The difference between a fantastic piece of music and a mediocre one often has nothing to do with the actual melody or music itself. Often, one music tracks sounds much better than another simply because it has a professional final mix while the other has been sloppily recorded and thrown together without skill or experience. Creating a great mix is simply a matter of knowing what to do and the following tips will assist.

1. Always use the very best and cleanest recordings or samples to create your music track. Terrible recordings will only muddy up the mix and make it sound amateur and dull.

2. Cut separate areas for each instrument within the audio spectrum by using EQ. For example, keep the bass drum and bass guitar from getting muddy by cutting out all frequencies below 80Hz on the bass drum track.

3. Create a nice stereo field by panning some instruments. While the bass drum and guitar should stay in the center to give the track stability, other elements such as cymbals and strings can be panned to add depth and sonic intrigue.

4. Understand and use compression to give clout to presence to each instrument. Tracks sound weak and lame without compression and is often a main difference between professional and amateur sounding tracks.

5. Compare the overall sound of your track next to favorite CDs in the same genre before you master. Make sure your track sounds as close to possible as the professionally made track and if it doesn’t, then figure out why and correct.

6. During final mixing, limit high peaks with a limiter which will let you increase the loudness of the entire track to its highest potential without distorting.

Finally, after you’ve burned your new mix onto a CD or into your .mp3 player play it in your car, your living room, your buddy’s house to make sure that your hit single sounds fantastic in all types of speakers systems.