gets to be so bad.
Bottom line: For dance studios, rehearsal, recital, competition – mp3 at 256k or higher variable bit rate, or m4a at 256k or higher bit rate, are going to be fine, with one very important caveat: as long as the song has not been resampled/resaved in mp3 format more than once. And this is precisely why music taken from YouTube ranges so wide and far in quality…. it can be nearly pristine, or it can be severely degraded, depending on how it arrived there.
Just like cassettes in the old days: if you recorded a CD onto cassette, it didn’t sound too bad…. just a small amount of hiss was added. But as soon as you start recording cassette to cassette — you are left with practically nothing but noise after just one or two such transfers. The hiss becomes nearly as loud as the music!
Well, that’s exactly the same thing that is happening with an mp3 to mp3 copy, and this is where compression comes in that you mentioned six comments above (lol). When you save music as an mp3, indeed, you are compressing it, compared to CD-quality which is uncompressed. The mp3 encoding throws away some of the “less important” details of the music in order to save space in the storage of the file. If you take a CD, and save it as a 256k-rate mp3, you can barely even notice any difference. But if you save a 256k-rate mp3 as a 256k-rate mp3, now you are throwing away even more detail. And low-quality YouTube videos have music that is encoded as a 128k-rate mp3. So if a person takes an mp3, and then uploads that as the music of their YouTube video, now you are listening to the same thing in essence as a cassette-to-cassette transfer. If you then save the music track from the YouTube as an mp3 on your computer, and remix or edit it and save the result as an mp3, now you are doing the same thing as a cassette-to-cassette-to-cassette transfer. So if the music sounds awful at that point, well, now you know why.
Here’s an example of audio that sounds terrific on YouTube. Especially if you click the quality setting to 720p HD or higher. (Switching the YouTube video to an HD setting increases the audio quality to the highest available.)
Here’s an example of music that has been pretty severely degraded, as a 48k bit rate mp3. This would be similar to saving a 96k-bit rate mp3 more than once:
On the above clip, if you go back to the start of the video, you can hear what it sounds like as a very high quality mp3. Every 30 seconds, it’s played as a lower and lower quality mp3.
If you have any questions about CD-quality, m4a/AAC, or mp3 audio quality, please comment, and I will answer to the best of my ability!
Button: The payoff moment in a song; the moment when the song is “buttoned up” and finished.
On Broadway, music composers know that nearly all of the time, they need to deliver a button on their songs…. that point in the music when the audience knows the song is over, and it’s time to applaud. The same concept applies when editing music for performance dance routines. When a song fades out, your audience is robbed of the routine’s button. That’s why Squirrel Trench Audio retains the ending of the original song so that the button is delivered to your dancer. The audience knows the routine is over and it’s time to clap.
There are times when a song might have a big musical finish that lasts 20 seconds or more. These type of endings, while great in a music performance, are too long for a dance performance. In such cases, we will edit down the big finish into an appropriate length for the dance routine.
Competition season for dancers is here in earnest. This past weekend featured two studios utilizing Squirrel Trench music for their routines at the same competition (27 routines!). We’re thrilled to report a slew of 1st Places, Platinum, High Golds and Overalls were garned by these dedicated and hardworking dancers and choreographers.
Now that we’re in the competition phase of the year, don’t forget to clean your music at the same time you’re cleaning your routines and costumes. If there is a hiccup, jump, skip, mis-matched beat in your music, or section of music that is too soft, or not punchy enough, too fast or too slow, it’s not too late to get it fixed in time for the next regionals competition.
Already, Squirrel Trench Audio has helped dance teachers and studio owners get higher scores for their routines in a number of ways. For one tap number, the dancers were rushing too fast for the music. Solution? Speed up the music. For another studio, the routine was receiving deductions for inappropriate language. Solution? Inappropriate language obscured through clever remixing by Squirrel Trench. For another studio, the music they were using was too soft compared to all the other music being used. Solution? Brought up to current loudness levels by Squirrel Trench through a process known as mastering.
We know that many dance teachers and studios cut their own music. One of the potential pitfalls to self-cut music is that in the course of rehearsing the number five hundred times, any mistakes or hiccups eventually sound normal, just because you become used to hearing it that way. Of course, the judges will be hearing it for the first time, and if there is a hiccup, skip, jump or any other strangeness in the audio, it detracts from the polish you’ve worked so hard to achieve with your students.
So find a friend who can listen to your competition music with fresh ears. If they hear something that doesn’t sound right, send it my way to get it fixed in time for your next Regionals, so that you’ve got it the best it can be in time for Nationals. If you have something that needs fixing, use this Online Request Form, or email me at: morriss@squirreltrenchaudio.com
Just finished bringing up the volume of another movie soundtrack song (based on a Broadway show tune) for a dance teacher in Tennessee.
We can raise the volume (without distortion) of any tracks that are playing too quietly compared to commercial releases today. This service is quite different than simply raising the volume in your audio editor of choice, which will invariably cause a harsh kind of distortion called clipping distortion. I’ve actually heard this kind of clipping distortion blasted over competition sound systems. It’s not pretty.
Raising the volume in this manner is most commonly needed for show tunes, movie soundtrack songs, and some older songs. These type of songs actually sound fantastic, because they retain their dynamic range, but in the world of dance competitions, the people responsible for the sound systems expect a certain volume from the CDs they are playing. You can’t rely on them to raise the volume of a soft song because they don’t know if a loud section of music is still to come. (However, if a song is too loud, you can count on them to turn the volume down.)
Bringing a song up to the proper level without distortion is currently being offered for only $19, and if the song is being edited by Squirrel Trench Audio, then this aspect is included in the regular price. What a bargain!
Most group music is probably now finished for the season. Perhaps a few solos still need to be created. In any case, with the bulk of the primary music editing season behind us, now is a great time to fix any glitches that might exist in the music you are practicing with. Better to fix it now than just before competition, so your dancers have a chance to get used to the fix!
So to put the finishing touches on your music stylings, we can fix any unnatural sounding transitions, skips, hiccups, pauses, or drop-outs. In addition, we can perform Mastering services, which will ensure that the volume of the music is at the expected level, without introducing distortion, which is what would happen if you simply increased the volume using music editing software. Read more about that here in Mastering the Loudness of your Dance Competition Music.
Here’s a tip that will make all of your music edits (or cuts) much, much easier.
I just got an emergency assignment to edit a popular remix/dubstep song down to the routine length of 2:30. The dance teacher just couldn’t make it happen. This is very understandable; there are a lot of echoes and the dynamic range is pretty compressed, making it difficult to make out the downbeat in the waveforms.
However, if you start your editing projects by determining the tempo, and then lining up the downbeats to the tempo grid, doing the edits becomes a piece of cake. I am almost embarrassed to say that by lining up the music to the tempo grid, I had about 8 seamless cuts done in about 15 minutes. Boom, done, because I determined the tempo was exactly 140 bpm before starting to make transition points.
Not every music edits goes that quickly. Freeform jazz, or any music done without a click track can be really tricky to edit seamlessly. But for modern dance music, figuring out the tempo first can make the difference between hours and hours of waveform alignment (and still not getting it right), and a perfect precision job that is done in minutes.
If you are tired of pulling your hair out trying to get your music cuts to be seamless, send me an email instead. Let me know the name of the song and the length that you need the finished piece to be, and I’ll make it happen for you for only $39!
I’m sure you’ve noticed that there are some songs where your dancers are constantly being held back by the tempo of the song. When this happens it’s almost like there is an invisible force subtly sapping the energy out of the routine. Conversely, there are other songs where the dancers are always rushing to keep up with the beat. Adjusting the groove of the song, by even as little as 1% slower OR faster, can make a huge impact on how well your dancers perform with the music. Use the Tempo SlowMo app to dial in EXACTLY what the tempo should be for every routine you choreograph. Spin the jog wheel WHILE your dancers are performing to find the exact tempo that FEELS just right!
