Not only is adding reverb to a snare drum buried in a stem or minimal mic recording of drums possible, but it can be quick as well. We show you how.

Working With Premixed Audio

Increasingly, whole records can grow up out of recorded material begun by someone else, be that artist or engineer. For that reason, those mixing music can find themselves working with a range of premixed audio including stems, or scratch recordings made by artists. Using modern tools, being able to incorporate artists’ own audio sketches into the finished product has never been easier, and adding elements such as reverb is still possible even after recording or mix decisions have been ‘baked-in’.

Reverb On Single Mic Drums

Bringing found sounds into a production is one of the things artists do best. Perhaps no better illustration of this is with spontaneous drum recording for loops or other uses. The humble one-mic recording can be so much more than a mere ‘placeholder’ on any project, and different options for creative processing expanding all the time. Some one or two mic recordings can benefit from a bit of reverb or ambience on certain kit pieces to lift them out of their rehearsal space or domestic setting.

Reverb On Drum Stems

Many mixing or mastering engineers will recognise some of the challenges involved with receiving stems to work with. While problem-solving EQ or dynamics processing can vastly improve subgroups or stems, the scope for this has a limit. When it comes to creative or aesthetic tweaks with premixed or minimal recordings the engineer has even less room for manoeuvre, and there is a limit to what can be achieved. Certainly, while going back to the project to work with individual tracks or requesting stem tweaks is the ideal scenario, this is not always an option. With this in mind the engineer can employ techniques to deliver targeted reverb on kit pieces. This way, a snare drum can benefit from treatments that give it a sense of place, for example.

In the video, we show you a technique to apply reverb to snare drum on a kit recording made with just one stereo pair in front of the kit. We demonstrate a worse-case scenario recording, but of course this could apply equally to a drum stem, or sample. Whatever the situation, constructing a reverb send from existing audio can elevate existing sounds, and using intelligent gating can be quicker than edits to get there.