I have no skills at all period. I'm pretty much a worhtless leech on society

Now use different instruments and add a lead melody on top. Could work as synthwave with the right choice of instrumentation. It's mostly just presets, very easy.

I'd abandon the second one. Also, you don't need to use that many notes at once. There's a lot of dissonance that doesn't sound intentional or good. You should also vary the velocity. Less note velocity is often more powerful. Leave the top velocity notes for special emphesis in rare situations.

wow, thank you man, that's great advice. Appreciate it

also my sage doesn't imply sarcasm, it's just I've already gotten more than my fair share of attention thus the thread doesn't need to be bumped anymore, thanks again for everyone who replied/replies

Meh, better than pony, BBC and furry porn.

What DAW/sequencer are you using?

ableton live. Also is there anything different to consider (from your advice) if I don't ever plan to delve into electronic/synthesizer sound and want to mess around with orchestral samples instead?

It doesn't matter if it's synthetic or samples. The important thing for your purposes as a beginner, in my opinion, is an easy to use and very graphical piano roll that makes it unproblematic to move or alter the properties of each note, scale the X and Y axis, etc. I recommend FL Studio for that. It comes with free updates for life, and they got the GUI right, unlike Ableton.

You're gonna want sample libraries for orchestral music. The realistic ones can get quite expensive, so you might wanna start with some older ones. In my opinion, EastWest has the best orchestral libraries. The EWQL Hollywood Orchestra collection is very expensive and CPU-heavy, and requires a lot of fine tuning.

For you, I recommend EWQL Symphonic Orchestra in FL Studio. That will be the most direct and the least bloated approach to drawing melodies on a timeline.

Does it matter if I pirate samples when I don't actually sell anything? Could I still get sued if I semi-anonymously upload some mp3 on the internet with usage of unauthorized samples (although I can fathom how someone could figure out whether they were legally obtained or not)?

...

They probably won't notice. Their business module is based on the need for a physical dongle called an iLok, which can be emulated. Go for it, but you should buy it for a more stable version if you start getting used to it. There are other libraries that can be pirated easily, I think the Vienna library is one of them.

got it. Thanks for the input.

Happy to help. Post on >>>/musicprod/ if you get deeper into it, I'm the BO. It's pretty dead at the moment, though.

It's a very fun hobby, and you clearly have an instinctive grasp on harmony and progression.

damn that's nice. I'm definitely going to check it out, hopefully I won't just keep only browsing Holla Forums and Holla Forums like always, I already have a million favourites that I never actually visit. But one thing is pretty clear, I have no excuse to just post on Holla Forums again should I have another music related question, so thanks man

So I'm guessing you are this guy? soundcloud.com/audiopolis

The first one is a good tune.

Consider putting some bass and drums on it and filling it out. I thought of something like link-related – make it into a danceable track, ya know?

m.youtube.com/watch?v=QVwr7g5leHg

Here's the imbed in case you're a lazy fucker

Damn nice song and artist, I mostly see what you mean
Thanks! Yes I'll try to follow your suggestion as best I can, I guess till I'm actually ready to make something credible I'll need at least a few more years worth of experience. So this is welcome practice, I appreciate the suggestion.

in case anyone is still lurking here, wouldn't you say the first may have a slight resemblance to webm related? Or is it JUST the rhythm that's… clearly copied

Slight resemblance, sure. Right around 2:44, you used a different sound, and personally, I would fish around for sounds other than the piano for the whole track.

Again, you could definitely make these into some killer dance tunes.

Yep, that's me.

fuck you make amazing shit. Truly excellent, does that mean you're hired/do music professionally for money and various projects?

I absolutely now understand the dance thing, at first I wasn't really aware but it's so blatantly obvious to me now, I don't think this harmony could be for anything BUT dance

Glad you see the dancey possibilities now

Listen to this track at around 2:40, and it will become even clearer.

Why are you concerned about your value to society?
Be of value to your self, why are you concerned about normalfags?
You are not worthless mate.
Love yourself no matter how unskilled you are.

thank you. Yes it is clear as day, sadly I lack the knowledge in music theory to accurately describe this somewhat "phenomenon"
Dope as hell songs as well, appreciate all the input from you guys, thanks again

That's highly positive for Holla Forums, but I'll have no shame taking it, so … thanks for the kind words

Thanks, man, that means a lot. I have been hired for a few small projects before, for pocket change, but I'm getting a university degree in programming and computer systems that will get me much more money for much less work than composing for people's projects ever would. I'm doing it for the joy of having created an experience that I can be proud of, and if someone else enjoys it as well, it's even more satisfying.

No problem

Now, assuming you already have a midi controller, get yourself a few synth/drum machine programs and get crackin.

That's really noble, and imo the right attitude. Hope everything works out mate, truly marvelous audio production skills… however much that may mean to you coming from someone who knows very poorly of the intricacies of any and all music

Dude, you are talented, what's that bullshit about being worthless?

7/10 would jam with

wow.. thanks
but in all honesty, I know the OP was obnoxiously self-pitying cancer, it was a mistake and I would change it if I could. I suppose it was also kind of intended to be "semi-ironic"(forgive me), I'm not depressed at all actually, I guess I didn't think it could come over as something serious.
Back to your post, I sadly can't even play an instrument, I can strum some chords on the guitar if I'm given enough time to adjust my fingering and that's it, welp

We should be supportive to each other, no use to be edgy and tell him to kill himself, Holla Forumstards should support each other and be edgy towards normalfags.

Nigggaaaa, You gotta make some music that's a little more complex. or at least feeling invoking. try something besides just piano lines. and work on it for long enough to consider it perfect so long as you're playing around with computer generated sounds.

yes, that makes sense. I mean of course I'll try to do something more complex, I just hope I'll actually, eventually get the hang of it. Sadly I can't ever make pieces/clips of music that are longer than 1 minutes yet at the same time coherent (doesn't dramatically change harmony from sad to happy for instance) and not too repetitive, so that's just too difficult for me to do. It'll have to come naturally. I mean it's not like I'll "release" a song any day now, I just wanted premature feedback because otherwise I myself am the only damn person who actually hears this audio, and for any training to actually take place I need criticism or just general acknowledgement of what I'm trying to do from other people

best advice i can give you is, Don't give a fuck what the public thinks, and just make what you think is good.

if you really think so.. okay thanks. I mean perhaps I'm kind of an insecure faggot who drives the significance of this "acknowledgement from other people" into ridiculousness. Whatever the case, really thanks for the advice and input mate, do really appreciate

Which genres/artists do you normally listen to, and what kind of music would you ideally want to make?

damn you really don't let the thread die.. I'm not complaining though, I definitely appreciate all the attention
Ideally, although none of what I currently "experiment" with fits the genre, I'd like to do some generic fantasy RPG music, all orchestral, or mostly orchestral at least. I listen mostly to video game soundtracks, otherwise some rock bands.. eh wolfmother maybe? I don't make an effort to listen to an artists discography, so artists vary wildly.
But damn I've listen to world of warcraft tracks a million times, mostly the main themes (medleys?) though, best of everything packed into a single track

embed related are things I'm particularly fond of. I just love it

I'm asking so I can recommend a starting place. Because this is very detail-heavy music, you need quite a bit of experience with orchestral instruments in order to pull that off.

Try finding some free but realistic, simple string ensemble VST and make a very slow, gentle (low velocity) harmony progression that's moving without any melody, then try adding arpeggios on top and go from there. Just talking from experience; it's best to start where you can succeed, and make something simple, yet evocative. Disregard the limitations of a real orchestra in the beginning. For example, it doesn't really matter if the violas are really violas, or just violins playing supporting notes, or if the horns are in the wrong side of the stereo image.

You should start focusing on harmonic progressions that sound good when looped. Let the melody on top be separate from that repeating progression, by being loopable at, say, four times the duration. Before the melody loops, the progression has looped four times. The second time around, the melody could be played slightly differently, by a different instruments, and you might let the basses play one octave down, things like that. I have a feeling you'll quickly find out where to take it from there.

Here's your sage, lol.

alright. It's just a pity I know so little about how real orchestras or just orchestral instruments work, but don't have much desire to research them thoroughly either. Well, can't have it both ways
Wow, thanks for all this advice. I don't deserve any of that, but I appreciate it very, very much. I'm going to screencap the thread just for all the tips, thank you again, truly

just one more thing. what do you think of this example piece of music from final fantasy 12? I converted it to piano only and I think it sounds just as good - if not better - than the orchestral sample version (no real orchestra was used), of course velocity data is heavily used, but aside from that, I'd say songs can be pretty solid purely from melody and harmony alone, without regard to choice of instruments octaves, ranges, and so on. That some pieces don't at all need intricacies of a real instrument or excellent audio production

ah, forgot the webm

actually I may not even be making a lot of sense here… ehh I think I just wanted to show some music I liked or something shit I don't know

Composers have been composing for the piano and its related instruments for a few centuries now, so sure, but now imagine that webm with some concert hall reverb, maybe some playful woodwinds and legato strings to accompany it. That's not very hard to do, unlike full, symphony orchestral productions. Google how to add some basic reverb in Ableton Live, maybe. Reverb will make even such a basic piano sound pretty realistic.