Recording Vocal Harmony to Cubase

[Michael Trigoboff]

I have figured out how to record Genos vocal harmony (by itself, without audio from the style) to Cubase. I have all the Genos audio but the mic routed to Sub 1 and Sub 2. Mic audio is routed to Main, and is then routed into Cubase from Genos DIGITAL OUT via my audio interface.

It all works fine, except that the recorded audio is distorted, and has occasional clicks and pops.

I have the audio interface synced to the Genos, and the Genos receiving MIDI clock from Cubase, so I don't think I have a digital audio sync problem. None of the audio meters on the Genos, the audio interface, or Cubase get maxed out.

Does anyone have any idea what the problem might be? Has anyone successfully recorded Genos vocal harmony into a DAW?

[Lee Batchelor]

Hi Michael,

Clicks and pops can be caused by the following:

1) Too many services running in background - being a software engineer, I'm sure you have most of the bloatware turned off .

2) Are you using the ASIO driver with your interface? If so, make sure it's up to date. Again, something I'm sure you have covered.

3) Check the Buffer size in the Cubase options to make sure it isn't too big for your CPU to handle.

4) Internet activities running in background. Disconnect from the internet.

If none of these checks work out, perhaps join up with the Cubase forum and post your question there. They have hobbyists who are well versed in these issues. I believe they also have qualified audio engineers who moderate or at least chime in ideas once in a while. Please let us know what you find out. Thanks .

- Lee

[Michael Trigoboff]

I should have added this:

When I turn Vocal Harmony off on the Genos, leaving all other settings the same, my singing gets recorded into Cubase perfectly, with no clicks, pops, or distortion.

So I don't think that any of Lee's very good suggestions are the problem in this particular situation. It seems to be something directly related to Vocal Harmony.

[Amwilburn]

In that case, it doesn't sound like an audio interface buffer issue.

The vocal harmony *can* easily get distorted; try checking the vu levels by going to the master compressor (from mixer). I find you have to dial the mic gain *just* right, too little and vocal harmony is barely there (and VH itself will have trouble tracking the note you've sung, in which case instead of a normal chordal VH, you should change to a *vocoder*, which doesn't need to track your original sung note) too much gain, and while it tracks your singing easily, you'll have constant crackling from distortion (even though it *might* not appear too loud internally, it's still too much gain for the VH send)

It's like when you setup a compander (compressor /expander/ limiter); the output might appear to stay in the green, but the signal going in may have already exceeded the red-line)

Conversely, you can also leave the gain high, but don't sing close to the mic


Mark

[Michael Trigoboff]

I find you have to dial the mic gain *just* right, too little and vocal harmony is barely there (and VH itself will have trouble tracking the note you've sung, in which case instead of a normal chordal VH, you should change to a *vocoder*, which doesn't need to track your original sung note) too much gain, and while it tracks your singing easily, you'll have constant crackling from distortion (even though it *might* not appear too loud internally, it's still too much gain for the VH send)

Success! Thank you so much!

All I had to do was turn down MIC GAIN slightly, and all the clicks, pops, and distortion went away!

It's weird because none of the meters (including the one for the compressor) showed anything maxing out. But I guess something must have been, internally and invisibly.

[Lee Batchelor]

Good to know, guys. Thanks for the update. Glad you found the problem .

[Lee Batchelor]

It's weird because none of the meters (including the one for the compressor) showed anything maxing out. But I guess something must have been, internally and invisibly.

Would this be because the meters only show a pre-fader level?

[Amwilburn]

Success! Thank you so much!

All I had to do was turn down MIC GAIN slightly, and all the clicks, pops, and distortion went away!

It's weird because none of the meters (including the one for the compressor) showed anything maxing out. But I guess something must have been, internally and invisibly.

Yeah, it's a little odd, I think it's because it doesn't show the gain for the harmony itself, just the mic. So like I said, it can easily overdrive that circuit (which still won't show any redline because it's already clipped going in... does that make sense?) They really need at least an on screen VU to show VH overloading.

I only knew that because I'd had the exact same issue with a customer who insisted on buying a mixer without fx, and then using the aux sends to go into a separate fx unit... of course, an aux send with line-level signal vs going xlr directly into the Multifx is going to give very, very different distortion levels!

Mark