5 Extraordinary Things Top Label And Artistes Do Before Releasing A Hit Song
– 5 Extraordinary Things Top Label And Artistes Do Before Releasing A Hit Song,
The Professional Music Production Process learned from Top record labels
Top tier recording companies (labels), and popular Artists keenly followed for years use this process in order to make a good song and most of the time, this same records always later turns out a hit in our society.
They make their project process this way to achieve desired result
The process is in 5 stages;
- Lyric And Arrangements
- Instrumentation
- Recording
- Review and Editing
- Mixmastering
1. LYRIC SESSION – The A&R or manager of the Artiste books a meeting or session with the Producer They analyse the song structure, the chorus, the target audience key attractive lines, song switches and best chord progressions. They make sure the song is balanced first with a skeleton instrumental (chords, bassline and shakers, depending on genre and style)
2. INSTRUMENTATION – this is the second stage where the producer acts as the head of his creative team, bringing in every live instrument needed to bring out the song better. Most times he or she hires someone to play something. He is like the cook , adding the Maggi and all to sweeten the song instrumental.
3. RECORDING – this stage , the song is about to be built on the instrumental produced, the producer either hires a vocal director or take over himself if he’s good in that aspect too. The vocals is the major focus in this process stage. All pitches and notes must be well sung. Three things matters here to the A&R person, the Clarity of every notes, loudness, energy of the vocals rendered, the breathe control and dynamism of the song.
4. REVIEW AND EDITING – This stage is where the A&R person and the team on the project takes the song, listen for a week or two , analyse every lines and come back to either edit and ask for vocal replacement or add-on by the singer or agrees to the song ready for next process.
5. MIX & MASTERING – This stage is the last, mixing is way different from mastering but in Nigeria, we do it together though. That’s why Artistes hire professionals like my Baba Namedeymixandmaster and people like Mixmonsa, Indomix , Swaps OntheMix etc.
Mixing blends the vocals and instrumental together, giving every vocal and instrument line a space in the mix. The vocals above the mix for clarity is a key focus. Mastering comes last to cap it with the needed cuts and boost in frequency and some other radio quality needed effects. This is my study. A finished song most times to many of us is not done yet when Professional and well experienced A&R and music executives listen.
Summary: Take your time to review your song before ‘running’ to drop it. DEBOLA’snew song, SHY was reviewed three times and each time we had to record her again after we felt better ways to present the song. One of the secret of A&R is that we play our project beside reference songs and compare market acceptance and factors.
