How do I remove the voice from a CD track, leaving just music?
A common reason for wanting to do this is to have a disc that can be sung along with, either for personal practice or for karaoke. There isn’t a perfect method for doing this, but it’s possible to get close with some CDs. Music is generally recorded in independent tracks and then mixed into a balanced whole. The recording studio can create masters with or without the vocals, which is where a “clean” karaoke source comes from. The music is usually recorded in stereo, and the vocals in mono (the singer has one microphone). The mixed result has slightly different signals on the left and right channels for the music, but the same signal on both channels for the vocals. By removing all signal components that are equal on the left and right channels, the vocals can be removed with relatively little distortion of the music. This is called “center channel elimination”. This doesn’t always work out in practice. If the track in question doesn’t keep the vocals “centered”, all bets are off. Many
(2003/11/29) A common reason for wanting to do this is to have a disc that can be sung along with, either for personal practice or for karaoke. There isn’t a perfect method for doing this, but it’s possible to get close with some CDs. Music is generally recorded in independent tracks and then mixed into a balanced whole. The recording studio can create masters with or without the vocals, which is where a “clean” karaoke source comes from. The music is usually recorded in stereo, and the vocals in mono (the singer has one microphone). The mixed result has slightly different signals on the left and right channels for the music, but the same signal on both channels for the vocals. By removing all signal components that are equal on the left and right channels, the vocals can be removed with relatively little distortion of the music. This is called “center channel elimination”. This doesn’t always work out in practice. If the track in question doesn’t keep the vocals “centered”, all bets a
