The use of digital pitch correction software on vocal recordings

Let’s bring this discussion “down to earth”. A little reality check, if you will.

I am as much of a “purist” as anyone else; probably even more so. There is no question that the use of electronic processing in the music recording industry has become pervasive and excessive. It has given rise to many popular, so called “artists” that are nothing more than “product”. The product of producers who maintain a very low artistic bar. These performers are not “artists” at all. They lip-sync when performing live and when recording rely entirely on processing tools such as pitch correction. In fact, it could be argued that it is the producers who are artists…if one can find artistic merit in the ability and skill to appeal to music consumers who, themselves, maintain a very low bar in their appreciation of art. We all know who these performers are. Pretty pathetic.

HOWEVER, consider the truly talented artist who on a given day, for whatever reason and on a day when the recording studio has been rented for the recording of their next album, is having trouble with that last high note note of a phrase. Maybe didn’t sleep well the night before, or maybe ate a little too much phlegm-causing ice cream the night before. A little electronic tweak can fix an otherwise wonderful performance. So terrible? So artistically objectionable? I don’t think so.

A little electronic tweak can fix an otherwise wonderful performance. So terrible? So artistically objectionable? I don’t think so.

For sure you are right it is not objectionable ...😊 Why will it be ? We are no purist nor snob..

But the main point as you observed and judged it yourself is the gesture integrity and individuality of the artist versus a manufactured results and versus an artist as a manufactured product...

All this discussion could be perceived as one about the number of an angels on a pin point, but we humans are confronted not only with sophisticated tools that increase the distance between the spontaneous natural gesture of an artist and the end result but by his replication soon and hyjacking by A. I.

Is nature exist ?

or is it a matter of consumers choice, nothing else...Corporations think so...

Is a work of art a spiritual and body expression at his root or is it only a manufactured product ? Corporations think the second case is the crux of the matter ...

Corporations will disapear and even A.I. one day...Musicians will stay at the root of civilization integrated in Nature...😊

@frogman

I thought the conversation was cruising at a very reasonable altitude.
People having a civil conversation.
If I may ask, how did this conversation, in your mind, necessitate being “brought back down to earth?”

“A reality check, if you will.” Frankly, there is a pompous tone to that statement.
A “reality check”…thank heavens frogman is here to “educate” us.

I don’t characterize this issue as being about “purist” vs. “non-purist.”
As I said in the OP, it is about honesty.
To an artist/producer that releases vocal recordings, or performs “live,” (very intentional use of quotation marks there) under the pretense that the vocalist is…singing…I have a request, “don’t pee on my shoes on tell me it’s raining.”

It’s false advertising.

I love Kraftwerk. Love them.
They, and artists of a similar type, tell me right out: “these vocals are a certain way,” and I know what I’m getting. and it’s all good.

Some kid with an acoustic guitar, wanted me to buy their music, is telling me something different from what the Kraftwerk-type artists are telling me.
They’re saying, “listen to my singing! Buy my record!”
Well, I’d be happy to, kid, but your end of the bargain means not lying to me.

If the “bad part” of the performance is such a tiny segment of the performance, then they can easily punch in that 4-second part and be done with it, and have a vocal recording that actually is the thing they’re advertising: a human expression of vocalization.

It is just lazy and disrespectful to the buyer to do the DPC thing.

Often, the “bad note” wasn’t “bad” at all.

We’ve all heard vocal performances from the past 100 years that caused us to feel deep emotions, all of which had moments of pitchy-ness. All of them.

Pop, opera, all corners of the musical universe…non-perfect pitch is a matter of course with vocal performance, and we all, rightfully, love it.

Personally, I find the vocal performance that was shoehorned into digitally-dictated pitch to be aesthetically ugly and bad-sounding, which makes this practice all the more maddening.

If it actually made vocals sound better, we could have a real argument here.
It doesn’t.

Please, Planet Earth, I beg of you…stop using digital pitch correction software.

I would say a normal person only notices “pitchy-ness” when it’s particularly egregious. Obviously, that is not acceptable in a professional situation, and needs to be remedied.
The idea that such a remedy must be via digital pitch correction software is pure bunk.
The apologia that comes into play at this point, i.e. “recording is too expensive, so we won’t call the singer back in to re-take”….BS.

It’s enough to cause me to wonder if we should actually have a label on the release: “Vocals recorded with digital pitch correction software,” should the proprietors want to be honest.
I’m being semi-serious with that last bit, but I think I’ve made my point.



 

It is precisely the vulnerability, fragility and relative imperfection of the human voice, even trained, that give to it his diverse and individualized expressivity potentials and power...

It is the reason why the human voice is the root and grounding musical instrument in speech as in singing which anyway are merging everyday unbeknonwst to us... ...

You can tune a piano externally or/and mechanized it , but the human voice is integral part of your body and  could not be regulated externally save at the price of loosing its specific unique power...It seems to me that saying all that, i am very "down to earth"; as much as tonal rythmic basic speech gesture are down to earth and are imbued with physical and spiritual meanings ...There exist even a specialized field studying it in linguistic .. 😁

Suppressing this individualized always perfectible BUT never perfect gesture by regulating it by external standardized means and tools is killing art and transforming it in marchandise,like perfect Mcdonald fries, and replacing the root and fruit of the expressive tree by artificially genetically modified seeds.... It is the same act...

I think your observation is right OP...

"Imperfection is the peak" René Char...

Pop, opera, all corners of the musical universe…non-perfect pitch is a matter of course with vocal performance, and we all, rightfully, love it.

Personally, I find the vocal performance that was shoehorned into digitally-dictated pitch to be aesthetically ugly and bad-sounding, which makes this practice all the more maddening.

If it actually made vocals sound better, we could have a real argument here.
It doesn’t.

@tylermunns , oh, please! Take a chill pill and relax, man. Obviously, I struck a chord (😊) with you. It should be obvious why I used the phrases that I used. “Pompous”? Really? Read your own words to see pomposity.

I’ll make it short:

The use of pitch correction and its possible attack on musical integrity is a matter of the degree to which it is used. It seemed from many of the responses (including yours) that the use of this electronic tool is considered objectionable in all instances and not only when there is a gross reliance on it by the “artist”. Used very sparingly it can be very useful and not objectionable, imo. That was my point, nothing more.

**** I have perfect pitch. I know what off-pitch sounds like. I’m a singer.
I sing on pitch.****

Pomposity, anyone?