Whether you're releasing your music in a physical medium like CDs or vinyl, or uploading your tracks to streaming services like Spotify and YouTube, mastering ensures that your music plays back properly in every format. Mastering engineers were now required to optimize audio for a wide range of different formats.īut in the digital age, where most music is written, recorded, mixed, mastered and listened to on a computer-do you even need to master your music? Over time, as technology continued to grow and evolve and new formats like cassette tapes, 8-tracks and CDs began to pop up, the role of the mastering engineer began to change. Originally, the role of the mastering engineer was to transfer the audio signal from the tape machine where it was recorded and mixed to a vinyl record where it could be played on a common turntable.