manual/include/muting-and-soloing.html

<p>
  Each track and bus has two buttons which have important implications
  for signal flow: <dfn>mute</dfn> and <dfn>solo</dfn>. The behaviour
  of these buttons is configurable in Ardour, to suit different studio
  set-ups.
</p>

<h2>Without a monitor bus</h2>
<p>
  When using Ardour without a monitor bus, there is only one way
  in which mute and solo will work:</p>
<ul>
  <li>
    Mute on a track or bus will mute that track on the master bus,
    so that it will not be heard.
  </li>
  <li>
    Solo on a track or bus will solo that track or bus and mute all
    others. Soloing a bus will also solo any tracks or
    busses which feed that bus.
  </li>
</ul>
<p>
  The Solo status indicator button in the Toolbar blinks when one or more
  tracks are being soloed. Clicking this button disables any active explicit
  and implicit solo on all tracks and busses.
</p>

<h2>With a monitor bus</h2>
<p>
  For setups with a monitor bus, more options are available, mostly
  governed by the setting of the
  <kbd class="option">Solo controls are Listen controls</kbd> option
  in <kbd class="menu">Edit &gt; Preferences &gt; Monitoring.</kbd>
</p>
<p>
  With <kbd class="optoff">Solo controls are Listen controls</kbd>
  unticked, behaviour is almost exactly the same as the situation
  without a monitor bus. Mute and solo behave the same, and the monitor
  bus is fed from the master bus, so it sees the same thing.
</p>
<p>
  With <kbd class="option">Solo controls are Listen controls</kbd>
  ticked, the master and monitor busses behave differently. In this
  mode, solo controls are more properly called <dfn>listen</dfn>
  controls, and Ardour's solo buttons will change their legend from
  <kbd class="menu">S</kbd> for Solo to show the listening point,
  either <kbd class="menu">A</kbd> for After fader or
  <kbd class="menu">P</kbd> for Pre fader.
</p>
<p>
  Now, without any mute or listen, the monitor bus remains fed by
  the master bus. Also:
</p>
<ul>
  <li>
    Mute will mute the track or bus, so that it will not be heard
    anywhere (neither on the master nor monitor busses), much as before.
  </li>
  <li>
    Listen will disconnect the monitor bus from the master bus, so
    that the monitor bus now only receives things that are "listened to".
    Listen will not perform any muting, and hence the master bus will
    not be affected by a listened track or bus.
  </li>
</ul>
<p>
  When solo controls are listen controls, the listening point can be set
  to either After-Fade Listen (AFL) or Pre-Fade Listen (PFL). The precise
  point to get the signal from can further be configured using the
  <kbd class="menu">PFL signals come from</kbd> and
  <kbd class="menu">AFL signals come from</kbd> options.
</p>
<p>
  The solo-mute arrangement with a monitor bus is shown below:
</p>

<figure class="center">
  <img src="/images/solo-mute.png" alt="mute/solo signal flow">
  <figcaption>Mute/solo signal flow</figcaption>
</figure>

<p>
  Here we have a number of tracks or busses (in orange). Each one has an
  output which feeds the master bus. In addition, each has PFL and AFL
  outputs; we have a choice of which to use. PFL/AFL from each track or
  bus are mixed. Then, whenever anything is set to AFL/PFL, the monitor out
  becomes just those AFL/PFL feeds; the rest of the time, the monitor out is
  fed from the master bus.
</p>
<p>
  In this scheme Solo has no effect other than to mute other non-soloed tracks;
  with solo (rather than listen), the monitor out is fed from the master bus.
</p>

<h2>Other solo options</h2>
<p>
  <kbd class="menu">Edit &gt; Preferences &gt;  Monitoring</kbd> has some
  more solo options:
</p>

<h3>Solo-in-place mute cut</h3>
<p>
  When using solo-in-place (SiP), in other words when soloed tracks are being
  listened to on the master bus, this fader specifies the gain that will be
  applied to other tracks in order to mute them. Setting this level to
  &minus;&infin;&nbsp;dB will mean that other tracks will not be heard at all; setting to
  some higher value less than 0dB means that other non-soloed tracks will be heard, just
  reduced in volume compared to the soloed tracks. Using a value
  larger than &minus;&infin;&nbsp;dB is sometimes called "Solo-In-Front" by other DAWs, because
  the listener has the sense that soloed material is "in front" of other
  material. In Ardour, this is not a distinct mode, but instead the mute cut
  control offers any level of "in-front-ness" that is desired.
</p>

<h3>Exclusive solo</h3>
<p>
  If this is enabled, only one track or bus will ever be soloed at once; soloing
  track B while track A is currently soloed will un-solo track A before soloing
  track B.
</p>

<h3>Show solo muting</h3>
<p>
  If this is enabled, the mute button of tracks and busses will be drawn
  outlined to indicate that the track or bus is muted because something else
  is soloed. This is enabled by default, and it is recommended to leave it
  that way unless extremely comfortable with Ardour's mute/solo
  behaviour.
</p>

<h3>Soloing overrides muting</h3>
<p>
  If this is enabled, a track or bus that is both soloed and muted will behave
  as if it is soloed.
</p>

<h3>Mute affects&hellip;</h3>
<p>
  These options dictate whether muting the track will affect various routes out
  of the track; through the sends, through the control outputs (to the monitor
  bus) and to the main outputs.
</p>