Serato Stems lets you isolate instruments from your music in real-time
“Serato Stems will change DJ’ing forever.”
Serato has introduced stem separation to the latest versions of its DJ software, Serato DJ Pro 3.0 and its free counterpart, Serato DJ Lite 3.0.
The new feature, Serato Stems, lets you isolate elements of a song – the melody, bass, drums and vocal acapella. It also provides accompanying stem-specific effects – vocal echo, instrumental echo, instrumental braker and drums echo which can help DJs transition between isolated stems on the fly.
This provides more seamless and creative blending of songs in the mix. (Finally, no more clanging kick drums when all you really want from the outgoing song is the vocal!)
Despite being touted by Serato to “change DJ’ing forever,” it’s not a groundbreaking feature. Virtual DJ and Algoriddim’s djay debuted stem separation in 2020. However, Serato promises that its “machine learning” stem separation algorithm and sound quality combined with Serato’s user experience, results in an “unrivalled” and uniquely “sophisticated high-performance product”.
Daniel McBride, audio research engineer at Serato, says: “We wanted to get it to sound as good as possible but we also wanted to make sure [DJs] could use those stems immediately as soon as the inspiration took them.”
Danny Gonzales, a fellow audio research engineer, says that Serato listened to DJs and recognised the qualities of a stem separation tool they would care about, such as the sound quality. “We want DJs and producers to take Serato Stem quality for granted,” he says. “‘What is a producer going to think?’ ‘What is a DJ going to think?’ ‘Are the drums crisp and clear?’ ‘Are the vocals crisp and clear?’”
You can join the Serato DJ Pro 3.0 beta for for free and get access to the latest software with Serato Stems at serato.com.
