A mix engineer (also known as a mixing engineer) controls how all the different elements in a recording (such as drums, vocals, bass, effects and so on) are combined, and how they blend together into one fluid, beautiful sounding song. In other words, I take your recordings and make them sound professional!

The music industry is changing, and today, more music than ever before is recorded in small project studios or even at home by the artists themselves, rather than in major studios by experienced engineers. While this can be very liberating for artists because they get to spend all the time they need without the clock ticking, the sound quality often suffers. That is where I come in.

Recording engineers sometimes do end up mixing their own recordings, and occasionally the result is ok, especially if the music was recorded in a great acoustic environment by someone who also happens to be a descent mix engineer. However, having a real mix engineer mix your music brings the sound quality up a notch to the level of major label acts, who almost always separate the process and take their recordings to get mixed by professionals who provide a fresh outside perspective and a set of highly experienced ears.

The amount of time required to create a great mix of a song varies greatly depending on a number of factors such as track count/complexity, where/how it was recorded, and what you want from the mix. Naturally, the cost too will be affected by these parameters. Contact me to get a quote.

I usually work on a track by track basis. At least with new clients. I’ve found this to work well because the client can get a good idea of what I’m capable of while I get a good idea of the amount of work involved before committing to a large workload.

Also, mixing is a service and not a product. The amount of work per song does not change with volume (the way that a large sale of physical goods brings in more profit without requiring much extra work) so volume discounts just don’t make much economic sense.

I always include mastering at no extra charge for every track I mix. That being said, it’s not something I specialize in. I only master music that I’ve mixed and don’t offer it as a separate service. Hiring someone who specializes in mastering can definitely be a good idea and having a second set of highly trained ears involved certainly won’t hurt. On the other hand, most of my clients are very happy with the mastering I do. In fact, all the tracks you hear on this website were both mixed and mastered by me.
At the end of the process, you will receive both the 24bit unmastered version of my mix as well as my 16bit master.

I do NOT charge any such fees. When the first draft of my mix is ready, I will email you an mp3 file so you can listen, comment, and make requests. Then I will adjust the mix accordingly and send you an updated version. This process repeats until you’re happy with the mix, so you can live with it for a while, check it out on different speakers, in your friend’s car, and so on. Of course, this process cannot go on forever, but happy clients are good for business and so far my clients have been reasonable, so this has worked well.

Instrumental, a Cappella (voice only) and TV (everything minus the lead vocal) -mixes are included if you want them. Vocal up/down or any other specialized mix too – as long as there aren’t too many versions and we make them AFTER the main mix is completed and approved by everyone involved. The reason for this is that it becomes complicated and time consuming to make additional adjustments to multiple versions of a mix (since I end up saving them as separate projects). Of course I can still go back and do changes at a later time (because I always save all my work), but then there would be a reasonable charge for my time.

I use Apple’s Logic Pro 9 to mix, and so I accept all Logic Sessions. I also accept individual PCM files (Wav or AIFF) of every track, as long as they all start from the beginning of the song. Regardless of the DAW used for recording, your recording engineer should be able to export the tracks that way. You can read more about this in my Client Instructions section.
I am also able to open 44.1 & 48kHz Protools Sessions for transfer to Logic, but depending on their size and complexity, there might be an extra charge for this.
You can of course send me files on physical media such as CD, DVD, USB Memory Stick or Hard Drive, but most of my clients choose to upload directly to my server (see the Client Instructions section).

The cost is no different from a regular mix. However, if you also need a stereo mix I can discount the total price since much of the work applies to both versions. Before hiring me for this however, I would recommend you think of your target audience and how they will listen to your music. Surround sound music is awesome, but delivering it to consumers can be tricky. For more information on surround sound, please see my Audio Philosophy section.