Feedback elimination

[amikecowarksmith]

I have been given an audiotape of a funeral service to convert to CD format - normally something I do quite regularly and without problems. However, this one (because of the singers not being near the microphone) the recording level has been turned up giving a lot of wowing or feedback. Can I reduce this or, better get rid of it, within Audacity, please? - especially desirable considering the nature of the service!

[steve]

Unfortunately there is not much you can do about it - the feedback noise will be in the same frequency range as the voices, so removing one will remove the other. You may be able to reduce it a little as feedback is often in a relatively narrow frequency band, so you my be able to "notch it out" a little with the Equalisation effect, but if you try to reduce it by much it is likely to start making the voices sound weird.

[kozikowski]

You might be able to use the noise removal tool.

Noise removal works by memorizing a segment of sound (the sample) and then trying to subtract that sound from the show. Normally, this is used with air conditioner noise or something like that. If you have a brief segment of howling before or after they sing, you use that for the sample. That technique works far better than trying to figure out at which frequency the room is ringing.

If you pick a sample with one singer faintly audible, that singer will vanish, too.

You may also find out that the noise management in 1.3 is far easier to use than the one in 1.2

Koz

[amikecowarksmith]

Many thanks, twas as I feared but I'll try your suggestions.