If you take a song recorded in stereo, split the signal into two mono paths, then invert the polarity of one of the mono tracks and remix it, you’ll remove the vocals from that song.Ī disadvantage of removing vocals by using the phase cancellation method is that anything in the track that is panned center will be lost because it will be canceled out. This is the principle behind removing vocals from a signal, of course, there is a lot more going on behind the scenes, but this is just a simple explanation of the theory behind the process. When using phase cancellation to remove vocals, the signal that contains the vocals needs to be 180° degrees out of phase or have the polarity inverted so that it’s canceled out.

If two frequencies are 180 degrees out of phase, they cancel each other out, resulting in a loss of signal. They are out of phase if they start and end at different times. Two waveforms are considered to be in phase if they start and end at the same time. The phase of a frequency is measured in degrees, and it defines a particular point in time of a given cycle. Sound Frequency is a measure of the number of wave cycles that occur in a second. The tutorial in this post is based on phase cancellation to remove vocals.Įvery sound is made by vibrations of molecules and can be represented by frequencies. If all you want to do is remove the vocals from a song to sing along with a karaoke song, you don’t want to spend that much money and devote months just learning how to use the software. In our case, we are not using such professional software because they cost thousands of dollars. There is advanced software that can remove vocals from songs using complicated algorithms to do so.

Let’s dive in.īackground Information on Removing Vocals I have put this post together to help you with this matter by explaining how to remove vocals from a song using Audacity an open-source, completely free program that delivers excellent results. Sometimes the song that you want to sing doesn’t have a karaoke track, and you end up wondering how can I remove the vocals from a song? After doing some research, you end up downloading an app that wants to charge you to remove the vocal from your favorite song.

Removing vocals from a song audacity