



HOW TO BUILD A SMALL MUSIC STUDIO ON A SMALL BUDGET



So you want to make music and become a producer but you are unsure of where to start?

I wont babble on about how different it was when I started back in the early to mid 90's, but I can assure you it was a long and winding road that often led to frustration, due to the fact that the only help you could get was through talking to your local music shop dealer who was more often than not a metal guitarist and knew next to nothing about electronic music production. There was also word of mouth with other ambitious producers in the area and the occasional second hand copy of the Atari ST Cuebase instruction manual that would change hands for around £30 from out of the ad mag which was like eBay before the internet gave us all we needed.



Nowadays you have a million different tutorials on the net for all kinds of genres. All you need are the tools and the patience to learn. So you want to make music and become a producer but you are unsure of where to start?I wont babble on about how different it was when I started back in the early to mid 90's, but I can assure you it was a long and winding road that often led to frustration, due to the fact that the only help you could get was through talking to your local music shop dealer who was more often than not a metal guitarist and knew next to nothing about electronic music production. There was also word of mouth with other ambitious producers in the area and the occasional second hand copy of the Atari ST Cuebase instruction manual that would change hands for around £30 from out of the ad mag which was like eBay before the internet gave us all we needed.Nowadays you have a million different tutorials on the net for all kinds of genres. All you need are the tools and the patience to learn.





But in order to learn we must first acquire some basic tools both with software and hardware. So here is where the Waxadisc guide to building a basic set up to get you going comes in. I hope this can inspire and encourage you if you are a start up producer.





This guide is assuming that you already have a P.C either Windows or Mac. As long as it has a reasonably sized memory and ram you can begin the process.





DIGITAL RECORDING SOFTWARE OPTIONS





For those of you who follow my You-Tube channel and my blog, you will know I always use Ableton as my weapon of choice. I used to be an avid Cakewalk user from Version 2 back in the late 90's through to around 2010. But it is all subjective when it comes to finding the right software for the right price.





Below are my recommendations for starter Digital Audio Workstations, also known as DAW









Check the link here or click the image to find out more about the lite version of Ableton.



CLICK THE IMAGE FOR MORE INFORMATION ON ABLETON

Propellorheads Reason V10 Intro

A legendary DAW which is unique in the fact that it is an entire studio in a box and not just a sequencer with a few effect units. This is the intro version for a discounted £70. You can create unlimited synth pre sets and mix everything together in here to create your own patches and arrange them in a traditional way like in Ableton. It comes with a few things lesser than the full version of course but it still packs a punch with many effects and other utilities to dive into and learn. The only fall back on Reason is the arrangement window is small. But once you get into it, you soon get over that. It is worth having a trial period and see if you like the feel.



CLICK THE IMAGE FOR MORE REASON 10 INFORMATION

15 HOURS OF ABLETON HOUSE MUSIC CONTENT FOR ONLY £10

CLICK THE IMAGE BELOW





FREE DIGITAL AUDIO WORKSTATIONS



For Wave editing and sample chopping you can download Audacity. Back in the day I used a similar piece of premium software called Sound-Forge which I would use to convert samples and add effects and so on which would end up back in Cakewalk. Audacity is great also for taking samples and speech snippets or whatever you like from You-Tube and recording them as a wave and importing the sample into Ableton. This is ideal if you like sampling and cutting up loops. Its free and quick to use. Also you can record your DJ sets into it or your podcast. It really is a good piece of audio editing software.



CLICK THE IMAGE ABOVE FOR AUDACITY SOFTWARE LINK

To test out a really good free DAW I would recommend Tracktion. It carries no limitations and you can use VST plug ins and all of the effects and features that come with any other premium DAW. So you get included a whole list of things that are all marked out in the link below. It is very easy to use and does not require a great deal of practice to get your productions in full swing, It also won the freeware award of the year with Computer Music magazine, which says it all. Well wroth trying out if you cant afford to spend hundreds on premium software.





CLICK THE IMAGE ABOVE FOR THE TRAKTION WEBSITE



PRODUCE 5 DISCO HOUSE GENRES FOR ONLY £10 CLICK BELOW

















If you struggle for a budget on software then you can try one of the following free Daw which for a beginner is an ideal place to start without the need to spend a great deal of cash on software that you might not like. Here are a couple that come highly recommended.For Wave editing and sample chopping you can download Audacity. Back in the day I used a similar piece of premium software called Sound-Forge which I would use to convert samples and add effects and so on which would end up back in Cakewalk. Audacity is great also for taking samples and speech snippets or whatever you like from You-Tube and recording them as a wave and importing the sample into Ableton. This is ideal if you like sampling and cutting up loops. Its free and quick to use. Also you can record your DJ sets into it or your podcast. It really is a good piece of audio editing software.To test out a really good free DAW I would recommend Tracktion. It carries no limitations and you can use VST plug ins and all of the effects and features that come with any other premium DAW. So you get included a whole list of things that are all marked out in the link below. It is very easy to use and does not require a great deal of practice to get your productions in full swing, It also won the freeware award of the year with Computer Music magazine, which says it all. Well wroth trying out if you cant afford to spend hundreds on premium software.















Ableton Lite By far the easiest and cheapest entry way into the Ableton world. You can grab a copy of this for around £86 as opposed to the full version which is around £600.This version gives you a limited but quite a good starting point to learn the ropes of the many different techniques you can learn. The great thing about Ableton is you can perform live as a solo performer or as part of a band. You can DJ with it and you can arrange tracks in here for production in the arrangement view.Check the link here or click the image to find out more about the lite version of Ableton.







