Whenever I’m recording a full-band live it is mandatory to setup proper monitoring for each musician. The Cue Sends serve that purpose well except for the fact that they are limited to 4, so whenever I have a band larger than 4 musicians, I need to use normal FX Sends in order to get the job done. But that leads me to a problem: if I use Cubase IC Pro as individual monitor mixers for musicians this method will not work because the only way the IC Pro handles individual monitor mixes is through the dedicated 4 Cue Sends. Additionally, the IC Pro was abandoned and is no longer being developed.
Setting up monitor mixes is boring, time consuming and kills the flow of recording sessions. However, that issue instantly disappears when musicians have their own monitor mixes under their fingertips - I usually get monitoring done for 4 musicians in just two or three minutes - I need this workflow to be the same for a 7 or 12 piece band as well.
I’ve browsed the forum and noticed users asking for more cue sends since at least 2012, and there have been also several threads of people asking for a proper replacement for Cubase IC Pro since at least 2011.
If you need to setup monitoring for musicians and frequently bump into this issue, please vote, so we can gather attention and have Steinberg further develop on this.
When I track larger sessions with many musicians I create 4 submixes using the 4 cue sends. An example could be:
Drums/Perc
Bass
Comp (guitars, keys, misc)
Vocals
These submixes get routed to personal monitor mixers where the performer can set the levels of the 4 submixes as well as their own instrument.
I’ve never had any complaints.
That is a viable workaround for sure. And I’ve got my methods as well.
But those are unnecessarily complicated (eg. using two types of sends for monitoring or not using the cue sends at all - making them useless), and demand extra outboard gear and routing. If things can be simple and efficient for up to 4 monitor mixes, why can’t they be that simple for larger setups as well?
My point was, you still need the D/A, headphone amps and bunch of tablets running IC(?).
Personally I wouldn’t trust any artist with Cubase IC. It’s too complicated. A simple personal mixer with 5 knobs doesn’t need a lot of guidance.
For sure, I need D/A, headphone amps, etc. And I setup the IC Pros in a way the musician will only see a few tracks (click, own instrument, drums, bass, guitar, vocals) - it’s pretty much “what you see is what you get”.
The other advantage is: since all submixes are ITB, I can have 12 stereo mixes with only 24 physical analog outputs - and if the musicians are using IEMs, there will be zero cables on the ground.
If you need to go on the road for a session, there’s simply no better way.
Already did. It’s a neat app but way too complex to put in the hands of a musican that just wants to set his/her monitoring levels right. Even with its flaws, the IC Pro still serves this purpose best.
If the Avid app was customizable, it would be brilliant.
In my case it unfortunately often freezes Cubase during recording, so its a no go…
But I got the answer from Steinberg, that their plan is to revive IC Pro, so I hope this will be implemented properly.
Oh, that’s a shame. My experience is a bit different. The IC Pro is a bit sluggish to operate but I never experienced it freezing Cubase on the main PC.
I even like the fact that it’s a web based app, which makes any device, Android or Apple, usable - no installation required.
For the future, I believe the best option is to arrange a customizable midi controller app to be configurable through the new Midi controller setup tool.
The only thing really, really missing is more cue channels.
But it’s great to know Steinberg is looking at this!
I see it as an incapacitating condition
There are advantages that do not need a vote at all. People are looking for ease of use and no restrictions, and you tell me should be more than 50 votes!
Why only 4 when most of the competitors have an unlimited number of CUES?
Is this, in your opinion, a matter that requires a vote, or does it require the development department to pay attention to the competitors and develop all that is necessary without request from users
Yep, otherwhise the IC Pro app would be all I need. I also use it on an android device via browser (as thats the same the iOS app would do) and I really like it. But yeah, the fact that it crashes Cubase sporadically during recording, makes it unusable for me. Hopefully there will be a solution soon, as this system can save you a lot of money, and musicians usually love the ability to mix their own monitors.
You’re right, I’ve been using Steinberg software since the early 00s but only became “active” on the forum since C9.5 and even now my activity here is residual.
I kept loyal to Steinberg DAWs throughout the years because, in my opinion, it has the best set of audio editing tools. But since day one of using audiowarp and variaudio I felt both tools were great but still missing out on some key areas (yeah, that snap to grid triplet thing - I bumped on that minutes after using it for the first time), and that remained unchanged for a lot of time. Then one day I got tired of waiting and took the initiative to “lobby” for that issue here and within a couple of versions, the issue was dug out from the dead, people started talking again about it, up to the point that it was finally addressed and solved. It worked!
Everybody has slightly different needs in a DAW (I can live without a gapless engine but I understand why people are asking for it) and everybody knows Steinberg has limited resources to cater for all those requests, so they need to prioritize and one of the ways they use to take decisions is collecting forum feedback through a voting system.
I’m not sure if it’s the best way but it is a way and if it helps to contribute to make the software better, then I’ll take it.
Thank you for your response. I hope the development and programming department will follow up on the market and work to bring everything that facilitates the use of the program
There are very limited things that have been without development for a long time, and there are things that do not work properly
Steinberg is a big and pioneering company, but in my opinion, if it continues in this way, it will be the beginning of its downfall
I can’t even find today among my friends who use Steinberg , and most of them are sound engineers who were once using Cubase and Protools
I see Steinberg resisting, but what makes them exist today is the love of people
We use Cubase PRO for rehearsals, but rely to Behringer X32 for cue mixes. Meanwhile we ran out of send channels on the mixer, so or we buy a new mixer or we switch to another DAW with more CUE sends. Fairly hard after having bought 3 PRO licences for mixing also at home of the single band members.
3 other Bands with the same problem in my area already sold their licences and switched to another DAW to make all cue sends inside the DAW. Also 2 little amateur recording studios already switched to pro tools to record bands with more than 4 members in a single session. There are also some small bands (6 reached out to me) in my area which cant afford a big mixing desk and would use a DAW for rehearsals. All of them i had to turn away from cubase because of this.
So… in a single year Steinberg has lost a minimum of 10 licences only in my little town.
I am pretty shure there is quite a big market for rehearsal mixing inside a DAW, so i hope Steinberg would invest some priority to raise the CUE count to at least 15 or 20 and provide us Android/iOs apps for easy CUE level send adjustment.
Or meanwhile, raise the channel send count to at least 30!!!
I hope that the Steinberg administration, dev
will give serious consideration to these feautres that people demand
They are no longer additional advantages, but rather a basic requirement that all steinberg competitors have @Matthias_Quellmann
