At 08:20 PM 5/3/2020, Richard Thomas wrote:
>Do you know how to get a backing track with just the rums and the bass
>on that ? Kareoke site?
>I want to provide the guitar parts and vocals for efferson Airplanes
>White Rabbit, it is on their catalog. For other songs Iay want an
>organ or piano as well.
>I tried iddling around but couldn't figure out how to get only the
>drums nd bass unless the mp3 file I would download can be split into
>individual nstrument tracks by audacity.
>They have the White abbit backing tracks but clicking on an instrument
>like bass has the uitar, drums and vocals and so I couldn't figure
>out how to selectore than one instrument to get only the bass and
>drums ? on the acking tracks.
>Is there a way to select a ombination of instruments to get only a
>bass and drums or,
>Can audacity split out individual tracks from the ownloaded mp3 file?
Although some simulated soloing can be done by muting the center
channel or using very aggressive equalization filters, the real
answer is a resounding no! No software can split an mp3 into its
constituent tracks because it's not that smart. At any given musical
instance, no software can know exactly which instrument is playing,
for how long it will play, what it played before that instance, etc.
Rather than think of a multitrack audio file as something to be split
into individual tracks, let's try a different model.
Back in the day, when we worked with tape, if it was two-track, we
got a left and right channel or one stereo track. With four-track
tape, we could record two more tracks, but most projects required
more than four tracks, so we'd bounce some tracks down to a stereo
pair and record two more. With 8 and 16 track tape, bouncing became
less necessary. So, imagine 1967. The Jefferson Airplane has jousted
recorded "Rabbit," probably on 4-track tape, and mixed it down to
vinyl and cassette pressings. You couldn't buy one of those records,
take it home and magically solo the bass and drums because it's all
mixed down to a stereo track.
fast-forward to the digital era and you essentially have every
digital audio workstation doing the same thing: recording each
instrument or voice as a separate audio file, then relying on the
software to play all the files simultaneously. These are called
stems. if you have bass and drums stems for a tune, you can import
them into Audacity, add your own guitar or keyboards and make a new
track. But in order for you to have those stems, someone must make
those individual files available. No software can extract those
individual stems from the final mix anymore than you can isolate all
the garlic or black pepper in a delicious dish and pile it all on a
small plate.
If you want individual instruments so you can play yoru own on top of
them, karaoke sights won't help you. They only provide instrumental
versions of songs minus vocals. Most times, the vocals are actually
not removed from the originals; rather, the original versions are
meticulously copied by studio musicians. A close friend of mine put
both his kids through college playing congas and other Latin
percussion on these Japanese karaoke tracks of classic pop music,
mostly Motown. He tracked his parts using scratch or scrap vocals
that would never make the final cuts because those karaoke versions
were meant to be instrumentals for people to butcher after getting
way too drunk.
You need to search for stems or soloed tracks for the songs you want
to cover. There's a producer/composer/guitarist on Youtube named Rick
Beato. He's a great musician with that magical combination of street
smarts and school. Anyway, Rick has this series called "What Makes
This Song Great," where he analyzes the songwriting, production and
individual musician performances on any tunes that either strike his
fancy or about which people ask. I don't know how he finds the stems,
but in most cases, he is indeed able to play individual instruments:
bass, drums, guitars, lead and backing vocals. I suspect these stems
get leaked out by recording engineers and have made their way on to
the internet.
Playing them doesn't constitute copyright infringement because he's
using them for educational/analytical purposes.
So, bottom line, no software, not Audacity, not Reaper, Cubass,
Logic, Ableton, not even Pro Tools, can take a stereo mix and isolate
individual instruments. The only way to get that isolation is to
track down either the original stems or people's attempts at playing
everything note for note.
I hope this clears up some confusion. Rock on!
Orlando Enrique Fiol
Ph.D. in Music Theory
University of Pennsylvania: November, 2018
Professional Pianist/Keyboardist, Percussionist, Arranger, Performer
and Pedagogue
Charlotte, North Carolina
Home: (980) 585-1516
Mobile: (267) 971-7090
Email: ofiol@xxxxxxxxxxx
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