What is Music Production – Busting the Myths and Mysteries

Did you ever hear a catchy tune and it got stuck in your head for hours and days at a stretch?

No matter how hard you tried to ignore it but ended up humming it everywhere?

During a bath, car rides, lunches and dinners, while gaming with your friends only to be told that you need to shut up!

Only you couldn’t, even if you wanted.

Have you ever wondered how these tiny, catchy tunes turn into full songs, often leaving you with a spellbinding story?

Have you ever been intrigued by how a mere idea, roughly recorded as a voice note turns into a high-quality song that ends up taking all the space in your head?

If you’re as curious about this as I was, then you’ve come to the right place.

So what is Music Production?

The art and science that takes a tune from its rudimentary form to a well-structured, polished song worthy of being presented to an audience.

Although the art and the science in Music Production overlap each other almost all the time they can still be classified into two broad categories:

• Music Making – the art
• Audio Engineering – the science

What is Songwriting?

Songwriting at first might imply writing lyrics but that’s only a part of it. It has two major stages:

• Composition and Song arrangement – Building over a tune.
• Writing Lyrics and Structuring it around the Composition.

There are no rules to songwriting, sometimes it starts with the lyrics, other times the composition. What matters is the idea and if it clicks!

Before we move into the details, let’s address a frequently asked question…

What is the difference between a Songwriter and a Lyricist?

Do your words convey emotions that can move people, make them cry, smile, feel nostalgic?
Is your grasp on language, vocabulary, rhymes, syllables excellent?
If yes, then you’re a lyricist.

Add all of the above to playing an instrument and creating tunes, compositions, hooks.
Do you also have an understanding of what a song structure is?
Creating an intro, chorus, bridge and the whole shebang your forte?
If yes, then you’re a songwriter.

Read more on this: Lyricist vs. Songwriter

Moving on to the stages:

Stage 1: Composition and Song Arrangement

Let’s say you came up with a tune at first. Think of it as the foundation of a building.

A Songwriter starts to build a song around that foundation. There’s no rule as to where that tune might land in the arrangement, it can be the hook or chorus, the intro or a verse. That’s the beauty of it, you’re absolutely free to experiment.

If you have a slight idea of how storytelling works, you can easily take your audience on a journey they’ll never forget.

In a matter of minutes, you can make your audience feel what you felt, isn’t that amazing?

How a combination of melodies, harmonies, chord progressions and choruses enables a Songwriter to convey profound emotions will never cease to amaze me. It remained a mystery to me back in the day but when I learnt how it can be structured, things started to fall in place. I knew I could do it too and so can you.

More on the details of a Song Structure: What is the Structure of a song?

Remember: Learning the structure is like learning a tool but the real magic happens when you feel the emotion in and out.

Stage 2: Writing Lyrics and Structuring it around the Composition

The magic of words – there is no other power like it, don’t you think?

Words help you to convey a feeling as much as they help you communicate. Love and anger, compassion and hate, words enable you to do it all.

Let me tell you a little story – I’ve always been fascinated with storytelling and languages. In the pursuit of learning poetry, I first started reading Urdu poetry. It made me even more curious about the language so I looked for someone who could teach me. I opted to learn it from a website called Aamozish but eventually found someone who was as crazy about Urdu as I was.

She made sure I learnt it well. She gave me her precious time, taught me like I was a little kid, gave me assignments and a lot more. She even taught me on call during the Covid lockdowns. Malika, if you’re reading this, I’ll always be grateful!

Learning to read and write Urdu has been one of the best decisions of my life. Just a day before writing this article, I went back to some of the old poems I’d written. I’m brutal when I critique myself but I found this one to be absolutely amazing:

More on my Instagram poetry page: Khayaal-e-rooh

There’s a reason I took a minute to tell you this story. Writing breathtaking lyrics require a meticulous grasp of language, rhymes, syllables and vocabulary. These skills will enable you to put your thought on paper instantaneously. Make sure you polish your language skills frequently if it piques your interest. It’ll make you a better lyricist.

A month ago I chose to take up a short course on Poetry by Swanand Kirkire on Front Row. It’s absolutely brilliant. Check it out, you’ll learn a lot about how lyrics are structured around compositions, both in films and in an independent capacity.

This sums up the art side of Music Production.

Moving on to the science side:

What is Audio Engineering?

To make a finished song structure sound balanced on all audio reproduction systems, we use tools and techniques to alter the physics of sound - that's audio engineering.

See how I stressed the physics of sound because that is what we’ll be dealing with.

Less talk on melody, harmony, piano or guitar…

More talk on Frequencies, Gain Staging, Compression and EQ.

The shift in terminologies will help you shift your perspective.

In the modern music era, the roles of a Songwriter and Audio Engineer are handled by the same person (more often than you’d think). But that is a lot to handle because you need room to shift that perspective. If you’ve got a different set of ears for these jobs, you’re in the sweet spot.

Confused?

This image will clear out all the doubts you had about the duties of a Songwriter, Audio Engineer and Music Producer…

A Music Producer can be both a Songwriter and Audio Engineer. But if two different people handle these jobs, you can get better results in less time.

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Moving on…

An Audio Engineer handles three tasks: Recording, Mixing and Mastering.

Sometimes, these tasks are handled by three different people because they are intricate and require a further change of perspective after every stage is completed.

More on this in another article of mine: What is Mixing and Mastering?

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A while back, due to a dire need for flexibility, mobility and cost reduction, everyone had one question in their mind:

How to Produce music at home?

In the post-Covid era, it became even more important for the entire Music Industry.

Fortunately, to get started with music production at home, all you need are these three things:

1. A laptop/desktop.
2. A Music Production Software or DAW (Digital Audio Workstation).
3. Headphones or speakers.

With these 3 things, you can start composing music, creating structures and demos immediately.

One step ahead would be adding a Microphone to record vocals.

And the next step would be adding an Audio Interface to record your vocals or instruments in a higher quality.

With the advent of new Audio technology, the list of Music Production equipment has become absolutely minimal. These five things will cover all the tasks that we’ve discussed till now (including Recording, Mixing and Mastering).

You can keep adding gear to enhance your quality further but to start off, you don’t need any fancy equipment.

Music Production Software

The technical term for Music Production Software is DAW (Digital Audio Workstation).

As the name suggests, it’s a workstation in which you engineer audio digitally.

A DAW can perform the task of a mixing console and outboard effects both, and that too within the box.

You don’t have to buy multiple compressors or equalizers or any outboard gear for each track anymore, you can use their digital simulators or plugins, within the DAW and use them as many times as you want.

This is one of the major reasons why it’s so easy to start learning and producing music today.

Now, have you had this question in your mind forever:

Which is the Best Music Production Software?

Have you always been disappointed with the answer?

Well, I’m going to disappoint you too because there are so many DAWs out there, each having amazing capabilities.

It’s so subjective. What’s best for me might be absolutely difficult for you to operate and vice versa. The only solution is to experiment. If you don’t want to study the entire DAW, read about the basics. See if the User Experience appeals to you.

Do you like to have multiple tools for each action or do you prefer minimalism?

Do you want to design sound or just mix a project?

There’s a chance that a stock plugin of a particular DAW gives you the tone you aren’t getting anywhere else. It’s all about your comfort zone.

If you’re absolutely new, here are a few DAWs you should start reading about:

1. Ableton Live
2. Pro Tools
3. Cubase
4. Studio One
5. Logic Pro
6. FL Studio

What is MIDI?

MIDI stands for Musical Instrument Digital Interface.

I wrote this article in English and you’re able to read it because you understand English.

Similarly, for Digital Audio equipment to understand each other, the language used is MIDI.

Let’s talk about the usage of MIDI in a DAW and how it can help you compose music…

Firstly, it’s very important to know that MIDI does not carry any audio signal, it’s simply information. A MIDI signal tells a plugin, for example, a Piano, to play a note at a certain point in time with a certain volume level.

If you record a Piano in the traditional way (with microphones), you’d have to rely on the musician to play accurately and that means on time, with optimum pressure on each note. This is the least you’ll have to ensure as a recording engineer.

But with MIDI, you can use something called a Pencil Tool to just draw these notes across a timeline (in the picture above).

In the image, you have Piano notes placed vertically and the timing is present horizontally. It’s probably the simplest graphical representation you’ll ever come across. You can still choose to play live and record it with the help of your computer’s keyboard (yes, that’s possible) or any external MIDI device.

The beauty here is that you can alter almost anything you want –

1. The timing (when the note is hit).
2. The length of the note.
3. Velocity (how hard was the note hit to make it sound loud or soft).

You can place one note above the other to create chords, you can humanize it by delaying the timing of the notes within a chord (also known as swing). The possibilities are endless!

The same could not be done with a traditional Piano recording, there was too much pressure on the musician and the recording engineer to get it right on the spot.

Also, this isn’t restricted to just one instrument, you can choose a Drum plugin to do the same.

To some producers, the Pencil Tool is too mechanical so they choose outboard MIDI instruments to get the feel of playing a real instrument and still have the option to edit it later. Isn’t that brilliant?

If you don’t like a particular Piano tone, replace it. Don’t like a Kick tone, choose another one. I can go on and on!

MIDI can even be used as a trigger to change patches in external gear. You can automate parameters in and out of the DAW.

What is Sound Design?

Any sound you hear in the real world hits your ear at a certain intensity, stays there for a while and then diminishes.

That is the shape of a sound, also known as the Sound Envelope.

In Sound Design, you use tools and techniques to alter the envelope that makes the sound behave in a certain way. In other words, you define its tone by shaping the envelope.

Sound Design in Music is different from Sound Design in Film or Sound Design in Games.

Sound Design in Music further varies from genre to genre. E.g. Electronic Dance Music uses sound design extensively. It gives you an other-worldly experience because the tones and textures they create aren’t always present in the real world.

Have you ever heard a Bon Böhmer track and felt absolutely dreamy? That’s because of the ambience he creates with Sound Design.

Let’s take the example of a Kick Drum. A traditional Rock Music kick would sound clicky, like the ones in Metallica’s albums but you won’t hear the same in a Swedish House Mafia track. That’s because it’s been altered to fit that dimension, to create an overall vibe that makes you feel a certain way.

There are two broad ways to go about designing Sound:

1. Pick a real-world instrument or sound, record it, and shape it’s sound.
2. Use synthesizers to start with mechanical tones (such as a sine wave, square wave) and build around them.

These two techniques are often used together to design sounds we’ve never heard before.

E.g., the bass-heavy kicks and wobbles you hear in Dubstep are made with Sound Synthesis.

The kick is heavily compressed and layered with a Sine Tone to create that punch in the sub frequency range.

When I watched the Lord of the Rings for the first time, I was terrified of the Balrog's Sound, the monster Gandalf fights. You'll be amazed to know that his roar was primarily created by rubbing a Cinder Block on a wooden floor!

I’m going to leave you with a video that illustrates the wonders of Sound Design in Film:

Conclusion

1. Music Production might not be a mainstream industry but the opportunities are endless.
   
2. If you’ve got a catchy tune in your head that you know can be a banger, the time is now, pick a DAW and get producing.
   
3. The tools currently available in the market enable you to make any kind of music you want, all you got to do is start.
   
4. Make sure your hone your skills daily so that your idea can turn into reality before it vanishes. And trust me, it does vanish, sooner that you think.

Go out there and break a leg!

Check out my post on How to Become a Music Producer in India