A producer or audio engineer who produces vocals can make or break a singer's performance. Anything that affects the following areas will affect the studio singer's vocal ability:

1. The Breath
2. The Throat
3. The Ear
4. The Zone
5. The Vocal Cords

Here are some common mistakes I see production teams make:

• Putting music stand too forward right in front of the microphone. The singer will be leaning forward into the mic. This will tighten the ribcage and the throat channel of the singer, sabotaging breath, control of tone, pitch, licks, volume and vocal stamina.

• Not setting the singer's cuebox in mono or putting the same thing in both phones when the singer is using the 'one headphone half-off" technique. The singer's ear will miss something.

• Assuming the singer does or does not need reverb without asking, checking or experimenting. Different singers and even the same singer on different songs may need different reverb choices and amounts. 

• Pointing the singer directly into the control room. This is intimidating and distracting for new singers, and can be disorienting even for veterans, sabotaging the 'zone'.

• Assuming it's always best to have the singer sing the whole song every take, and compile the best of the takes for the final vocal track. Sometimes this indeed works for emotional songs. But many times (especially with big range melodies) it just fatigues vocal cords and certain parts of the song never get as good as they could if the singer has a chance to rest. Best to be flexible.

Labels: audio engineer, headphone cue mix, Judy Rodman, recording_producer, studio singer, vocal production, vocal recording