blending voice and music

[toneloperu]

Greetings, as a very occasional composer I find it very hard to get my voice and the background music to blend smoothly to resemble commercial recordings. I would like to know some basic tricks and tips to achieve a better mix. I would like to make a more natural sounding blend so it wont be heard as if the voice was forcibly spliced into the background. Any reply will be most apreciated.

[Ed Szymczak]

what does your current signal chain look like for overdubbing vocals?
mic to pre to compressor?
what kind?

[toneloperu]

first, thank you very much for answering. Recently I haven´t been recording much but so I don´t remember that well. Also I have no professional equipment for recording, in fact, I only use a PC, a mic, a 5 octave yamaha keyboard, and my voice. PC mics don`t make my voice sound too loud and if they do it`s full of clipping and there`s also a HF buzz in the background I have to cleanse with the equalizer. The wave of my voice in the screen looks very uneven, I used to apply an amplitude limiter from the soundforge effect menu and it sort of improved and looked like a straight, even streak in the screen. But not quite pleasing. Maybe I am not using the proper equipment. What I would like to know is, if I can improve the voice channel by doing stuff like panning, limiting, equalizing and such. I am not an expert in such matters and because of that I have been composing and playing mostly instrumental music, just for fun. maybe I should get a shure mic with its own amp and then plug it in the PC. I have also a 24bit soundcard but don´t know well what is it good for. Soon as I can I will have some mp3 samples of my voice and maybe it will be easier for you to diagnose what the problem is. Thanks again and I hope to have more participation here later.

[Ed Szymczak]

If your serious, you'll need more or less $500 with which to play. You need a better mic, a mic preamp, and a compressor. There are so many very fine choices out there for the serious hobbyist. If you give me an idea of your budget, I can recommend a few combinations.

[toneloperu]

thanks again for answering. I have been searching on the net for prices of both devices and there are many choices. Some stuff is pretty expensive and some are rather affordabble. I have seen the ART TUBE preamp with compressor integrated for 90 bucks but that`s in the US, here in Peru it must be a little more expensive (if available of course). I must take a ride and see prices in situ. My brother's friend recently purchased all the stuff and the recording quality is quite satisfactory at least to my ears but I guess he must have spent some money on that. But since I'm just an aficionado and occasional musician I will try to find the integrated one or the cheaper models. In fact, I didn´t even know what the compressor was for but know I`m aware and it's very important. Thanks to you now I know a bit more about the subject. Soon as I see the models available in local stores I will tell you so you can give me your advice.