Songwriting

[Dan Keaton]

Much to my amazement, I recently wrote a Rock and Roll song. So far, I have just wrote the lyrics.

Now, I wish to write the music.

I intend on using sampled sounds of different instruments in order to build the melody.

I am currently thinking of purchasing Sony Acid 6 Pro, and the appropriate content, also from Sony.

Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

[Jon Fairhurst]

ACID's a great place to start. Loops are really easy to use, and they're generally professionally recorded, so they sound great.

Here's one tip: if you will record yourself singing, first go into the preferences and tell the app to record things as "one shot" rather than "beat mapped". One shot just means that you will be recorded straight - just like on any other multi-track recorder. Beat mapping is specifically for making loops and can make your recordings sound warbled when you render.

The problem with loops is that you can't make the guitar play a specific melody, get a specific bassline, or get the drum fill to go ba-da-da-dump da-da-da-bump. It's more like building things out of Legos. They all snap together nicely, but if you don't have a windshield in your kit, it's hard to build a finished car.

ACID now includes a small sample player and MIDI with a few built-in samples. With these you can literally design your own melodies. For even more power look into the GVI sampler from Tascam, or Kontakt from Native Instruments.

Most serious MIDI composers use Sonar or Cubase as their MIDI sequencer, rather than ACID. ACID 6 is getting better at MIDI, but is still not the tool of choice. It does loops better than anything else on the market though.

The bottom line is that there are three techniques for making music: recording audio, playing loops and playing back samples controlled by MIDI. ACID lets you use all three techniques. It also lets you add effects, mix and master.

Have fun!

[Dan Keaton]

Dear Jon,

Thanks for the advice.

Creating a song melody is a new endeavor for me, as was writing the lyrics!

Bundled with Sony Acid Pro 6 is:

KOMPAKT Sony ACID Pro Edition
ACID Pro 6 software includes a custom edition of Native Instruments KOMPAKT. This full-featured VSTi sample playback engine comes bundled with over 120 instruments—all the basics, plus many fresh and versatile instruments that showcase the vast sound design capabilities of Native Instruments finest tools. You can also use this custom edition to create and save your own instruments, and load instruments in several popular and legacy formats.

[Dan Keaton]

Dear Jon,

My plan is to have a friend, who happens to be a world class singer, to record the lyrics (into a Sound Devices 744t)

Then I will import these lyrics into Acid Pro and attempt to build a melody around the words.

Then I will have my friend sing the song again to the melody that I will have created.

Since I have never done this before, I may have this all wrong. But it appears that this would allow me to build the song the way I want it.