Frequency Chart

Every mixing and sound-design decision ends up as a question about Hz: who owns 40–60 Hz, where the "box" in a snare is, how high to high-pass a pad before it stops fighting the bass. This chart gives the ranges that matter for electronic music (sub, kick, bass, drums, vocals, pads, leads), the boost/cut/watch zones per element, and a dictionary that turns studio adjectives into frequencies. All ranges are starting points for your ears: an element's real position depends on its tuning, so the note-to-Hz table is the other half of this page. Numbers assume a 4/4 club context, 20–20 kHz full-range system, and Live's EQ Eight + Spectrum as the tools.

The map

Each row is one element; bands overlap on purpose, because masking is the mix problem. Bold-named rows are the ones that must be mono (sub, kick fundamental) or must stay away from each other (kick vs bass, snare vs clap).

Element by element: boost, cut, watch

"Boost" is what you add when the element is already clean and needs to read; "cut" is the usual problem zone; "watch" is the thing that bites you later in the mix. Use narrow bells (Q 2–4) to find problems and wide bells (Q 0.7–1.2) to shape tone. EQ Eight's solo band (hold the band's headphone icon / click the band and use the audition toggle) is the fastest way to hear a zone on its own.

Adjectives to Hz

What people say in the room, translated. The ranges are fuzzy by nature; sweep a narrow bell (+8 dB, Q 4) across the range until the adjective gets worse, then cut there.

The low end in detail

The 20–250 Hz region is where club music is won or lost, and it is also where the ear is least precise: one octave (40 → 80 Hz) is the whole difference between "sub" and "bass". The diagram below splits the low end into the zones you actually assign to tracks.

20–30 Hz

Nothing useful lives here on any system you will play on. EQ Eight low cut, 24 dB/oct (type "Low cut", slope set to 24 or 48), at 25–30 Hz on the sub and the master; 40–60 Hz on everything else.

30–65 Hz

The sub octave. One mono source. If the kick's fundamental also sits here (long 909-style kicks at 50 Hz) you must sidechain or choose: see sidechain & ducking and sub bass.

60–100 Hz

Kick fundamental and the first harmonic of a 30–50 Hz sub. A kick tuned to the key (e.g. G1 = 98 Hz, or C1 = 65 Hz) stops fighting the sub's harmonic. See kick.

100–250 Hz

Bass "body", snare body, vocal chest, pad low end. This is the zone to HP pads and chords out of (HP 150–250 Hz, 18–24 dB) so the bass alone owns it.

200–400 Hz

Mud. Not evil on its own, but every reverb tail, pad and saturated bass piles up here. A broad −2 to −3 dB bell at 250–300 Hz on return tracks is a standard move.

Harmonic reality check

An element's "range" is its fundamental plus the harmonics you keep. A sub at F#0 (46.25 Hz) that goes through Saturator produces 92.5, 138.8, 185, 231 Hz… — so a "sub" can occupy the same 150–250 Hz slot as the pad. Any time you add distortion, re-check the chart. The note-to-Hz page has a harmonic-series table for common sub roots.

Using Live's tools

EQ Eight

• Filter types per band: Low cut (12 / 48 dB with the slope toggle), Low shelf, Bell, Notch, High shelf, High cut. The 48 dB low cut is the one for pads and returns; 12 dB for gentle rolls on bass.
• Mode: Stereo, L/R, M/S. In M/S, edit the Side channel and low-cut it at 120–200 Hz to mono the bass without touching the mid.
• Adaptive Q: narrows the Q as gain increases. Leave it on for surgical cuts; turn it off for broad tonal shelves.
• Oversampling (Hi-Quality): helps above 10 kHz on steep high shelves; costs CPU; usually off on 50 tracks, on for the master.
• Scale: scales all band gains at once — automate it to "turn the whole EQ curve up and down".
• Audition a band: click a band's filter dot while holding the audition toggle (the headphone button) to solo that band's frequency range. Sweep to find boxy/honky zones.

Spectrum

• Set Block to 4096 or 8192 to see the low end accurately (a 1024 block has 43 Hz bins at 44.1 kHz — useless under 100 Hz). Larger block = slower refresh.
• Scale: keep log; the linear scale is only useful for seeing high harmonics evenly.
• Range (dB) and Refresh: 70–90 dB range, Refresh 20–50% for mixing; 100% refresh for transient analysis.
• Drop Spectrum on the master and use its Max (peak hold) to see which element sets the loudest point in each band after a full drop.
• Drag the device to the stacked detail view (Live 12) to keep it large while editing EQ Eight next to it.

Tuner

• Tuner reads the pitch of a mono-ish sustained signal: perfect on subs, 808 tails, resonant kick decays. Put it after the sub and after the kick to check they are in key (see tuning kicks to key).
• On a kick, use the Classic view to watch the pitch glide; the tail's resting pitch is the number you tune to the key.
• Live 12 shows the set's tuning/scale in the clip view (tuning & scales); Tuner follows the set's A4 reference if you changed it from 440.

Other analysers

• Utility → Mono button: A/B everything in mono to catch comb filtering from Haas tricks (see Haas range).
• EQ Eight's spectrum overlays the input (and output) spectrum behind the curve — enough for most decisions once Block is high enough in the Spectrum device on the same track.
• Multiband Dynamics as a 3-band meter: with all thresholds at 0 dB and ratios at 1:1 it does nothing, but the per-band meters show how the low/mid/high energy is split.

Quick numbers to remember

Related

• Note to Hz — tune the chart to your key.
• EQ strategies — the workflow that uses these numbers.
• Layering rules — who owns which band.
• Mid/side & stereo — the 100 Hz mono rule in practice.
• Sub bass, Kick, Snare & clap, Pads.
• Listening checklist.