August 6, 2016 editorial: comments

It’s the Dynamics!

Playing dynamically is one of the most overlooked aspects of musicianship. Sure, if you’re an orchestral musician who’s reading a piece of music, you’ll be following the dynamics in the score. But if you’re playing live in a band or some other less formal scenario, or recording in the studio, it’s easy for your attention to focus mostly on playing the notes and rhythms, and not as much on the intensity and volume from one section to the next.

In theory, we all know the importance of playing dynamically. A song that stays at the same intensity level throughout is less likely to keep the listeners’ interest than one in which some parts louder or denser or more intense than others. Contrast is an important part of both arranging and mixing.

In live performance, musicians have a tendency to want to bash away, and the dynamics get lost in the energy of playing. I’ve been in many band situations where in rehearsal, someone says, “We’ve got to come down in the verses.” But then when the gig comes around, those good intentions go by the wayside, and everyone ends up playing at full throttle the whole time.

The subject of dynamics came up in my recent interview with mixing guru Andrew Scheps (part 1 of which was published this week on Audiofanzine), when I asked him about problems that he finds in the multitrack recordings sent to him to mix. One example he gave was that sometimes the verses are so big, arrangement wise and dynamically, that there’s nowhere to go on the chorus, and thus the song sounds too static.

One of the interesting ways in which he remedies such situations while mixing is to push up certain instruments, or groups of instruments on the downbeat of the chorus (or bridge), to add a little intensity and excitement to the transition that wasn’t there in the original performance.

It’s ironic, because you so often hear people complain, often legitimately so, about music being digitally processed into sterility — such as when there’s too much pitch and time correction applied. Yet what Scheps is talking about is using the power of digital audio editing (in this case volume automation) to add life to a song by changing the dynamics.

Of course, the best way to create a dynamic recording is for the musicians to play dynamically during the session. In order for that to happen, though, the dynamic aspects of the arrangements need to be ingrained during rehearsals or preproduction. In addition, if there’s a producer on the session, he or she must stay focused on them during the actual recording.

I hope you’re all enjoying your summer, and I’ll be back at you with another column on September 3.