Modes and Key Signatures have a variety of different characteristics and are great for outside-the-box songwriting. Here’s a cheat sheet to remember them!
Tag: theory for producers
Articles about our Theory for Producers courses and on music theory for electronic musicians, generally.
Why Producers Need to Learn to Analyze Common Pop Song Structures
As a producer, it’s essential to have a knack for songwriting structures and forms so your music doesn’t feel aimless.
The Importance of Theme and Variation in Hip-Hop Beat Making
With a minimalist music style such as hip-hop, the slightest change or variation on an established musical theme can have a deep impact. Here’s how.
Exploring Tonal Hierarchies in Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance with Somebody”
In his ongoing attempts to seek out the answers to why we like the music we like, Hunter Farris has uncovered a melodic hierarchy via Whitney Houston.
How I Combined Sample Pack Sounds and Live Instruments for My Latest Challenge
Some thoughts on producing tracks with sample pack sounds as well as letting collaborators steer the production ship and open up new possibilities.
Practical Approaches to Writing Lyrics (for Producers, Mainly)
For electronic home producers, writing lyrics doesn’t always come easy. Here are a few tried-and-true strategies culled from our newest online course.
Our 10 Favorite Rap Beats of 2018 and Why We Still Love Them
We count down and break down our ten favorite hip-hop beats of 2018 to find out what’s going on inside them and why they’re still so good.
2019’s Oscar Nominated Film Scores Loved Their Chords
And the winner is…. Chords! This year’s Oscar nominees for Best Score put a ton of stock into creating lush chord textures over other attributes.
Learn Diatonic Harmony from a Classic Breakbeat
A particularly perfect music theory lesson happens to exist completely intact inside this classic breakbeat from funk/soul history.
How Imagine Dragons Writes Such Memorable Melodies
Imagine Dragons’ “Demons” plays with our sense of memory about how the melody is supposed to play out each time. How does this work?