With some of my CD recorded tracks involving vocals I find that the vocals are submerged in a sea of accompaniment. Is there some way to bring up the vocals relative to the accompaniment?

You could try enhancing the midrange which would expand the vocals a little but doing this too much will make the sound very harsh and uncomfortable to listen to.

Another reason for this effect is surround sound which tends to swamp vocals. Listen to your tracks in 2 channel stereo for the best results.

Thank you MJB.
It occurred to me that it was possible to remove vocals from a track for the purpose of using karaioke
(not sure how it is spelt). If this was the case I wondered if the removed parts could be retained as a separate file, and then processed, before returning it to the original track

Nope.

"It occurred to me that it was possible to remove vocals from a track for the purpose of using karaioke
(not sure how it is spelt). If this was the case I wondered if the removed parts could be retained as a separate file, and then processed, before returning it to the original track"

Yep! Bootleggers do this all the time start here and search/google around for tutorials for separating off vocal tracks. free vacals remover