Dynamics: The use of compression techniques improves the dynamic range of your music. It maintains the louder signals while raising the more subtle frequencies in the mix. Compression is used to normalize the and giving it a cleaner more consistent and uniform sound.
A Music Demo (or a Demo): is a sample recording of your music. Usually, demos are rough recordings of songs and often do not include an entire album’s worth of material. Demos are frequently sent by bands to record labels to try and land a deal.
EQ: This is the process of enhancing specific elements of the song that you want to stand out, while correcting any spectral imbalances. The idea is to ensure proportionality in the sound so no outlying frequencies will stand out and balance between tracks is achieved.
Handles & Sequencing: Sequencing is the process of organizing the track order in your extended project or album. This includes the transitions, time, and delay between tracks among other things.
Loudness: An important part of the mastering process where audio limiters are used to stabilize the overall amount of loudness in a song. In doing so, it creates a peak loudness limiting factor for consistency in the sound as tracks transition without distorting or clipping.
Quality Control: This step is used to give the mix a once over and look for any mistakes, errors or oversights. These may include clicks, pops and other minor mistakes that come up after a mix is amplified.
Sample Rate & Bit Depth Conversion: The final output medium you select will dictate the dither you need to use. If you want to release on CD, then you’ll need to convert to 44.1kH 16 bit. Most likely you’ll also have to convert and dither your file to be the correct format. The same thing goes for streaming music files for downloading digital music as well.
Stereo Enrichment: This is used to help your music sound greater by broadening the special balance (left to right). It also tightens the center image by focusing low-end frequencies.
