Sidechain compression

Sidechain compression is the act of reducing the volume of one or more tracks for a short time.

This is a technique not to be neglected when producing music in MAO.

To begin with, there are a good number of sidechaining methods. We will see that some methods are more or less tedious depending on the choice of tools we use.

Then the settings will not be the same for each type of production. The main thing is not to have any confrontation in the low frequencies.

The different techniques of sidechining

The manual sidechain:

First of all, this technique does not require any particular software or compressor. To do this, we will determine the length and amplitude of the gain reduction on the track we want to compress. This is the longest method to set up, but it is also the most precise. Because the operation has to be repeated for each track if we want a different sidechaining for it. On the other hand, for a global sidechain it is enough to route the tracks to a return track and to apply the sidechain to this track.

Sidechain compression:

This time it is an automated compression. We use a compressor, but not for its primary purpose. Usually a compressor lowers the gain of a track from the signal of that track. In the case of sidechain compression, another signal is used as the trigger. We will therefore indicate which track should trigger the compressor, and with what amplitude. We can also set the degree of attack and release of this compression.

Multiband sidechain compression:

The multiband sidechain compression is also an automated compression. However, the compression is different because it acts in a completely different way. In fact, this technique allows you to apply the sidechain with different settings for each frequency range. For example, below 800 Hz the setting can be very short, and very long above 800 Hz. As with the sidechain compression, we can adjust the attack and release.

Finally, after these courses, you will be able to define which type of sidechain to apply, depending on the type of production you want to make.

Language: French

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