STEMS

[jafo37]

Hello All: Good ol Jafo here with another question about the listings I'm wondering about the stems they must mean multiple track format. Can anyone tell me what stem format they have sent a song in as and how that works if you submit mp3s for review? do they ask you for the actual stems later?ThanksJafo37

[mazz]

You are correct about stems being multiple track format. You submit your final mix to the listing. If you get forwarded and they contact you, they will ask you to provide the stems. I'm not sure what they want in each stem, I've been forwarded to them in the past but have not heard back. I can imagine they would want something like "bass and drums", "rhythm guitar", "keyboards", "full mix minus lead", etc. etc.In any case, you don't submit stems to the listing but you have to have a way to provide them if they ask for them. The way I do my pieces is: When I have it as I want it, I record all my tracks as audio, either stereo or mono depending on the part, mostly stereo though. Then I do my final mix from those audio tracks. If they ask for stems, I can just open my project and bounce the various tracks in whatever combinations are required. Hope this helped and wasn't too much information. It's the witching hour and I can't stop typing....... Mazz

[jafo37]

Thanks MazzAs always you are a big help. When you send your stems will you send them as wave files or somthing else?

[thestudioaz]

hey Mazz thanks, I was wondering about this as well. I'm glad to see I was on the right track. Also, when recording with midi, I keep all my midi tracks and all the patch info in a seperate sub group folder w/in Cubase, then I export those as audio files and use them in the main mix. It makes life so much easier when eq'ing tracks, using efx plug-ins and sub-mixing.Jafo, I would imagine ".wav" format, since that is standard for importing/exporting to all the various platforms including video editing. If they want something different like aiff or mp3, I'm guessing they'll request it. Most recording software out there can export in a number of different formats, so it shouldn't be too much of a headache. Of course, this is all guessing, I could be completely wrong, lol!

[mazz]

.wav is probably the most common format. Keep in mind that the sample rate for video is 48Khz which is different from the CD rate of 44.1. If the music is going to be used in video they may request the wavs at 48K. Make sure you can do this. If you send them 44.1, either they may reject it or the pitch will get shifted if they don't do the extra step of sample rate conversion on their end. You should do this conversion prior to sending the files in.Software that can do a batch process on your files is a great time saver if you have a lot of stems to send in.Mazz