When using external libraries does the mixer become redundant?

What it says on the tin.
How do you mix /balance your instruments if you use external libraries?

It depends on. E.g. NotePerformer or Kontakt provide their own mixer page where you can balance out the individual voices. Other plug-ins on the other hand might not have a dedicated mixer page. But latest when you use two or more different plug-ins/libraries you’ll need the Dorico mixer to balance them out.

Also you can have CC7 volume automation in an automation lane.

Hello… Wizard? :slight_smile:

I admit to a phase of going overboard with trying to fix things in the mix… These days I work as much as possible with dynamics and balance in the score and expression maps.

The mixer in the plugins I use for any big imbalances that might be there for whatever reason - usually if I’ve got sound design elements or I’m doing something with Mic positions that alters the overall volume. Turns out EWQL’s Nick Phoenix is pretty talented - who’d have thunk it? :slight_smile: As far as tweaking there, I’m more likely to CAUSE that one articulation to stick out like a sore thumb than I am to fix it.

If its needed, I find a FX, a compressor or Dynamic EQ across the entirety of the channels that make up an instrument (IE, by using an insert on the Dorico mixer) is better than putting them on an individual instrument’s articulation channels. I know its a somewhat different case when you have different instruments running in the same VSTi.

Even so I don’t like bringing individual plugin mixers up and down all the time. The more I do there, the slower the process. I want one board for everything as it were. My $0.02 worth of opinion.