Posts Tagged ‘music tutorials’
A Minimalist approach to songwriting
A minimalist approach to songwriting
A common situation many people fall victim to is that the more tools that you use for your songwriting, the more that can potentially go wrong. This is not to say that tools can not be incredible time savers, but they can also be huge time wasters as well. What I want to share with you is a new way of thinking when it comes to writing and completing songs.
Preparation
How long does it take you to “prepare” to make a track?
Do you plan this out beforehand or do you just fumble around for the right sample, plugin in, effect, synth, or synth preset during the songwriting process?
Besides all the sounds and effects, how many controllers are you setting up (or attempting to set up)?
Are you struggling with getting hardware up and running in order to simplify your songwriting process?
Are you working with a midi controller or 2? How often does it speed up your songwriting process rather than just giving you a prettier button to push to do pretty much the same thing?
I’m not trying to talk you out of using hardware or software tools, but rather warning you against trying to make everything “look” pretty and “professional” before you get started. This is a mistake myself and many other producers have run up against. Hopefully it will start to break this cycle for those who read and share this blog.
Remember: This is your songwriting time, this isn’t your “sound design, muck around with effects you’ve never used, try to get this damn controller working because everyone says how badass it is” time.
All that stuff needs to be set aside for another time, a time that isn’t devoted to writing and completing songs.
A DJ’ing Analogy
Think in terms of a DJ on stage, with a crowd ready for a great show…
Does a DJ get on stage and then start trying to learn new tools?
Does he think “wow, I think i’m going to read the manual on this new effects unit I just bought”.
Does a DJ think “wow, this is a perfect time to listen to all those tracks I bought on beatport to see what is worth playing”?
Does s/he decide that now is the best time to warp those songs in Ableton?
Of course not!
A proper DJ presents a set using the tools and the songs already familiar to him/her. Even though there are 1000′s of great tools available for DJ’s, common sense tells us that regardless of how amazing some tool might be, it will only take away from the performance to use tools that are unfamiliar to you and probably get you some strange “what the hell is this guy doing?” kind of looks.
This is exactly the way you should look at songwriting….
Only look to tools you are familiar with
Although there are a TON of choices out there (and probably on your hard drive), your best results are dependant on using the tools that are tried and trusted to you. This is not the time to learn a new skill. This is a time to put the skills you have already learned to use.
This one habit will help to build your production vocabulary and also force you to put to use what you know instead of filling your head with more techniques that you aren’t likely to use.
Another huge benefit is that when you hit a roadblock, you have just been shown exactly what it is you need to learn next!
Don’t bother reading manuals or watching videos that you don’t plan on putting to use right now. Why fill your head with information that is likely to be useless to you in this moment? Doesn’t it make more sense to only gather new information when you have run into a problem that needs solving?
This is powerful for 2 reasons:
1. Your focus stays on your music and it’s completion
2. When you learn a new technique that you put to use right away, you get this great feeling of discovery. For you, this is a new world you have opened up. You haven’t let it sit in your head and get stale.
How to get started…
Have a direction
This might seem obvious, but I can’t even count how many times I’ve convinced myself to just “go with the flow”. This, although it can create some magical moments and happy accidents, it’s usually a bad idea when you are in “song completion” mode. Going with the flow is much more of a sound design type mentality. A practice of open minded improvisation. Believe me when I say that this is a powerful way to get inspiring nuggets that can become songs, but a mind in that mode tends to want to continue on that path instead of actually finishing anything. If you do this type of thing during your songwriting time, make sure to set a time limit (i’d say 15 minutes at a time), and make sure you are using a tool you are familiar with. You don’t want to get caught up trying to teach yourself a new skill when you should be using the skills you have to finish songs.
Repeat after me:
“I know enough right now to finish a song”.
Now believe it..
Your “to learn” list
You may not be perfect, and it’s possible your song can suffer on a technical level because of it, but those are technical things that can always be revisited. A song can always be revised, but there is nothing quite like listening back to something you’ve done from start to finish and thinking ” I made this”. When you find limitations in your song, take note and put it on the list of “things to learn”. Keep this list to 3 things tops and make sure to tackle those and put them to use before you add anything new to your list. This should become a sacred practice. Use what you learn as soon as possible. If you don’t plan on putting a new technique to use, take it off your list. “This is really cool” is a completely different list, so don’t get hung up on that. It only stands to overwhelm you with choices and lower your confidence in the tried and true techniques you already know.
Take inventory
What works right now?
I’m talking about things that don’t need to come out of the box and be set up. Once again, What is working right now? What tools are you already comfortable with? If you are an ace at using Ableton’s Impulse, don’t jump onto Drum Racks or Sampler. Yes, those tools are amazing, but they aren’t going to be amazing for you until you’ve learned them. Put it on your “to learn” list and use those new skills on your next project.
During my last remix project, I bypassed all my controllers because they weren’t making my life any easier with completing the track. I even bypassed my studio monitors because my sound card was acting up on me. This just left me, my laptop and a pair of good headphones. I wasn’t even using an asio driver (low latency driver for pc). Although this wasn’t the idea situation, it was liberating to solve technical issues by simply not using what wasn’t working. I worked at using my limitations to my advantage by cutting myself off from too many choices and forcing myself to get to the business of completing my remix.
What do you have that works right now? Use what you’ve got and keep working until you simply have no more workarounds. Only at that point should you take a break from writing and teach yourself the 1 new technique or tool you need to move beyond your roadblock. I guarantee that this new tool or technique will become part of your vocabulary of production resources instead of just idly sitting inside your head filling up space.
Visualize
I can’t stress this enough. Give yourself the time to get a rough idea of what you are attempting to accomplish. Find some songs that you’ll want to use as references for the mood and arrangement you are looking for. Even if you have a 16 bar loop that you are happy with, being able to reference a completed song will serve to keep you on track and get you past several roadblocks.
If you don’t have any direction, then you are simply sound designing and experimenting. You aren’t songwriting. I am not denying the incredibly importance of experimentation, but rather attempting to keep you from losing focus and ending up with another unfinished idea that will never be heard or enjoyed by others.
Minimize your choices
Once you have a direction and know the basic sound and mood you are going for, it’s time to prepare the tools for the job.
Ask yourself “what is the fastest and easiest way to get the results I want”. Limit yourself to a couple reverbs and delays. Also have your drumkits, swells, reverse cymbals and “go to” fx sounds all ready to go (I personally lose a lot of time by not preparing this stuff ahead of time.. trust me on this one). Layout and name your tracks ahead of time with words that will give you direction (drums, bass, strings, melody, percussion etc..). Only use the tools you are already familiar with. Want to learn a new synth or plugin? Put it on your “to learn” list and take the time to learn it after your current songwriting session.. For now, only use what you know. You can bring your new skills into your next session.
Presets
For many, the word preset is a bad word. I don’t see this as the case. Presets are your friends, not your enemy. There are literally thousands of presets available to you and your own tastes dictate which ones you will gravitate towards.
There is an unlimited amount variations in classical music composers even though they are building their pieces from the same template f sounds. Don’t get caught up on the idea of every sound having to be home brewed. Think of all the great original music constructed from sampling other people’s music exclusively. Or think of how a great DJ takes the works of other producers and combines it together in a way that creates a new experience. In essence, the artist is working with already made presets. Of course you are free to make your own effects and synth presets on your off time, and I highly encourage that, but you want to have some “go to” sounds at your disposal for quick access. You shouldn’t have to mess around with a sound for too long before it sounds “right” to you for your project. You can always come back later to modify your work or introduce a new technique that you previously didn’t have available to you but whenever you are in songwriting mode, use what you know. Ableton makes some fantastic instrument and effects racks that give you a wide variety of results that you can make your own with some simple knob twisting. Don’t overlook those resources for sounds and effects. Take some time to explore these during your off time and you may discover they have solved some of your challenges for you.
As you build your own custom sounds, make sure to save these to your presets for quick access in other projects. A great way to build up some custom presets is to simply name and save all the sounds you use in your other finished and unfinished song ideas. You already know that these sounds are attractive to you, otherwise you wouldn’t have used them in the first place. This can really come in handy and start you building your own “sound”.
It’s completely ok to have your own formula for songwriting. You will always expand and evolve but you’ll be building from your past knowledge. Don’t abandon your current skill sets just because you saw somebody do something really cool on You Tube, instead pick up a couple of tricks that you can incorporate into what you are already doing. By holding to your own identity, you won’t run the risk of becoming a copycat artist that is always jumping on bandwagons but never developing your own personality.
The path of least resistance
Songwriting itself is already a path of a lot of resistance. It takes quite a bit of determination to complete something you started. Completing a song forces you to own your creative decisions and the best decisions you can make are educated ones. Let your past experience guide your current creative flow and let your current roadblocks drive you to new solutions, tools and techniques. Always aim for the solution that doesn’t slow you down. Completing songs is a skill above and beyond all others. You will likely find that many of the guys with the coolest and craziest techniques lack the ability to actually finish something. Don’t get caught up in thinking there is anything more you need to know in order to finish a song right now. Like with any skill, you will improve with consistent repetition and fine adjustments.
Happy Music Making,
Jason
P.S. – Don’t forget to comment & tweet (down below) & “like” (up above).
All your feedback & support is appreciated!
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Follow me:Â http://twitter.com/AbletonVids
Website:Â http://www.musicsoftwaretraining.com
10 newbie mistakes when writing in Ableton
10 Newbie mistakes in Ableton
Here are some common newbie mistakes people make when writing in Ableton. This isn’t all Ableton specific as some tips apply to music production in general. It also isn’t in any specific order and doesn’t necessarily assume to be the Top 10 of newbie mistakes. These are just some mistakes I’ve seen people make over the years and are certainly some mistakes I have made as well. If you are new to Ableton or cumputer music production, these should be of some assistance.
1. Assuming Ableton’s auto-warping will warp your songs perfectly :
This is a fairly common but huge mistake when working with Ableton. Although Ableton is excellent at warping loops without much trouble (as long as the loop is already seamless), a full song is a different animal altogether.
I suppose it can be pretty misleading to see an option called “Auto-warp” and wonder why your songs aren’t syncing up to tempo perfectly. While the auto-warp function does do a lot of the work for you, it’s your job to fine tune it so that every thing is 100% on. Learning this process is the single most important thing you need to master if you want to unleash 95% of Ableton’s true capabilities.
Here’s are a few videos to get you started.
For Ableton 8:
For previous versions of Ableton:
2. Recording parts on the same track in both arrange and session window:
A common mistake for people who are new to Ableton is assuming that the session window (the window with all the boxes for clips and scenes. Also home to the mixer) and the arrangement window (the window the most resembles other audio recording software) are separate entities.
For example you will have a clip on audio 1 in your session window but audio 1 in your arrange window is empty. If you are new to Ableton it is easy to assume that it’s fine to record on that track in the arrange window but that would be a big mistake. You will quickly find that one of your parts is no longer playing.This is simply because you have put 2 parts on the same track at the same time.
Once you understand how the session and arrange windows are intertwined, it will make complete sense what is happening. The simple rule to follow is:
1 instrument per track.
Think of each clip in a track (audio or midi) as representing what 1 instrument will be doing in different sections of your song. For example, one clip might be for the intro, the next for the verses, another for your bridge and another still for a chorus.
If you have ever programmed a drum machine, clips are similar to patterns on your drum machine. When you want to chain those patterns together to make your complete song, you would do that in the arrange window.
If you are recording something start to finish (like a full vocal take), you would also want to record in the arrange window. The important thing to remember is that at the end of the day, everything will need to go into the arrange window before you mixdown (render) your song. If you are arranging your instruments from loops or recording separate parts of your song to arrange later (like with drums) you would most benefit from starting in the session window and then chaining those parts together in the arrange window.
*As a sidenote, some would argue that you can do everything in the arrange window, and I wouldn’t disagree, but i’d suggest you learn the basics of both windows and then decide what works best for you.
Here is a video that might make the concept a little easier for you:
3. Too many loops or parts fighting for the same frequencies:
If you are building your songs with loops and samples, a common mistake is to think that the more loops you add, the more full and complex your song will sound. You are only half right though. It’s true that more layers can give your song more complexity and depth, but the downside is it can easily make your composition sound muddy, off pitch or just plain not right. Keep an eye on your fighting frequencies when choosing your loops. A good way to finding these conflicting frequencies is to use a spectrum analyser. Ableton 8 has one built right in, but if you are using an older version of Ableton, you can use one of this free plugin.
4. Not removing needless frequencies – Keeping on the subject of your EQ’s and frequencies, it’s really important to keep in mind what is the most important part of a an instrument and cut out the frequencies that aren’t needed. You won’t want 2 or 3 parts all playing a deep, heavy kick drum. You’ll need to choose which one has the best lows, and remove the low end from the other loops. Same with your hi frequencies. You’ll want to make sure your hihats are coming through clean by removing the highs from your othertracks. For snare and percussion in your mid frequencies, you may need to attenuate certain frequencies so that each part has it’s own space and doesn’t sound muddy. In most cases, you’ll find that popular music doesn’t have too much going on in any given frequency. Everything is balanced and that is what you want. The goal of this blog isn’t to tell you exactly how to dial in all of your EQ’s but rather to point you to where you should look if your songs aren’t sounding as good as you had hoped.
This video might give you the basic idea:
You can also read this Blog
5. Not arranging your songs in multiples of 4 :
Now I know that there are many other time signatures than 4/4 time but I just want to give some basic tips here for people struggling with producing songs. If you are struggling, it’s probably best that you learn to write in 4/4 timing before getting into complex time signatures.
That said, it’s very important in popular music and club music that you create your parts on multiple of 4 bars. For example, if you have a verse that goes 7 bars instead of 8 and then you jump into a chorus, it’s most likely going to sound all wrong. This multiple of 4 predictability in music seems very natural. Don’t try to get too tricky until you’ve successfully got this down. Once you know how things are “supposed” to sound, you can tweak the timing to create more tension successfully.
6. Doing your songwriting and sound design in the same session:
I’ve written a whole blog on this subject if you want to get deeper into this, but basically, you don’t want to be fumbling around trying to get THAT sound when you have a melody or bassline in your head. In the time it takes to create this amazing sound in your head, you will likely have lost the original idea that inspired you. It’s best to work fast with a template of sounds or presets that you have found to work for you and touch things up after the rough idea is saved.
7. Adding parts to compensate for bad sounding parts:
Each part in your song should be able to stand on it’s own. It shouldn’t sound crappy when you solo it. Of course I know that sometimes it takes a couple layers to get that certain Bass sound. It’s totally ok and even encouraged to layer your sounds but at the end of the day those sounds need to all stand together as 1 Bass or 1 Stab sound or whatever.
If you find yourself adding melody on top of melody in an attempt to make something sound “right”, you might be better off redoing your melody.
Make sure your drums, bass, pads, melodies and vocals all sound great on their own. You aren’t going to make good tracks by burying so-so parts deep in your mix. If you can break your song down to 6-8 elements, it will keep you focused on if you are adding too much stuff. You may end up with 40+ tracks in your song, but you definitely don’t want all those elements playing at the same time.
If you have 3 different melodies, you should only have one out front at any given time. Even complex songs should come across sounding fairly simple and there should be empty space between the parts. Put on a CD and listen to how many elements are going on at any given time. Notice how each sound has it’s space to come across clearly.
The less you have going on in your song, the bigger each sound is able to be. That’s why with a 3 piece band like Nirvana, each instrument can sound so big.
Regardless of the style of music, we are all limited to a certain frequency range. When you have parts fighting for the same frequency, both parts are bound to have to sacrifice something in order to fit into the mix.
Another way to look at building a song is to ask “What frequency am I going to fill in now?”, then you want to use a spectrum analyzer to find what works in that range. If you have 2 parts you like but they are taking up the same frequencies, perhaps you can take one up or down and octave so it has it’s own range. Once you have filled up your full spectrum you can see how strong each element is before adding any extra layers.
8. Too many options:
Having too many choices with instruments and plugin’s without having made yourself a “go to” collection can become a huge time and energy waster. It’s far better to have a few “go to” plugin’s and instruments that you know really well than it is to have 100′s that you aren’t familiar with. Using unfamiliar software can really slow you down and give you below par results.
Find 4 or 5 synths (or even less), 2 compressors, 2 or 3 reverbs, a couple delays etc.. Then take some time to find out what each one is really good at and build some “go to” presets. This will make things much easy and you’ll be getting the sound you are looking for much more quickly.
It’s fine to have lots of plugins in your arsenal but it’s best to find out what each one does before you start your songwriting process. Believe me when I say that I am writing this for myself as much as for you!
Before the days of free plugin’s and fast computers, we pretty much had to make due with whatever equipment we had. Given those limitations, it’s easiest to get to the process of making music instead of trying to fiddle with every toy in the toy store.
Another thing that you’ll find is that when you get comfortable using certain equipment, those limitations become your sound and gives you some consistency. Get your “go to” collection started asap.
9. Not making a template:
Templates are a saving grace when it comes to songwriting. When you have a setup that works with your favorite effects settings or your send/returns, drumkits, synths etc take the time to save it as a template songfile or to drag it to your presets for later use. This will save you loads of time trying to figure out how to get that certain sound you had before.
Fumbling through presets and setup takes time and can easily distract you from your goal: To get your ideas down while you are inspired.
Templates give you a basic setup with all your “go to” stuff included. You can even make different templates for different styles of music. Having several options will allow you to be ready to go regardless of what creative mood you are in.
10. Using low quality samples:
Using low quality samples with the intention to “fix it in the mix” is another big mistake. Now I’m all for lo-if and I’ve been known to use less than optimal quality sounds to great effect, but you need to make sure it works for your track and that you aren’t building your track off a bunch of lo quality sounds.
If you have to doctor it up with tons of effects and eq to make it sound decent, you should probably use a higher quality sound that has most of the tone you are looking for from the get go. For example, a kick drum that doesn’t have good low end from the start is never going to sound deep,punchy and professional.
Using a lower quality sound might not seem like it will make a noticeable difference, but just wait until you have a whole song full of these sounds and the overall quality will become pretty apparent to you.
Using mp3 quality is something I wouldn’t recommend. Generally speaking 16bit 44.1 should be the minimum you accept. If your computer can handle 24 bit recording at 96kbps you will likely hear a difference, just keep an eye on your hard drive usage. I personally stick to 16bit for most of my work and I get good results.
I hope this has been helpful for you. Feel free to email me your newbie mistakes and I’ll consider updating this Blog to perhaps 15 newbie mistakes.
Happy music making,
Jason
P.S. – Don’t forget to comment & tweet (down below) & “like” (up above).
All your feedback & support is appreciated!
Control Ableton with this cool Iphone ap!
*This post will likely only interest Ableton users who have an Iphone and work on a PC (or Bootcamp/Parallels).
Here is a custom controller I have made to control many of Ableton’s features with my Iphone. Although it isn’t an “end all” solution, it definitely makes things go faster and much more conveniently whether you are producing at home or DJ’ing. As long as you have a wi-fi signal to connect to, you’re golden.
Here is what you will want to do to get started.
1. Go to your Iphone AP store, purchase and install Snatch Remote (don’t worry, it’s only $4 and if you don’t like my custom controller, you cn pretty easily make your own).
2. Download and install snatchtrackpad & remote onto your computer at this link http://www.hoofien.com/Snatch/
3. Open up Snatch on your computer, and then your Iphone
4. enter the server/password info into the setting on Snatch inside your Iphone
5. Download and unrar my Snatch remote files at this link http://www.musicsoftwaretraining.com/share/snatch.rar
6. In Snatch on your Iphone, hit “Keys” tab, then “Edit” then “load screen”
7. a window will pop up on your computer, choose the first Snatch file, confirm on your Iphone and hit “done”
8. On your Iphone, swipe from right to left to get another blank screen and repeat steps 6 and 7.
9. Watch the video below and make sure to assign your 1,2,3,8,9 & 0 keys to the correct locations.
Enjoy!
I look forward to our community sharing further tweaks and custom controls.
Happy Music Making,
Jason
Follow me: http://twitter.com/AbletonVids
Website: http://www.musicsoftwaretraining.com
Digital vs Analog
Analog vs Digital
The Analog vs Digital war battles on and will likely continue through the ages, however year by year digital has tightened the gap and is getting warmer all the time. Some of the softsynth reproductions of “analog” warmth has been pretty impressive as well. Although I’m not planning on taking sides, I am going to defend digital a bit for all the heat it seems to get from so called “analog purists”. I am also not planning on getting into the math on this one. That kind of stuff bores me to tears and defeats the point of this little blog.
Digital strengths vs Analog strengths
The Art of Mastering Audio by Bob Katzs makes some good points on this subject. Being one of the most respected mastering engineers, I take what he says as coming from years of experience in both the digital and analog world. This is what Bob has to say:
Analog recordings tend to excel at producing accurate detail in the lower frequencies and get less detailed and fuzzy at the higher frequencies.
Digital recordings excel at accurate reproduction of the higher frequencies and get fuzzy on the bottom end.
Bob uses this analogy to give you an idea of how this works:
Analog recordings would be like looking up at a skyscraper from the bottom whereas Digital would be like looking at the same skyscraper from the rooftop down.
From this perspective you can see where both digital and analog could both be used to good effect, depending on what you are going for. You can say that analog has a pleasant muddiness (I’m using this term loosely so don’t throw a fit) and digital has a sharper sound overall.
Imperfections
The thing many of us love about analog is that it’s imperfect and thus more human. The artifacts created in an analog recording keep a recording a bit more dynamic and unpredictable whereas digital recordings come across much more sterile and with virtually no artifacts or imperfections. Many producers keep this in mind when recording in the digital domain and do their best to inject some variation and unpredictability to the recordings. Many high end virtual instruments and fx plugin’s do a good job of recreating analog-like artifacts and “analog” warmth. If you know the right tools to use in the digital domain, you can fool most people most of the time.
Mastering
Many people think that a professional mastering studio only uses analog equipment to do their work but this isn’t the case.
Most engineers agree that taking your wav or aif file master recording, running it through analog equipment and then back into the digital domain will usually do more harm than good even if they are using excellent converters. More often than not, if an artist wants everything mastered in the analog domain, they will deliver their reel to reel masters to the mastering house, otherwise the work will most likely have the best results staying in the digital domain.
For Studios on a small budget, the cost of comparable analog gear, the converters and all the highest end cables would not be worth it. Also remember all the maintenance to keep the equipment working top notch. That isn’t cheap. On top of that, you can’t expect to have an artist come back to you years after your first session and have presets that will deliver identical results. Analog gear can’t be expected to get the same results day after day because its not crunching numbers like in the digital domain. There will always be a little chaos added to every piece of analog gear. This can be wonderful during the recording phase but can make it very difficult to master an album over the course of months or years.
The Real Test
Go ahead and go through your CD collection and pull out your warmest analog recordings. Pink Floyd? Stevie Wonder? Air? Notice the difference you hear in those recordings. Notice all the warmth from the tape saturation. Notice the difference between that and the most obvious digital recordings and these old recordings. Some of you might prefer the clean modern sound and that’s totally fine. To each their own.
The most important point that I want to end with is that digital must be pretty damn good at reproducing analog sound since the best CD you’ve ever heard is still a 16 bit digital representation. It might not be vinyl, but most of what you listen to these days ends up digital at some point. In fact, don’t doubt that some of your vinyl is just an analog representation of a digital recording.
This blog wasn’t meant to answer all the questions in the analog vs digital debate but rather to open up a healthy conversation on the topic. These days there is so much great technology at our fingertips whether it be Analog or Digitally produced that it’s hard not to be attracted to both. Even with free software you can create release worthy music. Don’t get hung up. Use what you’ve got. If it sounds good to you, roll with it. When it comes to your art, it’s your opinion that matters most.
Happy Music Making,
Jason
P.S. – Don’t forget to comment & tweet (down below) & “like” (up above).
All your feedback & support is appreciated!
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