How to get Enya-type vocal sounds?

[PaulG]

Hi, there,

Short of layering an "ooh" sound 47 times (or even 46 for efficiency) does anyone know some ways to approximate the lush vocal textures that she gets on her songs?

I am not looking to copy exactly, just wondering how to get textures like that from starting with a single "ooh" vocal sample.

Thanks a lot,

- Paul

[C00kie]

Layering 47 times (with different mikes & preamps) is all there is to it, alas

[chicken muffin]

be enya. her voice is angelic. theres only so much you can do with a crappy take or voice. theres and endless amount of things you can do with a beautiful voice.

[HunterKiller]

I've found that 45 and a half does the trick.

What are you boys doing with those 2 extra layers?

[gravehill]

I tried it a while ago and managed to get something similar with a vocalist who sounds "angelic" and doubled her 15 times (seriously).

[PaulG]

be enya.

You know, believe it or not this does have some merit.

But if you listen to her solo tracks they are miles different than the lush vocal pad-oriented ones.

I thought the same thing, too, about ABBA's vocals, that it was just "them" (and ONLY them) until I got one of their albums which had a dry single vocal from each girl. It didn't even sound like the same girls singing.

Obviously the production techniques are the "multiplier" of the original singer's quality. You don't want to get a crappy singer and multiply by zero, so to speak. So my question was geared more toward what happens AFTER the sound hits the microphone for the NON solo parts.

[sloworm]

layering is great. but the best advice would be to find a singer like enya, talent and skill wise. then record.

[zircon]

This is called a "pop stack" and really only 3-4 voice layers are required to make it work. Panning them widely, increasing the high end EQ, using a bit of chorusing and then lush reverb will really bring the sound out.

[Unkie Al]

Fnarr fnarr fnarr ... okay, cheap laffs out of the way.

Enya's primary vocals are recorded much in the same way that background singers are engineered in any other popular recording. I'd start by spreading out the ensemble voices in the stereo image, add some gentle limiting, EQ out a lot of the lower freqs and wash the layers in reverb. Nothing dense; you're going after angel poop, which is almost weightless, so do the mix with very few lows if any.

The temptation will be to add a pile of highs. Cut the lows instead. It'll be easier to tame the levels that way.

[PaulG]

It seems, too, that she has some kind of ADSR volume envelope on some of her tracks, too, for the volume swells. I don't know how you'd sing the volume changes and keep the texture of the whole grouping.

They could just be using host automation on the volume, too. But it's be nice to be able to control it via a MIDI keyboard or something.

[PaulG]

Thanks, Zircon and Al,

Would this technque be possible if you only had one take of the vocal sound from a single singer? Or is it necessary to use multiple singers or at least multiple takes?

[zircon]

I've gotten the sound from my girlfriend, but only in multiple takes/layers (not necessarily multiple takes per note though.) It's pretty hard to do from one recording since even something like a good chorus that will create multiple copies of the audio still won't sound quite as rich. Maybe one of those harmony generating programs..

[aallvor]

Reverb, and lots of it...

[zircon]

Actually, one thing worth mentioning is Symphony of Voices, which has a number of backing pop stack samples. I use those all the time. Might be an expensive purchase if that's all you need it for though.

[chicken muffin]

layering is great. but the best advice would be to find a singer like enya, talent and skill wise. then record.

man! how annoying is that! i said it first you just changed what i said and made it your own