How many tracks should i have on my cd?

[tone_aot]

Hi everyone. I'm about to put together an instrumental cd with various different types of styles of music. I was wondering, since it's an instrumental cd, how many tracks would be a good number but not be more or less that should be? Not sure if this is the right section to post in so don't grill me!

[Nightfire]

Depends what kind of music, and how long each track is. If your music is very muc the same throughout, dont go overboard. I'd say 7-9. Best is if you can take the listener on a journey, treating the cd like writing a book. Decide on your introduction, your climax and the resolution. I usually like Cd's with 10-12 tracks the most.


Mike

[taeyoung]

Originally Posted by tone_aot

Hi everyone. I'm about to put together an instrumental cd with various different types of styles of music. I was wondering, since it's an instrumental cd, how many tracks would be a good number but not be more or less that should be? Not sure if this is the right section to post in so don't grill me!

Not sure if there really is a correct answer to this, but a lot of the people and bands I work with try to keep a minimum of 9 tracks to a full length CD. Of course, this depends on many factors.
1st) How long are the songs? If they are radio length, you want at least the minimum #, but preferably more. There are many CDs that have 15-17 tracks.

2nd) How much material do you have? There are some people that come up with tons and tons of songs in a short amount of time! If you are one of those people, find the best tracks and release a good number (over 10 at least!)

3rd) How does everything flow together? Does it sound like an album concept, or just a random set of songs thrown together? If there are different styles of songs you are trying to put out, decide whether you want it to be a cohesive sounding album or not. If not, then wait to release some of the very different songs til next time maybe.

Well, this is all very opinionated, but that's just some ideas.

[tone_aot]

Thanks for the responses! Very much appreciated! I can do all types of styles but the majority of the cd will be of a jazz nature. Not sure how long the tracks will be but they won't be overbearingly long. Depends on how long i jam and how much if it i like!! Of course i'm gonna get a few opinions on the final product before it is released i was just wondering how many tracks were on most instrumental cd's. On the other hand, i'm trying to make this one different from any other instru. cd. I'm halfway through 3 brand new tracks and it's coming along great!

[VomitHatSteve]

I would generally recommend that you shoot for a minimum length. When I buy a CD that's only half an hour long, I kind of feel like I was ripped off. 45 minutes seems pretty standard, but there are some great albums that get as long as an hour or more.

Of course, it's also important to make sure the songs flow together well and that you don't have a bunch of filler.