I am 19 and have played piano since a young age and can play well,
I also play a lot by ear and have been said to have a great talent in doing so.
(I don’t want to come across as bragging but it makes my inability to be creative while producing that more frustrating. Just wanted to emphasise the point).
I never really worked on DAW’s up until last summer where I worked as an intern at a music advertising company (during my gap year). In those couple of months I learned how to use Logic and how all the plugins worked around. I was hooked. I used money from my savings to buy Logic Pro X and some plugins and began producing music in my spare time. I progressed well and made some basic enough EDM and some piano themed tracks. It didn’t sound all that amazing but I knew it was a learning process. Once I finished that internship and started working at a bank for a second internship my interest began to cool a little bit. This was due to a combination of having hardly any free time at this new internship and the fact that I no longer worked in a studio with a amazing set of plug ins to jam with in my spare time at work. (such as a pretty much full Kontakt library with strings and all, massive serum etc.).
I then went off to University last September brought a small midi controller I had along with my Laptop. I produced every now and then at the beginning but never really got going. Always ended up playing piano on the controller instead of producing. Then the midi keyboard starting making my wrists hurt when playing complex piano pieces, so I put it away to stop it from tempting me.
Im now really wanting to start producing again, listening to Djawadi’s work on Westworld made me want to start experimenting with classical and film music type pieces, while I still would like to produce melodic electronica like flume or disclosure.
I just don’t really know where to start in terms of composing. I still have serum from last year but really struggle to use it as an instrument. I don’t know all that much about how synths work. I often just end up sitting in front of the empty Window screen on logic and don’t know where to start, thats why I always used to resort to just playing piano on the midi keyboard back at the beginning of uni.
I realise I have amazing technology (Logic+ Serum+ Alicia’s Keys + Splice) at my disposal and have been a musician all my life, but I just can’t get any good ideas. I tried copying other songs to get a hang of logic and it somewhat worked, but every time I try to compose something it ends up sounding like shit edm/techno or a cheap ripoff of ludovico einaudi.
Its really frustrating me, I don’t even know if I want to make techno music, I don’t mind listening to it in clubs but it doesn’t really seem like the music i would enjoy making.
Anything you guys could suggest to kickstart my producing again and get me motivated. I loved the feeling last year of working on a track and gradually improving it. I just can’t get started now.
Sorry if this is a bit of a long post but it really means a lot to me
Submitted March 04, 2017 at 09:22PM by hsvarsenal https://www.reddit.com/r/edmproduction/comments/5xk3ig/cry_for_help_from_a_19_year_old_musician/?utm_source=ifttt