Turn your voice into a choir

How To Create A Choir with One Singer - Great For Working Safely During COVID-19

During this time of social distancing, choirs are not only hard to come by, they’re also largely prohibited at the moment. But what if you want that choir sound without leaving your house?  In this article, we show you a great recording trick to fake a choir with only one singer!

I’m a big fan of background vocals that are mixed with depth as a consideration in addition to panning. To me, when background vocals are all hard-panned and equally present, they’re less exciting. This might be a symptom of being a choir nerd during my formative years, but I like when some vocals sound closer, some more distant, and panned in one of 3 ways: hard left/right (100), left-ish/right-ish (around 25-45), or centre, give or take.

So, when I’m recording vocals and the goal is for it to feel like a choir, (assuming that there are no tuning issues that warrant separating singers) I mic the singers like a choir: a pair of cardioid condensers in XY, and a spaced pair of Omni condensers in front of the group.

You can also mic a single singer this way instead of a group, which might be the case for a while depending on how long social distancing lasts. This is also a handy trick for faking other kinds of ensembles such as string quartets or a horn section. I’ll demonstrate with one singer, singing four-part harmony; the first 30 seconds of Vivaldi’s Gloria XII: Cum Sancto Spiritu.

Here’s how you fake a choir using only one singer. 

Microphone Placement

Place a pair of matched condenser microphones in XY configuration, a few feet in front of the singer, and about 6 feet (more or less depending on how tall the singer is) off the floor. I’ll be using two Neumann TLM103s.

On both sides of the XY pair, place omnidirectional mics at the same height and distance from the singer, spaced around four feet off of centre. I’ll be using two Earthworks QTC40s.

Add an optional close-mic if you want to be able to dial in more closeness. I didn’t use one for this example, but I would have chosen a Neumann U87 or a Peluso 2247. 

On the floor, I’ve marked where to stand when I sing each part. From left to right, audience perspective, Soprano, Tenor, Bass, Alto. This ensures that the proper distance from the mics is maintained and that various takes done in each location will sound spatially similar. If you’re using a close mic, move it with you as you change positions around the XY/Omnis.

Setting up a Template

You’ll need four mono tracks or two stereo tracks per vocal part: Part 1 XY L, Part 1 XY R, Part 1 Omni L, Part 1 Omni R, all hard panned. Even though all my tracks are hard-panned, it won’t sound that way in the end because the singer performs from multiple locations in the stereo field.

To save mixing time and reduce latency, route the tracks for each voice part to a stereo aux track for compression and EQ, rather than compress and EQ every single track. For me, that means 16 mono audio tracks routed to 4 stereo aux tracks.

Mixing

On each voice part’s aux track is a send to a parallel compression aux track, labeled “Comp.” I’ve panned the comp track center and blended it in to thicken the sound. I’ve also EQ’d it by rolling off the lows and highs. 

Rolling off the lows prevents the sound from becoming muddy. Rolling off the highs softens diction and mimics how we would hear a choir in front of us. Singers whose voices have a more direct path to the ear (positioned off to the left or right) will sound brighter than singers who might be in the center of the group, but whose voices are more directional toward your forehead rather than the actual ear.

You may or may not have some tuning to do, which can get tricky with so many mics. My process is to use either Waves Tune or AutoTune on each aux track. Again, we are avoiding processing each mic separately, but are thinking in terms of voice part instead. Since I was singing with a bit of vibrato, Waves Tune introduced some popping sounds, so I opted for AutoTune EFX+ instead.

Here’s what the track sounds like tuned and with a bit of reverb:

And that’s all there is to it! If social distancing has you locked in your studio as well, give this a try and let us know how it works out for you.

Audrey Martinovich’s interest in recording was sparked from her background as a classically trained singer who, through experimenting with recording voice lessons and performances, fell in love with engineering. She co-owns Audio for the Arts with her business partner, Buzz Kemper, where in addition to their acoustic music projects, they produce podcasts, radio shows, advertisements, and do post-production for film.

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