When it comes to mixing jazz, restraint is often the key. The genre thrives on interplay, dynamics, and natural room tone, so the engineer’s role is more about enhancing what’s already there than reshaping it entirely.
I first met Jake Holt at Abbey Road Studios, introduced by world-class mastering engineer Alex Wharton. That connection led us to sit down together for a deep dive into Jake’s approach, focusing on his mix of GJ by the Ali Ramis Quartet, recorded with fellow engineer Mete Unju at the University of York.
The project was mixed entirely in the box using Logic, even though Jake’s studio, The Audio House in Welwyn Garden City, features an SSL AWS console. “For jazz especially,” he explains, “it’s about preserving the tone and performance. You don’t want it to sound overprocessed.”
Download the multitracks: https://producelikeapro.lpages.co/jake-holt-free-course-track-form/
Starting with the Drums
Jake’s approach began with the overheads, which had been recorded in mono pairs but needed balancing. He used subtle EQ to remove some papery midrange and a Pultec-style boost to add weight. A Fairchild 670 emulation added tone and gentle control, while a tape plugin provided a touch of sheen.
The kick drum presented a bigger challenge. “It sounded very pingy, almost like a basketball,” Jake recalls. He carved out harsh mids, used a sub filter to reinforce low end, and tightened sustain with transient shaping. To avoid flamming between the close mic and overheads, he introduced Trackspacer to duck a narrow band of frequencies in the overheads whenever the kick hit. The result was a rounder, more defined kick that sat naturally in context.
Bleed, often a curse in rock mixing, became a feature here. By carefully aligning phases and using selective sidechain ducking, Jake kept the cymbals lively without letting bleed muddy the picture.
Tackling the Bass
Unlike many jazz quartets, this session featured an electric bass rather than upright. Even so, it required shaping to fit in the mix. Jake reached for a transient designer to bring forward the attack, pulled out excess mids, then used saturation with FabFilter Saturn to reintroduce warmth in a more controlled way.
He described this balancing act as removing “flabbiness” while making sure the bass still reinforced the low-end energy already captured in the piano mics. A touch of tape saturation and subtle sidechain compression against the kick kept everything glued.
Piano and Saxophone
The piano was heavily affected by bleed, so Jake leaned into it. “I treated it as a room mic,” he explained. Gentle EQ removed resonances, while a Fairchild emulation and a touch of reverb smoothed the tone. Rather than fight the spill, he used it to enhance the sense of space and realism.
The saxophone, recorded upfront, initially sounded harsh. To tame it, Jake used dynamic EQ (DDSEQ3), overlapping Pultec boosts and cuts for body, and a longer reverb for depth. Compression was used sparingly, with automation doing most of the heavy lifting to preserve dynamics. “At the end of a phrase,” he noted, “the sax naturally drops in volume. I didn’t want to compress that away, so I used automation to lift it gently without losing the expressiveness.”
Less Is More
Across the mix, Jake’s guiding principle was subtlety. His bus chain contained only gentle EQ, minimal compression, and even a touch of reverb on the mix bus—set at just 2%—to provide cohesion without robbing the performance of air.
The philosophy was clear: let the musicians do the work. “Most of the mix comes from the room and the balance of the players,” Jake concluded. “My job was to smooth out rough edges and present it in the most natural way possible.”
Key Takeaways
- Bleed is not the enemy – in jazz, it often provides the glue and realism that polished processing can strip away.
- Automation beats compression – for dynamic instruments like sax, volume rides preserve the performance better than heavy-handed processing.
- Subtle shaping – tools like Trackspacer and saturation plugins can solve issues without resorting to drastic EQ.
- Context is everything – what sounds odd in solo often works beautifully in the full ensemble.
Jake’s session demonstrates that mixing jazz isn’t about flashy moves or endless plugin chains. It’s about listening deeply, respecting the performance, and knowing when to step back. As he put it with a smile:
“Bleed is good.”
And of course, none of this conversation would have happened without that chance introduction at Abbey Road. A big thank you to Alex Wharton for connecting us in the first place.
Download the multitracks: https://producelikeapro.lpages.co/jake-holt-free-course-track-form/