Cool Mix Tricks: The Big Mute - DigiDesign DIGI 1 Quick Start Manual

Cool Mix Tricks: The Big Mute

Now that you've started mixing with Pro Tools LE—and you haven't had this much fun in
years — here's a really cool thing you can do. We call this The Big Mute, and it's one of
those tricks you hear often in popular songs of any genre. The Big Mute is basically an
automated mute across a bunch of tracks used to highlight a small section of the song.
We'll write this mixing "move" as mute automation across all those tracks using an
automation group that's already set up.
To understand this trick better, you can refer to the information on Mix Automa-
tion and the information on Groups in the Pro Tools Reference Guide . We're not
going to give away all the tricks in this Quick Start Guide—we just want you to
have an idea of what's possible with Pro Tools LE.
To automate The Big Mute:
Go to the tutorial location by clicking "Big Mute" in the Memory Locations window.
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Enable the Big Mute group by clicking "Big Mute" in the Groups list.
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1
click "Big Mute"
Memory Location
Set the Automation Mode to Auto Write on the slap return track, called "SlpRt," by
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clicking the Automation Mode button and selecting Auto Write from the pop-up. This
will enable you to automate the muting of the slap return track, which puts a delay on
the lead vocal.
Click Play in the Transport window, and click Mute on the track to begin writing mute
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automation.
Chapter 5: Working with the Demo Session 57
2
click "Big Mute"
group to enable