Making your first song from start - Part 1
Today, I would like to write some information about the basics of music production. I saw several people asking about this, so here we go. First – I am going to explain everything on an .flp file, which you can download here. This file contains a song fully made in Flstudio, just extract it, open it up and check what I am talking about as you read this. So onto a couple basics, starting with a few shortcuts to make you more familiar with Flstudio.
F5 – This opens the playlist – the place where you put all your samples, melodies, automations, etc.
F6 – Channel Rack – you will find all your samples and synths here – everything that makes sound and you put into your project, you can find here to edit.
F7 – Piano roll – basically the place where you can make your melodies using the synths – plugins – that you add to your project.
F9 – Mixer – you assign stuff from Channel Rack here. The Mixer is used, you guessed it, for mixing, which is a thing we will go through some other day, as it is a bit more difficult. All you need to know now – It is wise to use Equalizer to get rid of certain frequencies for your instruments – the leads – you don’t really need anything except of the mids and higher – sometimes leaving the lows is alright too. You can also put other plugins that change how everything sounds here and it is the place where you do your mastering.
Well, those are the places you will do most of your work in. So now that we have this covered, onto the next step. The song itself. If you do not have the project open yet, now is the best time.
The song I have made is a simple Big Room House track (you can listen to it here), which I have divided into parts to help you understand the song structure. In this tutorial, we will talk about the horizontal structure of the song – from left to right, in next parts, we will talk about the vertical structure, mixing process, idea behind making melodies and some other steps which lead to making a whole track. I will be using the term segment in this tutorial – which is one part of the song, which has a started and finished melody in this project. For instance, the Verse 1 consists of 3 segments. This is only my own terminology for keeping this whole tutorial simple.
I have tried to use mostly native plugins to FL Studio, so you should be able to open the projects without problems. Only one that you might not have is SPAN, which is an analyzer for your sound, you can get it free on splice.com.
(Download the project file here)
The Intro
You can’t start your song blasting the full volume at the listener. The intro is the part which announces the song, you should keep it simple, adding a fade in into the beginning is a good idea. In this project, I have decided that some drums and simple instrument playing a simple melody would be nice. The length of an intro is subjective, it can be something short, or something longer, like in my project. Keep adding to the atmosphere as the intro develops and at the end, try to make a nice transition into the first verse of your song.
Verse 1
This is where your song starts. There is a Break in front of this part – breaks are the parts of your song where you change it up a bit, add some interesting element, and make it go quiet or change the instrument. They serve to break the repetition, create smooth transitions, and keep the attention of the listener. My Verse 1 consists of 3 segments – each adds on something else, either slowly introduces a new instrument or changes the melody a little bit. Make your song evolve from something simple to something more complex and introduce the atmosphere and the main melody of the song.
Buildup
The buildup of the song is where you will want to start building a sort of suspense, trying to foreshadow that there is a storm coming up. You can use instruments to build up this suspense, risers, various drums, snare is used mostly. Buildups usually start slow and keep getting faster as they play. It is up to your imagination and fantasy how you design your own.
Drop
Well, this is where you want to go all out. Depending on your style, you can make the drop loud with a lot of reverb and strong bass, or make a sort of anti-drop, where everything goes a bit quieter and there is one instrument playing, think of Garrixes song animals, where you can hear loud instruments in the beginning, and simple clicking sounds in the drop. Since the drop is probably the most important part of the song, you will want to give it some attention. You can use your main melody from your verse, change it up a bit, add a different instrument, or several instruments, depends on your style and genre. The drops usually have 2 parts, one where you present the melody, second where you develop it a bit more by changing the sound, adding elements, etc.
After Drop
The noise has ended, it is time to go a bit quieter and prepare for the second verse, second buildup and the second drop. Keep it simple here, make a fluid transition and tell the listener that you are going to start the second verse.
The Rest of the Song
The first verse and the first drop are your first half of the song. It is the ground stone. So what do you do now, do you just copy it and play it one more time? No! Of course you can copy the structure of the first song, but add some new elements. Maybe change the melody of the second verse a bit (see how I changed verse two from verse one by making the melody different, keeping the same instruments and adding a beat instead of just claps), add a new instrument, and make it interesting. When approaching the second buildup… well, copy it. The buildups are usually not changed, but be sure to have a different approach to the second drop, since it is usually more developed than the first one. A rule of thumb, copy the first drop and keep it as it is, then add third, possibly fourth part of it and change those up. It can be a completely new melody, maybe inspired by the second verse, it can be change of rhythm, change of instruments, different sound. Be creative.
Additional tips
Making music is about repetition and evolution. You need to have some degree of repetition in your melody, since the listener expects that you will make everything in the same mood. You need new elements, since you want to keep your song interesting. When making a new song, you don’t have to have a linear attitude. When I was making this song, I started with just simple drum intro, made the first verse, then the drop. I listened to each part and added transitions between them, then gave it another listen and thought about how to make the song evolve. I have added some fade in’s, new instruments and simple elements like sound effects. Always ask yourself questions – what can I add or change to make the song more interesting? Are these two parts too similar and is it bad, or is it ok this way? How could I get the attention of the listener? There are no rules how to make music, so don’t listen to anyone telling you how your song should be structured. The project I have showed you is just one of my many approaches. You can make the intro one half shorter, you could make the verse one part shorter, it is completely up to you.
I hope this breakdown of structure of this song has gave you a bit of insight on how you can approach to creating a new song. Next time I will talk about the vertical structure, what elements there are in the song, how it evolves and why I chose to put in what I did.