Spend $50, get $25 OFF — applied automatically.
Skip to Content Skip to Navigation Skip to Footer
Start freeJoin
Join Membership
Season 2 ·

S2E30 – Beatmakers Aren’t Musicians

0:00 / 0:00
This media could not be played.

Resources

PAID RESOURCES MENTIONED:

FREE RESOURCES MENTIONED:

Never Miss an Episode

Get new podcast episodes delivered to your inbox.

Home/Podcast/S2E30 – Beatmakers Aren’t Musicians

This episode may be a reality check to a lot of cocky producers, but the reality is.. most beatmakers ARE NOT musicians, and can barely play an instrument.

That does not mean they are not good beatmakers, however.

A musician is incredibly talented, and practices their instrument for hours a day, perfecting timing and loudness (velocity) of each note played.. (this is not an easy task).

A beatmaker takes on MANY ROLES that a musician does not.. such as actually making the beat, arrangement, mixing, mastering, and sound design.. and learning about many different aspects of the whole production process.

Listen close in this episode to understand the difference between beatmakers and musicians, and hear my piano beat and live piano playing example..

Contact me if you have questions, join the membership to watch all my FL Studio courses, or visit the shop to view all the various products mentioned in this episode!

BEAT TAPES By GratuiTous Beatmaking Drum Loops FL Studio Piano

Community

Questions about this episode

Transcript

S2E30 – Beatmakers Aren’t Musicians

  1. Season two, episode 30. Beatmakers aren't musicians.
  2. Now, this episode is going to maybe bring a little bit of controversy, but honestly,
  3. I think beatmakers need to have a little bit of a wake-up call because beatmakers
  4. are not musicians. Now, some beatmakers can be a musician, right?
  5. And when we say the word musician, we're talking about somebody who's very skilled
  6. at playing their instrument. Whether that is the piano, guitar, whatever instrument,
  7. right? If we look at a classical piano player, they are so good at what they
  8. do. And as a beatmaker, we just kind of break it down really simple,
  9. and we are really focused on catchy melodies, and I want to break all that down in
  10. this episode. It's gonna be really eye-opening for you, and also allow you to still
  11. respect the classical piano players, okay?
  12. Because whenever I speak, I'm never trying to make myself sound like I'm some
  13. professional piano player. I've come a long way.
  14. My piano skills have tremendously improved over the years of first getting into
  15. music production. Again, you can check out my piano lessons for producers course
  16. that's helped out a lot of you guys to learn the piano.
  17. But I want to talk about a couple things before we get into about that beatmakers
  18. are not musicians, okay? So the first one is a new hands-on FL Studio mixing course,
  19. it's coming soon, and what it's going to teach you is hands-on mixing with a MIDI
  20. keyboard in FL Studio based off of Fab Filter plugins.
  21. I always tell you guys it's really, really wise to get some good mixing plugins.
  22. You do not need millions of plugins, and I think Fab Filter is having their 25%
  23. sale on right now. They only run that once in a while, so make sure to visit the Fab
  24. Filter website. I will also leave in the show notes my article on what fab filter
  25. plugins to buy if you use FL Studio.
  26. I purchased Fab Filter plugins so many.y years ago, and I can't tell you guys how
  27. happ I have been I use them on a daily basis, whether I am beat making with mixing
  28. and mastering or even doing this podcast where I'm editing my voice, or if I do
  29. videos or courses, I am always using Fab Filter plugins.
  30. So for me, I really got my money's worth out of them.
  31. But I'm telling you, they're expensive, but the workflow is phenomenal.
  32. And this new hands on mixing course in FL Studio is based off of the Fab Filter
  33. plugins. I'm gonna teach you some things with some stock plugins because the
  34. information translates, but the workflow that you're gonna learn is just really
  35. really nice with Fab Filter in FL Studio.
  36. You get hands on, you can turn the plugin off and on to kind of do like an A and B
  37. comparison. this works for the Pro C2, which is a single band compressor, it works
  38. for the Pro Q3, which is a really powerful EQ.
  39. I was even able to get to create different bands off of the MIDI keyboards.
  40. So essentially, like you can really get a really hands-on workflow.
  41. Stay tuned. That one's releasing this Friday.
  42. I'll also say that the five golden pillars of music production course, which was
  43. released, I believe last week.
  44. There, it's already got tons of great great reviews from members.
  45. All right, so that's that's awesome.
  46. And one thing I also want to say is I don't think many people understand that this
  47. podcast is mainly for members of my platform where I kind of keep them updated on
  48. what's going on and I answer many of their questions.
  49. You know, when I get emails from you guys, this podcast is going to help you learn
  50. faster. Okay. So there's over there will be 30 courses this Friday when I release
  51. this hands-on course, but there's tons of stuff in there for you guys to learn
  52. everything from beginning to more intermediate to more advanced, and the courses are
  53. continuing to be created, which is awesome.
  54. And always feel free to reach out to me if you have questions.
  55. is This is what the podcast for.
  56. Okay, so let's get into this episode about beat makers are not musicians.
  57. Okay, so let's talk about a musician.
  58. Okay, so a musician is a very, very skilled person who plays an instrument, whether
  59. that's a piano, guitar, whatever, they're extremely skilled.
  60. And now, what do they practice, right?
  61. They are practicing timing as well as like loudness of notes, right?
  62. If you look at like a classical piano player, when they are playing the piano, not
  63. only is their timing like near perfect, they are also practicing how loud they
  64. are hitting their notes. And I'm telling you, if you go to play the piano, and if
  65. you're playing with the right hand and the left hand, in order to train yourself on
  66. the left hand to play notes quieter and the right hand louder, like that just
  67. stretches your mind, and you have to practice so much to be able to do that.
  68. And as a beat maker, we can just use like MIDI and velocity, all right.
  69. Also, these musicians, right? They have super strong like forearms and fingers and
  70. wrists from practicing so much.
  71. Okay, so if a beat maker thinks that they're like a super good musician or whatever,
  72. like typically they are not now.
  73. A beat maker can be a musician if they are very skilled, and you know, they always
  74. they are always practicing their instrument, but typically they're not, right?
  75. Most of the time when you see people making beats on YouTube, like you check out
  76. like their MIDI notes or whatever, and they're pretty basic, right?
  77. but so what I'm trying to say is a musician is a highly respected person, they are
  78. very skilled, and we as beatmakers don't be calling yourself a musician, you're a
  79. beatmaker. Now let's talk about you know what what is a beatmaker do then?
  80. What's really like the difference with a musician to a beatmaker, okay?
  81. So, as a beatmaker, we are training our ears to know what is a catchy melody.
  82. All right, when we are programming all our different melodies, we need to know
  83. what's catchy. That is the biggest trait of a beatmaker, okay.
  84. We don't have to focus on perfect timing because we know that if we can get
  85. something pretty close, we can modify it super easily with MIDI.
  86. Okay. I always tell you guys about MIDI.
  87. If you guys check out my safe spots drum loop training curriculum, I have a book on
  88. this, it's on Amazon or on my website.
  89. I have a course, and then also you guys can get the drum bundle trio sounds.
  90. you guys will all learn about the organic tools, which are free inside of any music
  91. program, and that's to do with MIDI, like velocity, panning, layering, note nudging.
  92. When you can learn these things, you have to train your ear for what is catchy, and
  93. then you can easily go and modify it with MIDI.
  94. And when you can teach yourself that, so first of all, you have the ear now, you
  95. know it's catchy. Then you can then you can think to yourself, I can make this work.
  96. So, to recap there, so again, we have trained ears to make powerful melodies.
  97. Now, another thing with a beat maker is like we kind of take on the role of like a
  98. conductor and a composer, where we are like arranging like the whole song.
  99. We have to know how to use our various different instruments, right?
  100. Like, so for me, I like to use a rompler.
  101. I will also leave a link in the show notes.
  102. It's a free video. You can watch my video about why we should be using romplers when
  103. we're beatmakers, especially when you're first starting up, because it's really,
  104. really easy. You can learn the sound design, you can do that stuff, but it pulls you
  105. away from learning how to make power.ful melodies and being able to flow fast
  106. A rompler is really powerful because you don't only have like pianos, but you have
  107. like various types of pianos and various types of guitars and orchestra sounds or
  108. synth sounds and pads and bass.
  109. Essentially, you just click a sound, you can keep making your beat.
  110. It's and there's super high quality sounds.
  111. For me personally, I do like Nexus.
  112. Flex is pretty powerful, but recently I have found it's a little bit CPU hungry.
  113. I also find a little bit with Flex that many times their presets are a little
  114. overprocessed, so sometimes I have to kind of dial them back a little bit.
  115. But I personally really learned beat making off of Nexus.
  116. And again, you just select high quality sounds, and then you can start teaching
  117. yourself how to program catchy melodies because that is the skill that you're
  118. wanting. Now, again, as a beatmaker, after we program our melodies, then we want to
  119. know how to use our different effects and plugins for a unique sound.
  120. And so, again, that's kind of like the differences between a musician to a
  121. beatmaker. You, as the beatmaker, if you can play your piano half
  122. decent, that's where you want to be.
  123. Because then when you play something, you can get it into your music program, you
  124. can edit it with your MIDI notes.
  125. Okay. Okay, so let's talk about a little bit of a piano example I have for you.
  126. So I have two examples. All right, I have one example where I have actually
  127. programmed these MIDI notes, like in FL Studio as if I was gonna make a loop.
  128. What I'll do is I'll play the piano loop, then I'll play it with a drum loop, and
  129. then I'll play it in context of the actual chorus of the song.
  130. I actually initially played this on a real piano.
  131. Then I came downstairs into the studio and I actually made kind of like the beat off
  132. of that. But then what I want to show you is there was another one that I just
  133. recorded recently, so I always like to play on a real piano.
  134. the And I just recorded it on my tablet just so that I didn't forget melody because
  135. I haven't had time to actually record this into FL Studio.
  136. So what I'm saying is you guys are gonna listen to one melody which has been
  137. programmed. It's kind of like all done.
  138. It sounds pretty good. It's actually a really catchy piano melody.
  139. And then I'll play you like a real piano, okay, where you can hear my timing isn't
  140. perfect, and that's fine because I know within my mind, I can go into FL Studio, I
  141. can get it into my music program, and then I can edit it later.
  142. Okay. So let's first start with the piano MIDI loop I
  143. programmed.
  144. Now I'm gonna play that piano loop with the drum loop of that
  145. song.
  146. And now here is the piano with the drum loop in context of the chorus of the song.
  147. Remember, as a beatmaker, we are learning for you know how to create catchy
  148. melodies, and in order to do that, we gotta know a key and a scale.
  149. And when you're listening to this, all these notes are were within the same key and
  150. scale, and now it's just a powerful production, all based off that original piano
  151. loop, which I originally played on the piano.
  152. I came to FL Studio, programmed the notes.
  153. You know, I had to fine-tune them, built the drum loop, built the other melodies,
  154. and here is the full song with the
  155. chorus.
  156. Hey, listen to me.. Yeah, listen to me
  157. Can't you see the science of the times?
  158. Wouldn't it be nice to hit rewind?
  159. Okay, so now here is the real piano example that I was playing.
  160. So usually, like I said, like almost every single day, I go into the real piano and
  161. I play. Just because I don't make videos of myself doing different things or
  162. whatever, doesn't mean that I'm not always busy doing some time, you know, something
  163. regarding music, all right. Again, if you guys reach out to me, if you send me an
  164. email, you guys know that I am responding fast to you guys.
  165. You know, I'm always in the background working to teach about beat making education,
  166. but I always try to practice almost every day on a piano, and if I have my tablet
  167. there, because this is a really good way to practice.
  168. I'm this is gonna be taught to you guys here very soon.
  169. Is I always like to play the piano over like a drum loop.
  170. So, for example, upstairs where I play on the real piano, I can plug in my tablet,
  171. which I have a long drum loop, it's about 10 minutes long.
  172. There's no melodies, it's just a drum loop.
  173. Okay, such a powerful way to practice the piano because you're playing over a real
  174. drum loop, all right. But this time I didn't have time to go to FL Studio and record
  175. these notes. So I actually just recorded through the tablet's microphone itself, so
  176. the audio recording isn't the best, but you will hear I made mistakes, and I just
  177. want to share with you that here's a real piano example that I recorded.
  178. I knew that this is a catchy melody that because I again I didn't have time to go
  179. make it into a beat in FL Studio, so I recorded it to remember it.
  180. Okay, so here is the piano
  181. piece.
  182. All right, so the moral of the story, beatmakers need to know how to create catchy
  183. beats. And we as beatmakers, we actually play a lot of roles, right?
  184. We play the beatmaker, we play the arranger, and essentially arrangement I call like
  185. audio painting. If you want to learn more, you guys can check out my book on Amazon.
  186. Type in audio painting, Riley Weller, and you will find it there.
  187. Or again, it's all on my website too, right?
  188. If you visit my website, there's special pricing to like my my book bundle where you
  189. can get my audio painting book, my SafeSpot's book, my FL Studio Beginners book.
  190. But again, we as beat makers, we we do play a lot of different roles.
  191. So again, the beat making, the arrangement, the mixing, the mastering, the sound
  192. design. Okay, and if we can learn the piano half decent, we can then edit the
  193. mistakes in our mini notes to get the exact sound we're going for.
  194. From there, the sky is the limit in terms of sound selection, the notes played,
  195. right? If you want to adjust the length of the note, whatever you have total
  196. flexibility as the beat maker.
  197. We do not need to know how to play our instruments like perfect, because that is a
  198. musician. Musicians, they try to practice for perfection because they actually have
  199. to go and you know either perform publicly or they have to record through a
  200. microphone, which is super hard to do.
  201. We as beat makers, we get the highest quality sounds.
  202. Our drum samples are typically really high quality, our virtual instruments are the
  203. utmost highest quality, right?
  204. You know, we don't have to suffer from you know room reflections or anything like
  205. that. Like we as beatmakers, we have it so good that way.
  206. All right, so closing out here.
  207. So again, really what I'm trying to get across to you is that a beatmaker is much
  208. different than a musician. A musician is an incredibly talented on their
  209. instrument, they are strive for perfection when it comes to timing, and they are
  210. very, very good at what they do.
  211. A beatmaker has to play a lot of different roles, but typically most beat
  212. makers are not even close to the skill level of a musician.
  213. Now, if you went to that musician and you put them into the studio and you said,
  214. Okay, here's FL Studio, I want you to make a huge powerful beat.
  215. That musician would probably struggle to make a powerful beat.
  216. All right. So a beatmaker has their own skills, a musician has their own skills, but
  217. the musician, they spend hours perfecting that instrument.
  218. Okay. If you want to learn the piano, okay, my course is called Piano Lessons for
  219. Producers. Just visit it'sgratuitous.com, visit my shop, and you will find my piano
  220. course there. But if you are a member, you get to watch all the courses.
  221. So, for example, this piano course, the safe spots course, which is all about drum
  222. loops. If you're brand new, you can start with my beginners course.
  223. You can go back an episode or two where I talk to you about the course pathways.
  224. It's my curriculum where you can watch each course in order and it teaches you how
  225. to get started for the best learning experience.
  226. Members of the platform within three months have seen pretty good results.
  227. Okay, so if you stick with it, if you're really interested, again, this podcast is
  228. mainly for members of my platform to keep them updated.
  229. So if you are interested in joining, just visit it'sgratuitous.com.
  230. If you sign up to my email list, you will get special pricing.
  231. I have a new course again coming out.
  232. It's the new hands-on mixing course in FL Studio.
  233. It's all teaching you how to get hands-on mixing in FL Studio off of your MIDI
  234. keyboard based off of Fab Filter plugins, because that's what I highly suggest to
  235. members of my platform. See the thing is FL Studio gives you the amazing beatmaking
  236. workflow. Fab filter gives you the amazing mixing and mastering.
  237. You're actually able to access everything regarding your audio, like the mid, the
  238. side, you can even EQ the left speaker different than the right speaker.
  239. These plugins are absolutely phenomenal.
  240. Okay, I understand there's a lot of marketing out there in this industry, but I tell
  241. you guys, it's all about selecting wise plugins as a music producer.
  242. If you use FL Studio, you want to get a couple high-quality virtual instruments to
  243. play your melodies. You want to make sure you have high quality drum samples, and
  244. then you want to have high quality mixing and mastering plugins.
  245. You do not need to have tons of everything because you will not learn it in time.
  246. There's too much to learn if you are trying to get every single plugin.
  247. So I just want to recap. So my recommendation to you is if you get FL
  248. Studio, all right, and I'll I will leave a link in there about what version of FL
  249. Studio to buy. The next step is to look at some virtual instruments.
  250. Now, I do suggest a rompler because it's just so easy as a beat maker.
  251. You don't have to learn sound design, you can just select your sounds and start
  252. learning to create catchy melodies.
  253. That's the number one thing that beat makers have to learn is catchy melodies.
  254. Okay, so I will leave two links regarding that.
  255. You will have what is a rompler link as well as my favorite virtual instruments..
  256. Virtual instruments allow us to play our melodies off of our MIDI keyboard
  257. Also, it is important to have a good MIDI keyboard for a good workflow.
  258. I personally am using the Oxygen Pro by M Audio.
  259. I have an in-depth review. I will leave that there for you.
  260. Okay. again, Fab Filter, I believe is having that 25% off sale.
  261. So don't miss that. If you are interested, I will leave that link regarding my
  262. favorite fab filter plugins to buy.
  263. And I will leave another link.
  264. This is a super special video.
  265. And if you really, really want to learn and if you really want to take my advice,
  266. it's about selecting wise plugins as a music producer.
  267. So if you visit my website, this is season two, episode 30.
  268. If you click that podcast article, you will see the resources, everything that I've
  269. listed in here. Watch through all of this stuff, and I promise you, you will
  270. understand what it takes to see results.
  271. At the end of the day, you will save money because you won't get stuck into what I
  272. call gearlust. All right, it's so easy to fall into the trap thinking that you need
  273. all these things. FL Studios phenomenal, right?
  274. For the beat making, yes, you need some virtual instruments for the one-shot drum
  275. samples. I will just mention that mainly in my courses, I use the exclusive audio
  276. drum bundle trio. You guys can get special pricing on my website.
  277. I know Xavier from exclusive audio quite well.
  278. I met him many many years ago.
  279. He is an extremely good sound designer.
  280. Be careful with all the marketing out there, like you know, when you get advertised
  281. to these people are super good at advertising.
  282. They're good at getting their product in front of your eyes.
  283. Around here, I just try to keep things super simple.
  284. You know that I provide super high quality education, you know, high-quality
  285. products. If you're not happy, right, you guys can always just send me an email.
  286. you're not happy I'll refund you if..
  287. But that is super rare on my platform
  288. Everybody has been having a great experience.
  289. I'm super grateful for you know everyone who has joined the platform who has helped
  290. me to grow. And you know, I'm just here to help you guys, okay?
  291. So again, check the show notes.
  292. that previous five golden pillars of music production course, it received great
  293. reviews. This new hands on mixing course is dropping this Friday, which is super
  294. exciting. Okay, so thanks for listening.
  295. Stay tuned for the next episode.
  296. And if you guys want to download some of my free resources to join onto the email
  297. list, you guys can go to it's gratuitous.com forward slash resources.
  298. There's some free beat making books and some sounds on there, and I'll talk to you
  299. guys in the next
  300. episode.
GratuiTous Radio Start free Join Membership 0:00/0:00