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Professional Mix Engineer Rates

Mr. Edinburgh

Active Member
hi all - again id like to ask a question that has some of us wondering...

how much does a top pro mix engineer charge per day to mix orchestral music?

lets say it's TV music (about 10mins of music) and it can be mixed in the box (not a fancy studio like abbey road with loads of outboard gear and a massive desk).

thanks
 
I believe one of the standard rates is $300/hour plus renting the studio but that's more for tracking. Keep in mind that most of the top scoring mixers don't have their own studios. I think with just mixing then you can get a bit more of a fixed rate rather than hourly. Some people charge more (close to $1000/hour) and others charge less (I charge $50/hour). If you're in the UK then Jake Jackson might be a good choice to look into. I think he has nice rates for working out of his little studio.
 
You're looking at £400 - £1200 per day for an experienced engineer, depending on weight of credits and busyness. Most people have their own setups these days, although perhaps not if you require 5.1. 10 mins of TV music should be very doable in a day.

Unlike the pop or dubbing world, no-one's getting $1000/hour (but one can dream...)
 
I know of a few mix engineers in Nashville, top shelf guys, that range between 500 to a 1000 per day.
 
Find a talented new comer with his own gear. Going to a top pro you'll be competing with labels and the such that have deep pockets. Really the best thing to do imo for an up and coming composer is to find either a young assistant to a top engineer or a guy trying to find work that will go that extra mile to make your music sound top notch. In the many years that I've used various engineers for this or that project I've always been surprised at how well I work with people that aren't considered "top" pros yet but that did a lot to help a brother out.

Also, in this way you can build a relationship and can grow together.
 
I mix professionally and my rates are no where near high as the ones you guys wrote here. 3000€ for mixing per song if I understood correctly? LOL :D
 
I know excellent engineers, practically none of whom would take more than 300 U.S. per song (and usually less).

Unless we're talking, you know, symphony movements or whole side rock epics.
 
very roughly around 600-900 for that. I once enquired about getting a pop mix done by Wez Clarke and his agent quoted £3000 plus royalties :D

You're talking to the wrong person, then. There are more great engineers around today than composers imo...shoot, you might find somebody more than good right in your own background.

If anyone gave me that as a quote I'd run their name through the mud. Ignorant.
 
An awful lot of composer/orchestrator/musicians are mixing everything, themselves, these days and getting excellent results. Besides, if you're mixing for TV, you're most likely going to be supplying stems, anyway, and someone else will be doing the final tweaking.
 
I tried to PM you but for some reason I can't. I mix for myself as well as a lot of other projects for nearly 20 years now. If you'd like to discuss this further just shoot me a message or email.

[email protected]
 
Songs? Labels? That's a different market than OP's question.

As with anything in the creative field, a (relative) handful of top people can command high rates. Of course quality can be found for less, but if you want a track record of serious credits then it'll likely cost.

The good news is that it won't cost the $4-10k per track that the top pop guys command.
 
I know excellent engineers, practically none of whom would take more than 300 U.S. per song (and usually less).

Unless we're talking, you know, symphony movements or whole side rock epics.
I come from the mixing world, and $300/song is low. I don't know any pro engineers charging that and can't say I've ever heard great mixes for $300.

If anyone gave me that as a quote I'd run their name through the mud. Ignorant.
Go ahead and run someone like Serban Ghenea's name through the mud, then. See how that works out. :emoji_joy:
 
hi all - again id like to ask a question that has some of us wondering...

how much does a top pro mix engineer charge per day to mix orchestral music?

lets say it's TV music (about 10mins of music) and it can be mixed in the box (not a fancy studio like abbey road with loads of outboard gear and a massive desk).

thanks
I do not like to do public quotes but, Ill do it for $--/hour or $--- for the day (10 hours), I can do in the box and I have some outboard as well.!! PM me if interested!
 
There a lot of factors... in the box vs outboard, turnaround time, genre and track count for the project... A mix engineer with Billboard credits in a major city will run you at 1000+ per song at an indie rate...
Right out of high-school i was sitting in on a session (around the economic downturn) and an indie single mix from a grammy nom/multi platinum engineer was 1500... That was for his friend who had no deal at the time and they'd been friends for a decade... You can get a good mix engineer's assistant to do a mix for about 500 though...
 
I come from the mixing world, and $300/song is low. I don't know any pro engineers charging that and can't say I've ever heard great mixes for $300.


Go ahead and run someone like Serban Ghenea's name through the mud, then. See how that works out. :emoji_joy:

$300 is on the high end for the mix of a single song...you don't know what you're talking about, son.

Not impressed by Ghenea either. So suck it.
 
Yep, $300 for one song is completely normal. Also keep in mind that when you have more than one, usually the rest of the songs may be a bit cheaper compared to the first one due to obvious reasons.
 
FWIW: I mix music for a living since about 30 years now. I ask for daily rates rather than for hourly ones. Usually these "days" encompass 10 hours of work, sometimes more, hardly less. I charge for "my work" and my stuff (software and selected outboard hardware). Studio rent will be charged in addition to that, which means that clients quite often ask me to come to their place (which I'll happily do if it is up to par acoustically).

As a rule-of-thumb I charge 50 Euro per hour, plus VAT. If we talk about an album or a complete score, I will often agree upon a flat fee for the whole production, which makes things easier for both parties, but still these hourly rates are a good benchmark.

Personally I decided to do rather a few well-payed, interesting (and musically rewarding) jobs than many cheap ones.*) Keeps my work-life-balance in shape ... ;) ... instead of poorly payed gigs I prefer to do free mixes once in a while for a student's project or an upcoming artist.

Sidenote: It might be worth mentioning that these rates remained more or less unchanged for many years now, which means that our actual income has dropped significantly since the raise of internet piracy ...

*) ... you guys know the proverbial "magic triangle"? It says: "Good - fast - cheap: Pick any two." 8-)
 
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