DIY Tips
A Frequently Asked Question is "Can't I just record my own music?" The short answer is: You probably can!A cautionary note here, however. There is more to recording and mixing a skating competition music track than just copying a song off a CD and stopping it at your program time limit. This music will be representing your skating just as much the elements choreographed into your program. I often hear or read of judges' comments regarding the recording quality of a skater’s music. Morry Stillwell, skating judge and former president of the U.S. Figure Skating Association has noted "Poorly recorded music is distracting for a judge and interferes with that judge’s ability to evaluate the skater’s program." * Also, there are many coaches that do their own recording of music for their skaters. While no one is better qualified to select the music piece that is best for their skater, many coaches are less skilled and experienced in current digital music recording and editing techniques. That said, if you have a good ear for music, the time to devote to doing precise editing, with a few computer software tools you can usually produce quite acceptable basic music tracks for your skating programs.
To that end, if you would like to try recording your own skating music tracks or, if you or your coach would just like to become more knowledgeable about today’s digital recording techniques and technology, V.U. Sound Studio is pleased to add this Tips page to our web site.
(The Basics of Digital Audio Editing)
In previous installments, we discussed the minimum equipment and software you need to try your hand at producing your own skating music and how to get your selected song from its source to your computer’s hard drive and ready to edit. We also took a step back to review some do’s and don’ts when selecting your source music.
Now it is time to begin the digital editing process. ( We would suggest that you make a copy of your music to practice your editing techniques or better yet, open another song to practice on.)
When you open your song you see the digital waveform display on Audacity’s main screen (or in what ever audio editor you are using). The varying peaks and valleys of the waveform are the digital representation of the actual musical content of your song.
Highlight a small segment of the waveform by dragging your mouse across it. Click the magnifying glass icon and you will see the highlighted portion expanded or magnified a bit. Click the magnify icon several more times and you will begin to see the amplitude of the individual beats or notes within the music. You will find that clicking anywhere in the waveform sets the Position cursor. When you click Play the music starts at the point of the cursor.
We previously noted that the process for editing digital audio is not all that different from editing text in a word processor. You highlight the area that you want to edit, and then copy, cut, or paste just as you would text in a sentence. However, instead of words, you are editing the digital waveform and you have to use your ears as well as your eyes to select the right "words" to edit.
Lets try out the basic editing procedures: Copy, Paste, Undo, Delete and Cut. First lets do a copy/paste. Highlight a random portion of your song’s waveform. Click Edit>Copy. Move the display to the end of your song and position the cursor right at the end of the waveform. Click Edit>Paste. You will see the portion of the waveform that you copied is now pasted to the end of your song. Play the song and see how it sounds with that new random section added to the end.
"But", you say, "I just wrecked my song by pasting a new section to the end!" Not to worry. Click Edit>Undo. Click the message "Undo Paste". You will see the new waveform section you pasted disappear. Audacity’s Undo has several layers so you can go back one step at a time and undo several previous editing steps. There is also another way you can remove the pasted section of waveform. Highlight the pasted section and click Edit>Delete. Make sure you do not get the end of your original song in the highlighted section or you will delete that as well. To aid in highlighting just the section you want use the magnify icon to enlarge the area you are working on.
The last of the basic editing functions is Cut. Again highlight a section of your song. This time instead of Copy, click Edit>Cut. The selected portion of the song is deleted and the sections before and after the cut are joined together. Play your song and see how it sounds with the section cut out. You can also paste the cut section to the end of the song just as you did with the copy exercise. Use the Undo on your last Paste and Cut to restore your song to it’s original state.
Up until now we have been copying, cutting and pasting parts of the song without regard to what it does to the sound of the song. Now lets try an actual editing task. A song is typically made up of several verses each separated by a chorus. In your song, lets try to add another chorus section so that at that point in your song the chorus plays twice instead of just once before going on to the next verse. Listen to your song, find a chorus and note the position in the waveform where it starts and ends. You can use the Magnify function and your ears to help you find the exact starting and ending points. Highlight the chorus section and do Edit>Copy. Next set the Position cursor at the exact end of the original chorus section and click Edit>Paste. The copied version of the chorus is pasted into your song immediately following the original one.
Now listen to your song. The music and rhythm of the newly pasted section should blend seamlessly with the original music. When done correctly and precisely the song will sound like it was originally recorded with the second chorus. However, don’t expect that result with your first attempt. This technique requires recognizing patterns within the digital waveform, training your eyes and ears to select the exact point to make your cuts or pastes, mastery of the editing software itself, and just the experience and repetition of doing the cuts and pastes over and over. As we said at the beginning of this series, to produce a quality music track that compliments your skating program, you do need to devote the time to develop your editing skills. So, just keep practicing and your edited song will get a little better each time. Next time we’ll continue our discussion of basic editing procedures and explore some techniques to assist you with your editing project. In the mean time see samples of some of the editing and mixing techniques we use at V.U. Sound Studio to produce your professionally edited skating music. Also check out our Studio Tour Pages to see some of the hardware and software we use at V.U. Sound Studio.
SEE ALSO: Jo Ann Ferris' excellent web page on Choreographing Your Own Skating Routine.
If there is a subject about Skating or Sports Music recording, mixing or producing that you would like to see covered on this page, please let us know. Also, copies of previous installments of these Tips & Techniques pages are available, free of charge, upon request. Just ask us.
Previous Tips and Techniques Subjects:
- 1.0 - What You Need (Minimum equipment, software, and skills required)
- 2.0 - Getting Your Music Ready To Edit and The Basics of Digital Audio (From CD or tape to your hard drive)
- 3.0 - Some Do's & Don'ts For Selecting Your Music Source (Supplement for 2.0).
- 4.0 - Getting Started Editing Your Skating Program Music (Basic editing procedures)
- 5.0 - Creating a Seamless Cut and Paste Edit (The core of digital music editing)