Backing tracks for music lessons via Zoom

[Adriel_Perez]

Hello, I am a music teacher and I use the Zoom platform to teach guitar and other instrument lessons.

Because there is a delay in playing along with my students, for classes I need the students to play over backing tracks that I prepare before having the class. This is easily solved if my student has a second device (another cell phone, tablet or computer) from which to play the tracks. The problem is that many times the students do not have another way to play these tracks and the class cannot be completed. I try to play the tracks by sharing from the Zoom application, but when I do this I cannot continue listening to the student playing their instrument, and if I ask my student to minimize the Zoom application to play the track from WhatsApp they cannot hear it well because the Zoom application makes the volume of other applications lower. This is a bit frustrating, and I would like to know if you as music teachers have managed to solve this situation.

[storyhub]

As an audio engineer I know that computer audio can be very complex. Since the student needs to mix the background track with their live instrument I would recommend taking a look at OBS Studio. OBS studio can connect with Zoom by installing the OBS NDI plug-in. Once this is configured then OBS can be configured to playback the backup track using share advanced computer audio or connect to the Zoom mic if desired to feed a mix. Then it will behave as a FREE software mixer for the audio and the camera or other graphic sources. You can send backup tracks as MP3s via Zoom's chat. It is preferable to make all audio files sampled at 48K rather than 44.1K. This will then provide a working environment. Alternatively a hardware setup would be to have the student purchase an audio interface, but this can get to be expensive. I do this and more sophisticated setups for Zoom all the time for hybrid events and studio broadcasts that I originate. If you would like professional assistance let me know via the forum's private message. You can also search YouTube to see what others may have to say.