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Why is my pitch so bad when I track with headphones?


gubu

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Hi Singer's Forum!

I'm a long-time poster in the recording forum, among others, and have only recently started giving serious consideration to my vocals. Up til now, I thought they were 'ok', but lately the pitch thing has been a major problem when tracking with headphones.

My pitch has never been perfect, but not too bad at the same time. The thing is, I'm never more than a few cents out when I track in front of the monitors, but it's all over the shop when I go for a take with headphones.

I'm sure that there is a simple explanation for this, and of any techniques for hitting better pitch when tracking thru headphones.

 

Thanks in advance for your replies!

 

:)

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One of the reasons why almost all singer intonate a melody  too imperfect is the missing fundamental tone, the bass or the root note.

When we track vocals we always give enough bass to the singer.

It is known that humans can not sing in good pitch when the bass or root note of the chord structure is missing.

A neuronal phenomena, we are just "constructed" like that.

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Maybe the mix is too busy sounding through headphones and masking your vocal monitor. You could try lowering the instrumental track volume or raise your vocal track volume.

 

It could also be the acoustics of your recording room. Some vocal booths might sound really dry, so you might need to give the vocal track some reverb to give the impression of space. Some singers also take off one side of their headphones so they can use the room's sound to help hear themselves too.

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I've had similar issues in the past. As far as tracking vocals, if I used cans, I'd be flat. If I took one side off, I was back on pitch. Same thing using IEMs live for me, I was always a little flat, whereas with a floor wedge, I was on. What ended up helping me was like Ido said, less low end in my mix helped. My voice was fighting for "frequency" space, I wasn't hearing what I needed to hear I guess. Also, I don't know if you track with verb, but too much will cause you to sing flat as well.

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