Recommended parametric EQ for live vocals?

Software
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Dear fellow zynthianouts,

I’m new to Zynthian, and I’ve been searching for a good parametric EQ effect for processing live vocals (through an audio-signal chain).

Ideally:

  • Something with 4–5 bands.
  • Something with variable Q.
  • Something with adjustable slope (e.g. Bell / Peak, Notch, HPF, LPF, Shelf…)
  • Something CPU-friendly (as I want other things to be happening elsewhere :-))

On paper, EQ4Q from the pre-installed effects seems to be just ideal, BUT it’s a bit of a mystery – its filter_type parameter exposes numeric values (1–12) in LV2, but neither the TTL metadata nor the stripped binary defines what those numbers correspond to (I couldn’t find any documentation online either…). Would anyone here know?

I’ve found another hopeful candidate – C* E40 - 4-band parametric equaliser. Looks just about perfect! I tried to add it through the Zynthian UI (i.e., made it “toggled”). I can see the effect among the others; nevertheless, when I try to add it to an audio chain, the Zynthian freezes.

So, before I try anything else, is there anyone with either a tip that would help me overcome the issues above or simply a tip for an EQ that works? :slight_smile:

Cheers,

woreshack

2 Likes
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Hi @woreshack !

For voices i find this one quite simple to use while being powerful-enough for most use-cases:

  • ZamEQ => LPF + 2 parametric bands + HPF

Perhaps it’s a little more simple than you requested, but It works nicely and takes very little CPU. Indeed, it’s not so different to EQ4Q, with the limitation that you can’t choose the type of filter for each band.

This one is also interesting and super-efficient for the power it offers:

  • TAP Equalizer BW => It has 8 independent parametric bands with center freq, bandwidth and gain.

The bands with gain set to 0 (exactly 0) are not processed, so they didn’t take any resources.
It’s more a “surgeon tool” and perhaps it’s best suited for fixing resonance problems or adjusting the tone colour of specific instruments, but it can be useful for vocals too.

Regarding the EQ4Q, i would recommend you try to understand the parameters from the native GUI (VNC enabled).

Regards,

1 Like
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Thanks so much, will give it a try!

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Hi @woreshack !

I’ve been testing with x42eq and i think you would find it super cool. It’s not enabled by default.

Regards

1 Like
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Cool, thanks! Will test it, too.