2. Apply the necessary EQ treatments needed for the song It’s also good practice to listen to the music the whole way through because different sections in the song can present different EQ challenges. By taking the time to digest the music beforehand, you get a better grasp of the unique EQ challenges that lie ahead. Not every song requires the same treatment.

One common beginner mistake when mastering is jumping straight into EQ processing even before thoughtfully listening to the music.

How to EQ Your Master 1. Listen to the entire music and take notes as you go along It might seem challenging at first, but with constant mastering and ear-training practice, your ears will gradually become more accustomed to this level of critical listening. With that in mind, EQ adjustments tend to be about 1 dB or less on a specific frequency range.

Every adjustment is applied across the whole mix so the impact of your processing is magnified. In the mastering world, however, because you’re typically working on a stereo mix which has already been approved production-wise, the EQ processing has to be much more subtle. In those situations, EQ treatments tend to be more heavy-handed and larger in scale-think 3 dB boost in the mid-range of a lead vocal, a steep high pass filter at 80 Hz on a guitar track to remove hum, or a +5 dB high shelf EQ on the overheads for more air. With mixing sessions where you have access to all the individual tracks, you’re able to hone in on a specific instrument and process it independently from the rest of the production. Much like compression in mastering, the main difference in applying EQ in mixing versus mastering is scale.

Eq master track