Compose Music - Lightning Fast

1. Welcome and Introduction: Hey, friends and welcome in this course you will learn my top tips, tricks and secret methods for composing music faster and more efficient. You will also learn how to optimize your time and energy so that you can Maxima's your productivity as a music maker and artist. After this course, you will be able to compose and produce music lightning fast. You will also have the power off productivity, which you can use in other aspects of your life. Basically, you will master your time and energy as a music composer and producer, which will make you able to advance your music career like it's speeding Formula One core. So let's stop and think about this. Do you want to get more music finished in less time? Do you also want to master your creative workflow and productivity as a music maker? Then these cores is perfect for you. My name is Mike, and I am a music composer and sound designer on an epic journey in music. I want to share all my best tips intrigues as well as the experience I have gained from making music since 1998. I want to empower you with motivation knowledge, skills and the energy you need to continue your journey as a music maker. So ask yourself, Is it time for you to go on your amazing adventure in life? Is it time for you to follow your heart and dreams to choose your path to become a professional music composer? All right, then don't wait for a better time because time always runs out in the end stores now. And I'm waiting for you in the next video. I might signing out and you broke my friends. 2. RIFF: Capture your Creativity: in this video, you're going to learn about a simple technique that I call the reef method. Imagine a G tourist coming up with the essence off a new song by creating a riff in my Method Reef stands for record ideas fast and free. The essence of this method is to capture your ideas as soon as you get them, and you should also be completely open to every idea. Don't judge it. Don't think twice about it. Just let it come out freely and record it as it is. So why should you use this brief method? Well, it's a strange thing, but I'm sure you can relate to this. We music makers can sit on the bus, take a walk in the pork, clean our apartment and be out and about and all of a sudden, get great ideas for amazing hooks. Beautiful melodies, bad as grooves, rocking rapes had all kinds of awesome ideas for new songs. But as soon as we sit down in front of our music making software on our computer staring at a blank, empty project, we get stuck. Well, that's why I recommend you to always have a device for collecting your musical ideas at all times, and this is easier than ever today because almost everyone has a smartphone. So simple installed a voice recording app and hum or sing your ideas as soon as you get them. Then you will slowly build a bank of ideas, which you can bring with you to your studio sessions. This way, you won't have to sit and stir at that scary blank project because you actually have an idea bank to start from. I find that these simple technique really is effective. Now it's your turn. Your action item for this video is to first install a voice recording up on your smartphone , then test the reef method out for yourself, put on a headset and perhaps go out for a walk store doing the dishes or any other tossed that does not require that much thought. Then start thinking about music, and as a music maker, I'm sure you will come up with new musical ideas in no time. As soon as you feel an idea bubbling up, stop your task Peress record on your app and hum or sing it in. Great. You now have your first idea in your idea bank database. I might signing out, and you broke my friends 3. 3S: Simplicity is a Blessing: are you sometimes feeling overwhelmed by all the choices you can make when you see it in your studio trying to make music? I know this feeling, and that's why I'm going to share a technique I call triple this. It stands for simple songwriting session. The Triple S technique takes advantage of the fact that simplicity can sometimes be a blessing by reducing the options down to the bare minimum. It can actually boost your creativity, since you have to focus on the musical ideas instead off the sounds and instruments and so on. The Triple s Method Simple song writing session can give you mind more room by getting rid off the noise caused by choice. Basically, this method works as fools. You seem to choose one instrument you know how to play most often a piano or guitar. Then you sit down and play your ideas using Onley, that one instrument. And if you don't know how to play any instrument, you can simply sit down with a basic music app like Garrett Ban, for example, and use that for your simple song writing session. There are also APS for your smartphone that you can use to come up with your own court progressions fast and easy. I can really recommend an app called Cooled Boat, which I personally use orphan for my simple songwriting sessions. When you come up with a good idea, you can, for example, right down the court progression hook, basic rhythm and accents and lyrics. If your song should have vocals and so on, I have personally found out that when I sit down by my piano, my ideas flow more freely than when I sit down to make music in the studio. The simple songwriting session is a technique used by many composers, even when the final piece of music will be played by a full orchestra. What you want to get out is the essence, the core of your new song, because when you have captured the essence of your music, it is so much easier to go into your studio and create and range the full song. So now it's your turn. Your action item for this video is to bring out a note pad and pencil, or your child that or smartphone and sit down with your favorite instrument or music making app to do a simple songwriting session. Remember to focus on the essence of your new song. I might signing out. And you look my friends. 4. KISS: Back to the Basics: do you often create complex arrangements? And here's a massive amount of tracks and effects in your music productions or you sometimes feeling that it takes too long to finish a piece of music. In this video, I'm going to teach you about the kiss principle and how you can use it in your music to get to your end result much faster, have with less effort. First, I have to confess something. I am a complexity later, and I might have just made up that word. But basically, I mean that I tend to overcomplicate things and processes I work on. This has three main disadvantages. First, he takes longer to complete the project. Second, the result is often overly complex, which in many cases can be a barrier for the audience. And third is so much harder to mix the finished piece of music. This is why I have started using the kiss principle had you should, too. All right, so what is the kiss principle Kiss stands for? Keep it simple. Stupid on what does it actually mean in practice? Well, the kiss principle states that most systems work best if they are kept simple rather than made complicated. Therefore, simplicity should be a key goal in design on unnecessary complexity should be avoided. Let me give you a very good example. Have you ever heard about a thing called a Rube Goldberg machine? Probably not, but I bet you have seen one of these often used by inventors in cartoons. It is a machine or complex creation where you use a serious off devices or mechanisms that perform a simple task and that are linked together to produce a domino effect. Each step in a Rube Goldberg machine acts as a trigger for the next step in the sequence, and the end result is usually so incredibly simple that the whole serious is just silly. And to be honest, Rube Goldberg machine is basically just a fun experiment. So instead of using all these unnecessary steps to perform a simple action, you should obviously use the kiss principle. The kiss principle would have you ask yourself, what is the shortest and easiest and most foolproof way to get to the end result whole, right? So how can you use the kiss principle when you make your music Well, you should always remember the basic elements of music vid, um, harmony and melody. And you need to realize that you don't actually need that many instruments playing at the same time, or that many effects all over the place to make a good song. In fact, the more you add, the more difficult it will be to mix it into a professional sounding song. So for each instrument, sound or effect, plug in you add, go back to the kiss principle and ask yourself. Thus, this really add to the overall experience for the listener off the song. In many cases, we just add more things because we can. But remember that the end result is all that matters to the listener. I have decided to always have the kiss principle in mind when working on any project, whether that is music or anything else. And I really recommend you to also apply the kiss principle to your projects to help you actually finish your songs and also make them have more focus in the end result. And now it's time for you to take action. Open up a project in your d A w that you have been working on. It could be a track you already finished or something you still work on on. Analyze that product with the kiss principle in mind. Which tracks and effects could you remove and remember that removing one thing actually puts more focused on the things that remain. I Mike signing out and you broke my friends. 5. MCM: Sketch First: when producing new tracks and your musical masterpieces. Or you often getting stuck browsing for presets, testing sounds and instruments, adding coolen certificates and doing all kinds of experimentation. Well, in this video, I'm going to teach you a more efficient way off composing music. Making music is super creative, fun, inspiring and simply amazing. You get to create a piece of content that people can listen to and enjoy. Your music will have a real impact on people. It might lift their spirit, make their day a little better when they feel down or even motivate them to follow their dreams. You're probably like me and love to compose music. You know that great, exciting feeling when you sit in your studio and listen to this song you just finished? Well, there's one big drawback. It takes a very long time to compose music, so it can be a long time between those great moments. Just offer finishing a new track. So here's the $1,000,000 question Easter away to compose music faster so that you will get more tracks finished and published. Yes, there is because when I try to think about what ports off the composing and production prose is I spend the most time on. I realized that it was mainly experiments with sounds, trying out ports and instruments for the arrangement, playing with effects, trying to get that perfect sound playing etcetera. So I came up with a solution, which I call the moke up composing method, or, for short, the M. C M workflow. Basically, you go back to the roots of music, which is that music is made from three main elements. Rhythm, harmony and melody. Then you create three tracks with those three elements at the top of your sequencer and group them in a full recalled moke up for the first track, called Rhythm. I load a simple drum track usually, and on that track I create the basic rhythm and groove off the track. For the second track, called Harmony, I load a simple piano track, and here I write the cool progressions for all sections of the track, and I don't include rhythmic pattern for the course, just simple, sustained chords. And for the third track, called Milady, I most often used an audio track so I can hum or sing in the military ideas. Sometimes I use a string instrument or my guitar to play the lead melody. All right, so how do I use those tree tracks? Basically, in my composing prose is I used them to write the skeleton off the track. They are like a rough pencil sketch off the full track. A graphical artist starts with creating a sketch first to get the rough ideas out on paper before he starts painting with colors and adding the intricate details. The moke up composing method is the same, but for music. Once you have these three main elements of music written down for your new track, you basically have your rough pencil sketch. Then mute the mo cap group track. And after that, you can start adding instruments and sounds and arrange your full track using your mock up tracks as the foundation. And one more thing. Since you have access to your mo cap tracks during the detail composing process, you can easily use copy paste to get, for example, the core progression copied to an instrument in your track. Since I have started using the mock up composing method, I have drastically reduced the time it takes for me to compose music. Now Here's a final tip that I also find extremely helpful. You can actually create the rough sketch on your smartphone or tablet using an app, and then export those ideas to open in your D a. W on your computer. I, for example, often use an app on my phone called Cord Boat, which is specialized in creating chord progressions. Then I export the MIDI from core bought and imported into my d. A. W. Now not all APS have meaty export. But check your music EPS on your phone or in the APP store, and you will find that many of them do. Now it's your turn. Your action item for this video is to test the mock up composing method for yourself. Add the three mo cap tracks in your D. A w rhythm, harmony and melody, and then try sketching out your rough ideas first for your new trick, I might signing out, and you broke my friends 6. POP: Follow the Chain: I assume you want to have the best sounding makes you can get for the amazing music that you make well, there is a time for that. But in this video, I'm going to tell you about learning to follow the chain off music production, and it's going to help you be much more effective in your music making process. All right, so what am I talking about here? That Shane off music production? It's simple. Think of the music making process. As a factory producing products, you cannot paint the finished product before you have manufactured all the different parts , then assemble them and so on. The conveyor belt in a factory does not change direction. It only goes forward. And while you might never reach such efficiency in music production, it is at least a concept to have in mind. I call this the Pope method. Short for perfectly ordered production, I realized that I was wasting a lot of time to eke you set levels Pan send effect etcetera on individual channels in my tracks as soon as I added them to the project. Basically, I was trying to mix my music without even having all tracks added yet or having composed and arranged the full song by using the mind set off a factory conveyor belt. I'm trying to force myself to focus on one part of the music production, Shane. At a time since music is a creative process, you obviously will go a bit back and forth. But the point is to try to improve your process so that it will be more streamlined like a factory. Here is an example off. One way you could implement the pope method. Step one. Use the moke up composing method to get the rough sketch of the track down. First step to use the kiss principle to create and arrange the most important sports off the song, including which instruments to use, as well as the basic arrangement. A Step three. Add additional tracks and finalized the arrangement. Step four. Make a rough and quick mix off the track. Step five. Make your final mix off the fact Step six. Master the track and Step seven. Render and export your finished track that's well away. You could implement this process. The main point off the Pope method is to try to make your music production process as structured as possible. Now, your action item for this video is that you should find your personal work full and process and write your music production chain as a step by step process. And remember, you don't actually need to stick to the process 100% as long as you always have the production chain as your guide. I Mike signing out and you broke my friends. 7. Chord Progression Notepad: when recording new instruments and pours of your tracks. Do you often make mistakes because you forgot the harmonic structure, meaning the core progression? I must confess that when I used to record an ad Newport's to attract, I was working on like a rhythm piano, For example, I often stumbled somewhere in the middle because have simply forgot the core progression off that section of the song this man that I became annoyed and irritated because I was mad at myself for making all these mistakes all the time when recording well, Eventually I developed a cure for this, which I am going to share with you right now. Here it is, right down the core progressions for all your parts of your soul, if you can. I recommend writing the courts right in your sequencer, for example, by having a cool progression track at the top of your project and then use the core names as the name for the ports. The second best option, in my opinion, is using a note pad function in your D. A W. And writing down these sections of your soul with a corresponding core progression. And the third alternative is to use a note pad app on your phone or computer to write a note for each song you work on and include all core progressions off that song. In that note, here are some things to remember one. Make sure to separate each core progression per section of your track. For example, vers wam burst to Cora's one chorus to etcetera to make sure to include the length each court is played until it changes to a new chord. And three, I always recommend adding the core progression as meaty in a track called Harmony, which you then have at the top of your sequencer as one of your mock up tracks. Watch the video on the look up composing that it again if you want to strengthen your knowledge of using the M. C n workflow. All right Now you have learned about using a chord progression short for your tracks. It makes it so much easier when you try to record a new track in your project. Your action item for this video is to put this technique to a real test. Go into a product you are working on in your D A W and add your cool progression short to that song. If you're D W does not have a way of adding a note pad, you should make a note on your phone instead or adding a cool progression track at the top of your sequencer. When you have set up your court progression short for your song, you should then try to add a new port by recording, for example, a piano and use the court progression chart as a guide while you record. Then you will realize just how great it is to have a visual reference off your core progressions. So start writing down all the courts you use. I Mike signing out and you rocked my friends. 8. Kickstart a new track: There are so many ways to compose music, so many angles to start from. Some people like to start with a rhythm and beat first. Some like to start with the reform, Milady and some composers prefer to get the harmonic foundation laid out first. What do you usually start with when making music? I believe that to evolve as a music composer, you should try out different approaches for starting new tracks, because how you start will heavily effect what the end result is going to be. The direction off how the track will grow into a complete production is very much based on the seed you plant in the beginning. All right now, here are some of the work those I have personal used to start new tricks. One chord progression. First, starting with a court progression on Lee can be a bit difficult, but you can usually hear melodies and riffs forming in your head while you compose the core progression. It is also a great way to become aware off the importance off harmonic variation, voice leading and other cool related aspects that will color your track to melody and hook first. This is a common approach, especially for music that you want to have appealed to the masses. Starting with the hook and lead, melody will make sure that your track will get that so important. Ham ability factor. Three drums and group first rhythm is the core foundation off all music, so starting with a beat is probably the easiest way to kick start a new production. Be sure to add variation groovin accents, and you will have a great foundation to build your new trickle four motif and base first. This is an approach I personally use often. Basically, I have a patch where I play the motif with my right hand and the bays with my left hand. This way, I can accents and rhythm with the base while playing the lead port and even adding harmonies with my right head. I find that the motif, plus based workflow also makes it easy to harmonize the track afterwards. Five. Rhythm and drive first. These approach works great for electric guitar players and also, if you like to compose with, for example, ostinato strings patches or rhythmic sink Paul's sounds. Basically, you focus on the strum patterns. If you're a guitar player, if you program a record meeting for the driver your track. You can use a base, staccato string patch or a short since plaque sound. Then you simply sequence instrument by adding short notes in Avery them you like first marking the accents with higher velocity. All right, now it's your turn. You should try out all these work flows and other ways. You can start new tracks in the future so that you will become familiar with them. This will greatly improve your field of view as a composer, which will in turn, make ume or experienced. I might signing out, and you looked my friends. 9. Organize your DAW projects: I am a huge fan of keeping good structure and organizing your work. In this video, you're going to learn various ways to increase your productivity and workflow in your D A. W. In music production. One very important factor for improving your work efficiency is to create a good structure of your projects in your d. A. W. This will help you in many ways, such as always having a great overview off the song. You work on a clean and clear layout of your project, the sections of your track, the channel groups, the sounds you use. And so I will give you my top ways for increasing your workflow and efficiency, using good organization and structure in your D A W project. One cooler coding Using coolers on your fax to keep them separated is a good practice, but I wanted to go even further by always using the same color for the same specific kinds of sounds. For example, personally, I have always colored my based fax red and my lead instruments yellow, because that is how I see the colors when thinking about these kinds of sounds. Now it's your turn. Close your eyes and think about a kind of instrument or sound at a time. Let's say you start thinking about base now, close your eyes and then think about what core you instinctively associate with it. This is different from person to person, and I believe it is very important that your core coding is customized for your personal workflow and preference. All right, now do this association exercise in a stick buster process until you have a full color scheme for your music productions in your D. A. W two section markers. I love using section markers to get a good overview off the segments off the track I'm working on you. Simply add a marker in the beginning off every new section of your track. For example, a section for intro burst from chorus, Verse two and Saloon in most VW's. You can then use shortcuts to jump between different sections, which is an added benefit of this technique. Three Sound library and favorites. I recommend you to create a folder on your computer called, for example, sound library in that fall over, then, at sub folders for each category off sound you have. The great benefit of this is that you will have a structure of sounds that is completely personalized to your way of organizing sounds. So this kind of structured sound bank is something you create outside of your door on your computers. Describe. But I also recommend that you always use the favorites or ranking feature of your D. A W and even of your most used instrument plug ins. The point is that you want to be able to find your favorite sounds as fast as possible. All right, so color coding section markers and your own custom sound library. Those are some of my top ways of using structure and organization for boosting your music making efficiency. Now your action for this video is to try out these three ways yourself. And also, if you come up with other ways to structure and organize your production workflow, hide those down and start using these methods. I might signing out and you rocked my friends 10. Optimize your Studio Setup: to be able to work fast and efficient with your music, you should have your studio structured and organized. Well. Things can mean many things, but here are a couple of examples I find very important one placing your most important tools right in front of you as close as you can. The trickiest port is usually getting your meaty keyboard and your computer, keyboard and mouse all placed perfectly for accessibility. The point is that you should be able to do almost everything without constantly needing to reach, for to placing all other tools as close to you as possible, preferably within reach. By just turning like this, it might mean that in he to invest in a bigger desk for your studio. Three. Keep your studio clean and organized. For example, you should spend some time to work on the cable management and overall layout of your studio. If your studio looks professional, it will have a positive effect on your confidence and motivation. Four. Add your personal vibe to your studio. It might be to use special cool lighting or placing some action figures, plans or whatever you feel is your personal touch to your studio. This is important because it will make your studio feel like your home. The personal things can help in getting you into a relaxed state of mind. Spark your motivation, inspiration and feel more comfortable when working. Five. Organize your computer. This is something so many people tend to overlook. I find that having a good structure off my folders and files on my computer have saved me so much time. So here are my top recommendations for doing that plays all your contact libraries in one folder so that you can easily find them when you are working in your D A. W. Creating Master folder for all your sound samples, which you can, for example, name sound bank and then at sub folders for each category off sound, for example, caps, risers, bushes and so on. And finally, keep a good folder and file structure for your projects as well as your finished productions. You can even include a note file for each track of your portfolio with things like a short description and tags. This will make it much faster and easier to upload to music licensing platforms later. All right, now it's time for you to take action taken evening or weakened to structure and organize your studio set up as well as your production computer. I promise you it will be worth it. It will save you lots of time as well as boost your motivation and energy as well as productivity. When you make music. I mike signing out and you broke my friends. 11. Master your main tools: Have you ever heard the saying Jack of all trades? But master off Now, as a music maker, you have access to so many tools, so much different gear to choose from and millions of different plug ins for instruments and effects. That school, isn't it? Well, over all, it is a good thing. But unless you're careful and purposeful, there are two main disadvantages. First, too many choices can lead to confusion, spending lots of time on testing different choices, presets, plug ins and so on. And second, if you use too many different tools, you will never most of them all. This means that you will basically be a beginner to perhaps intermediate, user off most of these big number of tools. Now, what is the solution to this? Don't become a jack of all trays. Instead, choose your primary tools and the ones you feel most strongly for off course you can. You several tools, but try to pick a few favorites than that. You then spend time on mastering. Let me give you a practical example. I have personally chosen the software instrument called Spectra Sonics all Miss Fair to be my primary sound engine for Syn thesis and sound design I made. That show is back in 2008 when it was first released. This means that I haven't spent much time testing and learning other soon plug ins and sound Indians that have been released doing these years, such as absent massive sea room etcetera. Instead, I have spent that time learning the depths off illness fear, which means that I can use this buggin much more efficient to create and shave the sounds I want quicker and easier. I truly recommend you to spend your time and energy wisely focused on your favorite tools. Both hold wear and software both instrument plug ins and effects, then learn them well, become a master of a few things instead of a jack off all trades. I promise you that this will make you so much more efficient when working with your music, and the faster you can work, the more motivation and energy you will feel. Now it's your turn. Go through all of the tools you have available in your studio, set up your gear, your suffer instruments, your effects, etcetera. Then make a list off a handful off all those tools, which are your favorites and that you want to become a master of. After that, you should try to use your favorites as you go to tools. When you make music, the hell it is only a matter of time until you master, I might signing out and you broke my face. 12. Master your DAW: ableto live logic pro X Q Base Studio one. There are so many choices of D. A. W's and personally, I have used many of them during the years. Which one is your favorite DW? I always say it doesn't matter about to use as long as you know how to use it and, more importantly, that you can achieve the end result you want. You might have heard these 1000 times, but it doesn't make it less true. So what d w is best for you? I believe that you can trust your own instinct here. Don't simply look at the features, the built in effect since instruments and other technical aspects. While those can sometimes be important. What is much more important to you when making music is that you feel that creating spork, that vibe, the energy and the workflow that it's simple feels like home for you and that you get that overwhelming feeling off wanting to make music when you open your d. A. W. You cannot describe this feeling in words. You just have to feel it. That is the D W you want to go for, but you might need to try a lot. Most of the major GW's until you find out that special one that feels like it was made for you. Now, after you have chosen your d A W. How do you actually master it? I would really recommend you to not raise time by simply messing around testing and trying to work things out completely by yourself. Instead, make an active choice to really learn your DW. Start out by making a playlist on YouTube for tutorials on your DW. Then spend some time searching for good tutorials on different aspects off the software and add them to your playlist. Now you have a resource bank off guides and information, which he should start learning from. You can also find really good in depth online video courses for your DW. Then there is a way of learning, which I personally enjoyed very much, and that is to follow music composers and producers on YouTube or live streams that make music in your D W. Then you can pick up some know that stand eureka moments by actually watching them used software in real time for making their music. And finally, you can learn and master your DW by making music. And as soon as you want to know how to do something in your DW, you go to Google or YouTube to search for it, learn it when you need it and implement it instantly. That is a great way to get knowledge to stick. You need to learn how to work fast and efficient in your dear W because it will make it much more fun to compose and produce music. Aside from mastering all the features and the workflow off the software, I really recommend you to learn all the keyboard shortcuts or as many as possible. At least working with keyboard shortcuts instead of menus and using your mouse will say you so much time and increased is so important. Momenta, Um, when you make music, you can search on Google for a PdF or document with all shortcuts for your DW. Give it a quick look through first and then use it as a reference guide. Every time you sit and work with your G A W. One by one, you'll add keyboard shortcuts to your memory and worth low, and for each time you will feel a slight boost in efficiency. Now it's your turn to take action, invest in yourself to improve your knowledge and experience off your DW. Using online courses, YouTube tutorials, live production videos and reference guides in pdf, etcetera, the more you learn and master your DEA W, the more you will feel like a professional music maker, and the music production process will become more focused on your creativity. Since the technology will become second nature to you, it's time for you to become a master of your D eight other I Mike signing out and you broke my friends. 13. Master your music knowledge: courts, scales, harmony, rhythm, melody and music theory foundations. These are things that you should learn and improve your knowledge in and experience off all the time. I have personally been making music since 1998 on for the longest time, I did not know hardly any music theory at all. As soon as I started learning more about these fundamentals of music, I noticed that I was able to both improve my music composing skills as well, a speed up my workflow for making music by a considerable time. So instead of messing around testing ILD and basically experimenting until you stumble, Polaris salty want, you can use your powerful knows of music to guide you. It's like a painter who knows which brushes to use, colors to blend, rules of perspective and lighting, and so on to create beautiful paintings. Knowing the foundations of music theory will make you much more professional and efficient music Pinker. Now here are the foundations of music theory. I recommend you to learn practice and master first one of the most common skills, all major scales and all relative minor scales to the most common cords, all major and minor. Try it's suspended chords and seventh chords. Three The intervals and harmonies in music from a minor second to a full octave. Four. Recognize and use all rhythmic note values from a full bore down to at least 32nd notes and practice adding accents as well. Five. Learn waste at expression to a melodic phrase such as dynamics leg, Otto Porter, aumento vibe, Rato Crescendo And so the main point of learning the fundamentals of music and music theory is to expand your color palette and remove as much guesswork as you can when you make music , the more knowledge and experience again, off the fundamentals music the easier and quicker you will be able to make amazing sounding music. So now it's time for you to take action. Start learning about these essentials off music and begin using the knowledge to gain as soon as you can learn how to control the true power of music. I might signing out and you broke my friends 14. Create and use templates: project any D W or big, complicated and can take a long time to set up. That's why I always use a d W template to stop new tracks from, And you should, too. By using a D W template, you will avoid doing all the repetitive things that you always have in your projects. I have a quick reference guide for you on things I personally always add to. My D W Temple is, well, you're ready one channel groups. Having your groups already set up in your mixer means that you can simply choose the output group for each instrument you add in your product to, I add the most common instrument tracks are used, such as illness, fear and contact, and set up the routing for them. I also have a couple of moke up instrument tracks at the top of the sequencer to sketch out my ideas for the track first three Send If it's I always have. The main re verbs and delay effects set up as sense for reverb Czar used three different sense. One for ambience, one for a studio room celled and one whole reverb for the bigger, lush sounds for delay I use a couple of different time values such as quarter notes and eighth notes. Four side Shane Compression. I always set up the routing for citing compression so that I can seem to choose how much compression I want on the base sounds to get the kick and low percussion to really put out in the track. Five. Channel. Kohler, Kolding I have all my channels colored according to my own personal preference. For example, all my bass tracks are read the tracks or yellow and so on. Six Channel naming. I like to start with good organization and structure when I make music. So in my D W templates, I add names to each channel, group and track that makes sense. Seven. In certificates, I add insert effects on the group journals because that's how I want to mix. So I add things like compressors and e que to each group shuttle in my d aaw template eight master effects. I add an entire effect chain for mastering on the master bus so that I can easily switch it on to hear what the final output will sound like. At least very close to it. What you add to your DW template is, of course, depending on your preference and workflow. But the important point is that you do create and use templates to speed up your music making process. A bonus tip I would like to give you is to also consider making templates for sounds and instruments. You can, for example, make multi output presets for contact, such as a preset for breasts, another for strings etcetera. And you can also do as I have done, which is to make master sound presets in your favorite these T instruments. I have done several master presents in all nous fear. For example, one is used as my starting point for all baselines since I made it myself. I know just how to adjust it to get the specific sound. I won't. All right now it's your turn. Make a list of all the things you want to include in your D W template, as well as instrument and sound templates, and then get to work, create your own custom templates and use them as a starting point for your new amazing masterpieces. You will create. I might signing out, and you broke my friends 15. Success Stories: I love stories. Well, we hold you, don't weigh a few things are as captivating as a good story. So how can this help you get motivated? I personally love success stories, stories of people who struggled for a long time but continued to record people who have met many obstacles and overcome them stories off dedication and blind belief off people who simply chose to follow their passion wherever it would leave them stories with a happy ending. I find it wonderfully motivating and inspiring to read these kinds of stories. It doesn't even have to be in my specific creative field. I find it fascinating to read the story behind how Steve Jobs started airport, how Ingvar Kamprad here in Sweden started I Kia and how mankind managed to land people on the moon. Success stories like these leaves a strong emotional afterthought. Nothing is impossible if you are truly determined to succeed, and this, to me, is a truly powerful thought. That sparks my motivation. So what success stories inspires you if you find yourself lacking motivation any day, take a moment to think about these stories. Let them truly sink in. You can do anything you want if you put your mind to it. I find that it is very motivating to also follow people in my field that I am truly inspired by people that have had great success in their journey in music people I would look up to as a mental or role model. I never had real mentor that I can talk to and throw ideas and questions that, But I do have a couple of unofficial mentors, as I like to call them. Basically, they are my role models. For me personally, these are creative people in the field of music and sound. My role models are Hans Cymer as a music composer, Daniel James as a sound designer and Lindsey Sterling as a music artist. So how do I get motivation from my role models? Well, basically, I follow their journey. I've read their stories and I watch and listen to what they create. Then I take comfort in knowing that they are people just like me, people who love to create people with a true passion for what they do. People that have worked hard and long to achieve their successful career in music, and I take comfort in that what made them successful all the very things that can also make me successful in my journey as a creative artist. Things like dedication, focus, creativity and passion. If they can do it, so can I. And so can you, my friend. Now your action item for this video is to ask yourself what role models do you have for your creative journey in music, which showed the people you look up to the success stories you can relate to. Think about this until you find the answer. In your heart, I think three is a good number. So right down the three people in music that did you look up to the most that you are inspired by and that you can say or your true role models. It can be music composers, music producers or any type of artists in the field of music. Once you have your least stored following their journey on social media YouTube and bookmark their website so that you can watch their journey and progression and also read their background story. Finally, remember that you have a story as well, and your story can start today if you just make up your mind to truly follow your dreams. I Mike signing out and you looked my friends 16. The Power of 100% Focus: it is scientifically proven that multitasking is extremely inefficient. Our brain is only man to focus on one thing at a time, and every time you switch your focus, it takes time to get two full speed again. Imagine these as if you're on a train that goes at full speed. What if the train switched focus all of a sudden and decided that the opposite direction should be the new focus? Well, first, it would take quite a long time to stop the train. They will take a very long time to accelerate the train back to full speed in the opposite direction. Now imagine that your work focus is like a train. You need to stay on track, stay focused and feel the rhythm of the engine. As you progress forward towards your destination. Complete focus is one off the key secrets, too. Powerful productivity. All right, So how do you guide your mind to 100% Focus on one single tears, Get a time. There are actually many techniques you can use to help yourself on. Here are my top methods that I had used personally and that have worked great for me. One. Remove distractions and temptations we has. Humans are so easily distracted. As soon as we hear or see something remotely interesting, we have to struggle really hard to stay focused on whatever we do. And today we are surrounded by so many distractions. It is almost overwhelming for our mind to handle phones, ringing text messages and email notifications alerting us app notifications beeping and so warm. We are living in a noisy world with so many temptations and distractions, and this is one of the main reasons we failed to be productive. Today, I have found that it is highly effective to remove temptations in your environment that can ruin your focus. It is like when I have cookies or other treats its of some kind of home. It is so hard to resist the temptation to not have a cookie when it's right there in front of me. This is not rocket science. It is just human nature. So what can you do to help yourself in this case? Well, that's easy. Remove the cookie from the equation, either by not buying cookies at all, all by storing them in a very difficult place to reach where you can't see them. How does this relate to productivity? Well, it is the same principle that applies, helping ourselves to resist the temptations by simply removing them from our immediate surroundings. This can mean closing all APS and programs that you don't need for the task at hand. Switching your phone to Do not disturb, turning off all browser tabs and abs that are not necessary for the work you are about to do. Switching off the TV, music or anything that draws your attention and basically removing anything around you that have a possibility to attract your attention in any way. Make sure your work area is clean and organized, and you should only have the tools and equipment you need in front of you to use Pomodoro. There is a technique you can use to help you stay focused when you work, and it is called the Pomodoro Technique. The way that it works is that you do your focus sessions in 25 minutes time slots, followed by a five minute break. After three repetitions off these times loads, you take a longer 25 minute break. There are apps for your smartphone. You can use to time your focus sessions and breaks. Just search for poor Maduro where you download your wraps. But I actually find that I like the old school We're here, which is to use an ordinary egg timer. I find that the end log ticking sound helps me stay focused and avoid distractions. Whatever you decide to use, make sure that you are strict on the Pomodoro segments. There is a psychological science behind the way it works, and you really need to take those five minute breaks to be effective. I just think of it as rules. I have to play by the rules in order to win the game. Cheating will only disqualify me. Three. Use triggers. You can help your mind focus by using a cue or trigger off some kind. That is the same for every time you want to focus on a task. Now this one might seem strange, but psychological triggers actually do work. It is like a mantra to help you get into the right mindset. A personal example is that for my work sessions, I always start with a fresh cup of coffee or tea. When I put the coffee or teacup on the table, that's the psychological trigger for my focus session to start, then I know that I will go into focus mode for these triggers to work. You have to build a habit out of them because it is actually the habit that makes them a trigger. So the first times you use a new trigger, it won't have the powerful psychological effect. That's why you need to use the same trigger every time. The general rule is that it takes 21 days to develop a habit. So it would be best if you can do a focus session every day for 21 days, and every time I use the same figure, then you will have a powerful trigger that will help you get into focus mode every time. So what kind of trigger can you use? Well, it can be anything really. For example, making a fresh cup of coffee or tea like I do, starting a special focus mode playlist of music or perhaps snapping your fingers three times. Whatever you do choose, make sure it is really simple. Then stick to it and develop the trigger into a strong habit for every time you want to have a productive, focused session. Now it's time for you to take action, right? A list of all the things that often grabs your attention, whether it is a distraction or a temptation, Then try to do work in what I call focused sessions, which means to focus 100% on one single task at a time. Doing these 100% focused sessions will be very difficult in the beginning, just like the resistance you feel when you try to develop, for example, an exercise routine every week. But as you strengthen this habit, you will realize how full feeling it is and how much it really improves your productivity. You know how they say that runners become addicted to running well, You could actually become addicted to focus sessions, at least from my personal experience, simply because how good it feels to be so productive and get so much done in a short amount of time. So remember, stay focused, I might signing out, and you broke my friends 17. The Walk'n'Work Technique: staying alert and energized is extremely important both for productivity but also to release your true creative potential. One of my recent discoveries for increasing my energy levels and staying sharp and focused while I work is what I call the book and work technique. Basically, I take my iPad or iPhone in my hands. Open up the thing I want to work on and start walking around in the room like this. It's really easy to do, but, whoa, the effect both surprised and impressed me. Of course, this method doesn't work for every task you need to do. But here are some examples off things I have used this method for with excellent results writing scripts, making keynote presentations, writing emails, doing brainstorming sessions, organizing projects and to do lists. Having Skype calls and meetings on the list goes on. There are so many talks you can do right from your tablet or smartphone. You can even use voice dictation to help you write things more efficiently or do creative music sessions on your phone, for example, i often use an app called cord boats on my iPhone to create my own court progressions, which you can also customize in the app and then export the meaty to my computer when I'm done. There are many music making abs like this that are so easy to use that they were great for a walk in Virk session. So your action atom for this video is to write a list of tasks that you could do in a walking work session, then tried out for yourself so that you can feel the wonderful effects it has on your energy levels and productivity is also a great way to get out of your home, office or studio, which I'm sure you sit in quite a lot. If you're like me, so do you want to have more energy and boost your focused and productivity? Then you better start walking. I might signing out and you rock my friends 18. Join a Music Maker Community: working alone in your studio all time without connecting with other people can become truly discouraging. I'm sure you know the feeling. That is why I believe that is so important to get music making friends online. And the best way I have learned is to join a community or music makers. But all have a strong passion for music as well as high ambitions for their future success . That way you can learn from each other, pushing motivated, shudder forward and even simply hang out and discuss things that matters. For music makers like yourself, joining a music community like this can be a great way to connect and become friends with fellow music makers and even do cross promotions and collaborations. Online forums is the classic way off, connecting and discussing things. But there are also lots of Facebook groups and Google, plus groups for music makers, but most of them are certainly full of music promotion posts and spam. So that's why I created my own community for music makers, and you are more than welcome to join. The important point is that you should not be alone on your journey. You need the support from music making friends just as pro dough in the Lord of the Rings movies needed his friends to support him to complete his epic journey. And please do not try to use these communities and groups to promote your music and yourself. That's not the purpose of a music maker community. The purpose is to connect network, elaborate, discuss and learn all things that is important for your music maker journey. So your action item for this video is to go to Facebook, Google Plus or online forums and join a music maker community to connect with music makers on a journey to success. If you want to do in my community simply search for music makers, group on Facebook and join for free today, then start connecting with people by adding value to discussions, start new interesting threads, always good questions and be genuinely helpful and positive. This is the way to make friends. This is the way to get support, and you need the support off friends to get the strength and motivation you need for your epic journey. I Mike signing out and you broke my friends 19. Positive Fan Support: If nobody cares about what you do, accept yourself. Your motivation will die. But don't worry if you truly love what you do and share it in a personal and entertaining way, your enthusiasm for your creations will make people take notice, and some of them will show their support with positive comments and kind words. Uplifting feedback works as a great catalyst for your motivation. It can be kind Commons on your YouTube videos, soundcloud tracks, instagram feed or wherever you publish the work you have done. It can be testimonials on your products, and it can even be people just reaching out to you to let you know how much they appreciate what you do. I have found that I really loved to reply to these nice and supportive comments and thank them. Remember, these people might become fans of your music and supporters of your journey. Perhaps they already or so please let them know how much they mean to you and how incredibly happy or for their kind words. If you do this, it is very likely that they will come back to your next creation and leave a comment again . It becomes a positive spiral on, the more people you get kind feedback in comments from the more motivation you will get. So make sure to invite people to comment and leave their feedback and support, encourage them even and always remember to thank them and respond when they leave. Nice comments. So your action item for this video is to go to the positive and encouraging comments you already have on your channels, where you posed your music story and creations have then replied to those comments, and let these people know how much we appreciate their support. I might signing out and you rock my friends. 20. Milestones and Celebration: what are the things you can measure that will show you that you're own your way towards your successful destination as a music maker? I'm going to teach you an important concept now that he should start using right away. If you truly want to create a successful career as a music maker and this method is simple and straightforward, you should create a milestone tracker. All right, so how do you make one? Well, first, you simply write down all the things in your music, make a journey that are easily measurable. For example, the number of tracks in your composer portfolio, the amount of subscribers or followers on your YouTube channel, Facebook page and so on. The number of people that are subscribed to your email list the total income per month from all your income streams and so on. You contract a lot of different things, but the most important point is to track the things that you personally feel has the strongest impact on your success as a music maker. Let's say you choose to track your YouTube subscribers well, then you simply make a ladder off milestones where you add a precise number two each milestone. So let's say you have 2400 subscribers today on YouTube. I will then make the first milestone 100 subscribers, the second milestone 1000 subscribers and 1/3 milestone, 2500 subscribers. That way you can check off two milestones right away as soon as you have created your milestone tracker. And also you are very close to reaching the third milestone. These will boost your motivation as you will give yourself kind of a pat on the back for your accomplishments. So far, Maiga's many milestones, as you wish on, try to space them so that it will not take years to achieve every level. Then do this for all the things you want to track with milestones. You should put the milestone tracker on a place where you can look at it every day to regularly remind you of your success. Journey in music. All right, so now you have your milestone tracker. The next concept is to celebrate. It is incredibly important to celebrate your milestones when you reach them. Most of us generally or bad at celebrating things. It is so easy to get stuck on problems and struggles and forget about all the amazing things we actually have accomplished. Let's say you're in Go is to build a full time successful career as a music maker. Well, that will take a while. And even though he should keep your eyes on the price of your end goal, it will help. If you have milestones that you'd fact, and each time to reach one of your milestones, you should take some time to celebrate. I'm not talking about a big party unless that's what you want. I mean to take a moment to tap yourself on the back, congratulate yourself for reaching this milestone and celebrating the fact that you are now closer to your end goal. You can even communicate your achievement by making a post on your social media channels, your blawg E mail list or other channels where your fans can congratulate you as well. People love to see progress and positive news from the artists they support, and their comments to these Post will feel great. I promise you. Now let me give you an analogy. Let's say you play a computer game in which your character collects points to gaining levels towards the maximum level off 100. All right, so that means level 100 is your end. Goal your price? Well, what if you had to grind every day for one year and still be at little one? Then all of a sudden, you level up to 100 staying at level one for a full year before any gratification or rewarded piers? Well, that journey would feel like a huge pain. Luckily, that is not how games work. They work by rewarding you with level ups and bonuses throughout your whole journey towards the Max Little. Why? Because our brain loves these small rewards on the way. It is such a strong incentive that some people even get addicted to these computer games. Well, what if you could use this model for your music journey? You can, and it is easy. Simply create a milestone tracker, follow up every week and celebrate your achievements every time. So your action item for this video is to create a spreadsheet and add milestones to all the things you want to measure on your journey. For example, total income per month Email list subscribers. YouTube subscribers. Social media followers Number of tracks in your music portfolio. And so, and remember to take a moment to celebrate each time you reach one of your milestones. Because basically, you have just leveled up on your journey to success. Congratulations. You're one step closer to becoming a hero. I might signing out and you rock my friends. 21. Stop being a Perfectionist: There is one condition that many artists and music makers suffer from, including myself. Perfectionism, and it really hurts productivity. First, you need to understand why perfectionism is so bad. I speak from experience, since this is something I have struggled with my whole life. I hope that this video will make you aware of your own tendency off perfectionism and that you will strive to cure yourself from it. Remember perfectionism and productivity or like mortal enemies. So if you truly want to become more productive, you need to get rid off, or at least reduce the tendencies for perfectionism. Let me share why you improve faster from experience. If you think about it, the best way to learn is from your own mistakes. It's just as when we start to learn to speak or walk. In the beginning of our lives, we're stumble with four. We do not know all the words, and we cannot even pronounce every letter. But still we try, and we improved by making mistakes again and again. The point is that the best way to learn is from your mistakes to one completed task is way better than 10. Nearly done, I make music, and I have hundreds off unfinished tracks on my computer. Honestly, most of them will probably never get finished. It is a bad habit, and I much rather have one finished track per week instead of 10 unfinished ideas. Three. Perfection is an illusion. I am guilty myself off spending hours upon hours, trying to perfect my music mixes, adjusting excuse levels, effects and so long to get a perfect soundtrack. But perfection is merely an illusion, and on top of that, the illusion is subjective. So even after countless of hours trying to achieve what you believe is perfection, no one else will see or hear the end result with your eyes or ears. In this case, what you see as perfection another person might see as gore bitch four. Progress feeds Motivation. Have you ever had that good feeling off pride and joy after sharing your final work with the world? Then you know that this feeling really boosts your motivation, which in turn can make you more productive if you use that energy boost to start making your new next thing. Every time you finish a project or tossed, it will add to your mo mentum off energy and motivation, and this is grateful productivity. Five. The 90% rue. Have you ever heard off the law of diminishing returns? Basically, it means that the closer you get to that illusionary 100% perfection, the more time you will need to work for every percentage improvement. For example, let's say that it takes while our to get your creation to 50% quality. If you spend another hour on it, you might get to 80% quality. Spend 1/3 hour, and perhaps you're up on 90%. If you choose to spend 1/4 hour, you might get to 92%. Hello. That is only 2% increase for the same amount of time that it took you to get from Syria to 50% in the first hour. This is the law of diminishing returns. So, as an example, you might spend 100 hours to get one single track to 98% perfection or spend the same amount of time that is 100 hours to complete 30 tracks up to 90% perceived perfection little and remember, quality is in the eye of the beholder. All right, now you know some of the most important facts off why you should avoid perfectionism. So how do you actually cure it, or at least reduce it? Well, here are some of the ways I have personally applied, and that had worked for me. One add mistakes on purpose. Whenever I feel I get stuck in a perfectionist mode, I add a couple of mistakes on purpose. You have to get used to the notion that nothing is perfect, and neither should you strive towards that illusion. Personally, I used to take up to an hour to complete a single business emails, sometimes simply because of my perfectionism. These e mails should have all the taking me perhaps 5 to 10 minutes at the most. So I have started to force myself to start adding a couple of spelling mistakes on purpose . To get rid of the feeling that I have to write a perfect email, this mindset shift have drastically improved my daily communication productivity, and the same principle could be applied in anything you do to keep your eyes on the prize. If you find yourself stuck in perfectionism mode, close your eyes and think about the amazing feeling you get when you complete the project. These can help you get back on track, so to speak and make you finish your project faster. Three speed were accessions. I also recommend you to try out doing speed work sessions regularly. Basically, this means that you set a time limit to complete a project. You usually spend way more time all well, by doing a speed work session and setting a timer. Or, let's say, one hour, you must force yourself to see paused imperfections and focus on getting to the end result . In just one hour, you will be amazed at what you can do by having a deadline like this. All right. No, it's time for you to take action. Write a list of things you usually spend more time on than you probably should also write a list for possible solutions that can help you reduce your tendency of going into perfectionist mode. Then get right on it and apply these solutions. In practice, I might signing out and you broke my friends 22. The Power of Habits: Let's be honest. Here we are all creatures of habits. Whether we realize it or not, it doesn't matter if they have is a good or bad one, because habits are super powerful on our behavior and what we spend our time on this is proved by science. But, hey, you can use this fact to your benefit as well. If you have a really strong habit, you get into an almost automatic mode. This video is not about getting rid of your bad habits, like eating too much junk food, smoking or whatever habits you have. It is about building strong good habits to help you become amazingly productive. I have personally found this strategy to be one of the most effective ways of optimizing and boosting my productivity. Just think about the strongest habits you have in life. For me, it is things like my morning coffee, uh, brushing my teeth and yes, even having snacks when I watched the movie. We all have habits we are not that proud of, like hitting the snooze button in the morning habits, whether they are good or bad or extremely hard to get rid off. One of the main reasons is that our brain loves automatic mode. This is because the brain is born boarded with many thousands of choices every day, and it takes energy to make choices. After all, a choice of doing or not doing something is, in essence, an argument and struggle within yourself. And we all know that arguing a lot drains your energy. So the brain basically rewards habits because this effectively saves energy by eliminating the thought process. Often active choice. All right, so habits are strong, like steel. That's awesome and all. But how do you effectively build in? You could have it. Well, there are no shortcuts here. Science has shown that it takes about 21 days in a row to build a new habit for that period . You just have to use your will power to just do it on the routine. You build should be done exactly the same way each time to build an effective habit. Let me give you an example. A year ago, I started doing a morning exercise routine. This routine includes some agility exercises, a spring session on an exercise bike and a couple of more things. The routine all it takes about 10 minutes in total. But still, I felt so much resistance in my mind when I started trying to develop this new habit. Well, I used my willpower and stuck with it. And today I am proud to say that I have done these exercise routine every morning for a whole year. It is such a strong habit now that I do it almost as a reflex. So now it is your turn, right? A list of things you want to develop into a strong habit. It can be brand new routines, all things you already do occasionally but want to do regularly make a list of habits evolved to build. Then you make a tracker to write down every time you complete the routine. I recommend using an ordinary calendar and simply marking each day with a red X. When you succeeded in did your routine, I'm sure you're like me and have some bad habits. But now it is time for you to use the power of habits to build amazingly strong good habits to boost your workflow efficiency and productivity. So start building your good habits that will increase the speed on your music journey. I'm Mike signing out, and you look my friends 23. Gamify your Productivity: game ification might seem like the latest new trend but is actually backed by science. Our brain loves these small and trivial rewards we get in games, so why not use this fact to power your productivity in this video? I will teach you exactly how to do just that. First, you should create a master to do list. I personally find it very effective to write down every single tossed I need to do on my to do list. This way, I always know what should get done. It can be a simple as a chick books list or as advanced as a project management software. I find the most important thing is that you don't spread your to do's into different places . Choose one to do up and stick to it. Collect every task in one place. I also recommend you to use enough that sinks between all your devices so that wherever you are, you can add a task or shake what is next. It is also important to prioritize your tasks in your to do list. Otherwise, it is so easy to do things that are not that important right now. It should also make a routine off checking and reviewing your to do list at least once a week. I find that when I do this, I always find some tasks that I simply can remove because it turned out I don't need to finish them most often. It is because I have made a task out oven idea and not every idea will or should be realized. So keep your to do list, organized, prioritized and up to date. Another benefit Hoeber to do list is that you get such a wonderful feeling often. Do you check off a task you have completed? This feeling is very motivating and makes you want to get more things done. Now that you have collected your tasks in your to do list, it is time to implement Gamification for me. Personally, I have found that if I miss you my results and give myself rewards in a simple point system , I get more things done each week. So I have actually gang unified my to do list to make it more fun to be productive. How did I do this? Well, basically, I grade all my tasks in my to do list with points one point per hour of work. I estimate the task or product will take and up to three bonus points for the tasks I feel have the most impact on my journey right now. At the end of the week, I count all the points off all the completed tasks on my list, plus a little bonus points. Then I feel in this total school into a spreadsheet so that I can see how productive I have bean for every week. This is the way I do it, and I have really increased my productivity by implementing this kind of Gamification for my productivity. And you can, too. All right, now it's time for you to take action. Find a to do at that you like, and install it on all your devices. Then write all the tasks you want to get done in your career and journey as a music maker right now and use Gamification to boost your motivation and track your progress. Let's make productivity fund I Mike signing out and you look my friends 24. Congratulations + Bonus: congratulations. You have completed the full course, which means that you are a person who finish what you start. And that, my friend, is a true sign off successful people. I also have a gift for you. Since you completed the full course, I have attached a bonus, Pdf with a complete summary off this course because I want you to use it to guide you so that you can use all the knowledge, methods and tips you gain from this course. So take action, my friend, because taking another step is the only way to move forward. Now, I would like to kindly ask of you to lead a review on my course because reading your reviews really motivates me to create new courses. It also helps me as a teacher. So thank you in advance for leaving your review. Finally, I want to thank you so much for taking my course. And I hope to see you soon in one off my other courses. Until then, keep making amazing music. I wish you a great future and looks of success with your music. I Mike signing out And you broke my friends