Hi - I’d like to automate having my piano duck the center by a dB or two when there are other instruments/vocals, then bring back a full center when it is the only instrument playing.
I’ve done that in the past by manually automating M-S balance in Voxengo MSED , but now I’d like to have that process controlled by a side-chain.
I took a quick look in the Cubase 12 Pro Plug-in manual, but didn’t see anything that did that … maybe I missed it though … does anyone know how I might do that natively?
Frequency 2 can do Mid/Side compression just like that. You can use either a high or low dynamic shelf to cover the whole frequency spectrum, and trigger the gain reduction using an external side-chain input.
I also wanted to also bump the sides up a dB or two when the mid is ducked, I just opened up another instance of Freq, and did a similar thing so that side gains were increased when triggered using the side chain input - fantastic, thanks again @Romantique_Tp ! [EDIT: To simplify, I have since put all the changes into one instance of Frequency. Very pretty display!]
NB: It was the slightest bit tricky at first - I was initially puzzled/dismayed to see the gain reduction/increase being triggered by the piano initially, rather than the intended voice which I had assigned to the side chain at the top Cubase dialog in Freq. For those that don’t know (like I didn’t), even though side chain is activated up there at the top, it still won’t respond to the side chain … in Freq itself have to double click to toggle open the Single-Band view, then choose “Side Chain” in the “Input” dialog on the far right of the Single-Band window that opens.