Vocalist who wants to make his own music.

[Nasty_Nate]

Hello! It's good to be here on the boards.

I am a 20 year old vocalist musician looking to make a CD. I want to make my own music.

Types of music that I will be making will be comparable to John Mayer, The Fray, Train, Alicia Keys, etc. if you get my type. Soulful, smooth singing over a piano/guitar with various other instruments.

I want to make all my tracks myself on a keyboard. Basically, I'm asking where do I go? All I really have to work with is a low end Yamaha PSR keyboard and very low end computer.

I want some type of studio setup to make my music here at home. All I can see is three options.

Option 1: Buy a newer, more powerful computer, download Reason/Fruity Loops or another software, use Yamaha as a midi, and make my music on the software. Record vocals over tracks at a studio.

Option 2: Just buy a keyboard with music making capabilities/sequencer and make music just using the keyboard. (The Korg M50 seems like a good idea for this option, but I would like more opinions.) Record vocals over tracks at a studio.

Option 3: Continue with option 1 and buy ALL the equipment needed to record my vocals at home, which would be tonza mula.


What should I do? One of these three, or is there a better option for me?

I want my music to have a sound of QUALITY over QUANTITY. I would much rather have a beautiful single track piano background behind my vocals than a ton of low quality BS going on. Catch my drift?

Thank you for reading and your reply.

 

[Chili]

Well, get ready to read... a lot!! Be sure to browse/search this site. Most of your questions have been answered in one form or another.

What are the specs on your computer?? You might be surprised to find it is adequate for the job. Audio doesn't require tons of processing power.

Getting good vocals doesn't have to be expensive. My go-to mic was $60 new. The interface I use often was $300 new and now on ebay for about $150.

Do you have/play any other instruments besides the keyboard? If you want music similar to the artists listed, you'll need guitars, keyboard patches just don't cut it.

Expect to spend money where you wouldn't first thought. Like your monitors and setting up a dedcated room for tracking and mixing. You need to think about acoustic treatment, which is not the same as "soundproofing" or sound isolation. It doesn't need to be expensive. Lots of discussion on this topic in the Studio Build forum.

If you're going to do everything by yourself, you can probably get by with a 2 channel interface. The USB types are common and fairly cheap. Lots of discussions on interfaces also in the newbies section (this one).

I would not recommend using a keyboard as a sequencer/ music maker. I know they're designed for it, but I think that's more for live work. I couldn't imagine trying to edit a song on something like that. You really want a computer based DAW. Most interfaces will ship with a Lite version of a popular DAW program, like Cubase, Ableton, etc. When shopping for interfaces, be sure to look at the software that comes with it.

Quality comes from experience and it's not something you're going to buy or plug in. to get the experience, you have to learn what to do first. Learn by reading everything you can, especially the forums. So much advice given out to get new guys started. It's all right here, just read and learn. Read then practice.

Look for some books, I always recommend Homerecording for Musicians for Dummies by Jeff Strong. A good guide to give you ideas of what you need to think about. Also the Tweak Guide.

http://www.tweakheadz.com/guide.htm Skip over what might not pertain to you.

Don't buy anything until you've done a lot of reading. Most people buy stuff because they think you need it to record, like a mixer, lol. Read and learn first, then you can make an intelligent decision on where to spend your money.

Good luck, have fun and welcome to the site.

 

[cadbawdbawks]

Buy a newer, more powerful computer, download Reason/Fruity Loops or another software, use Yamaha as a midi, and make my music on the software. Record vocals over tracks at a studio.

I don't recall DAW's like fruity loops, reason, cubase, logic, etc. having downloads available. You may need to consider the price of the DAW before even going ahead with all the gear...they usually cost at an upwards of $500.

Then again..you could use something free like Audacity..but I don't think you'll be too satisfied with that..

 

[kcearl]

well both Reaper and EnergyXT2.5 are $60 for fully fledged DAWs..

Id highly recommend Abelton Live...I got the Lite version free with an Axiom keyboard and liked it so much I now have the full version ..I only bought it as they had a deal with Sampler coming free or the Lite version would have been fine

They now have an Intro version for $99US...that's superb value


you can trial the full versions from here

http://www.ableton.com/downloads

inspiring software

 

[BrentDomann]

There used to be a free version of Sampletank that came with a nicely sampled piano. It also had usable B-3 and Rhodes sorts of sounds. If you get an interface where you can transfer MIDI to your computer, you can record the MIDI information and apply the patches later on.

 

[bozmillar]

It depends on how good you want it to sound. Every keyboard that makes "songs" sounds extremely cheezy. If you sing and don't play any instruments, that could work, but it will never sound good, but it could be a good way to at least a good way to get some stuff down so you can practice your singing and songwriting.

If you really want it to sound good though, you'll need real musicians playing real music. you can get away with fake drums if you get a good sample library, but fake guitars and bass and prescripted piano lines never sound good.

 

[Richard Monroe]

Yo Nate! Chili has given you one piece of critical advice. Do a ton of research before you spend a ton of money on stuff you don't need, which will use up the money for what you *do* need. Rather than specific advice, I'm going to give you some general advice:

First, you *can't* do this alone. You will need help. Why? Apparently, you are not a guitarist, you are a keyboard player. There is *no* sampler or midi based method that can allow a keyboard to substitute for a guitar. You will need a guitarist, and the technology to record guitars. This is simple in theory, but difficult to do in practice.

Next advice- tell us where you live in general, and find out who on the board lives in your general area. You'd be surprised how many people on this board are willing to help out a person in your position.

Third, and most importantly, you are making a fundamental mistake that most novices fall into- Thinking about the signal chain in reverse. You are already worried about what you are going to record the music *on*, which is the most irrelevent part of this equation.
First, you have a song. Then you have an instrument. Then, a performance. It takes place *in a room*. You may dial the room out of the equation for the keyboard by using samples, (although I advise against it), but you can't get out of it where vocals are involved. So you need a microphone (the *right* microphone, not the most expensive microphone). It needs to be in the right place. The mic is connected buy a cable (yes, the cable matters, and there are good ones and bad ones) to a preamplifier. Preamps vary from $2 per channel to about $5000 per channel. If the $2 one was the same, nobody could sell the $5000 one. The preamp is *huge* in importance, about the same as the mic. Then the output of that preamp is plugged into some recording medium, which may be the least important item in the signal chain, and the last thing on the list of concerns.

If you have a good performance of a good song in a good room, on a good instrument, into the right mic, in the right place, into a good preamp, I can record it on an old Tascam cassette recorder, and you can go collect your best new artist Grammy. If any of the first part isn't met, what you record the "Garbage in" on, won't change the "garbage out".

While sampling and MIDI can produce vaguely usable tracks, and is a very useful tool for composition, you'll notice that the piano tracks of your influences are more likely recorded on some old nice Steinway grand in a great room with real mics.

So where to begin? Increase your knowledge base and network a bit. You are in the right place. No matter what method you use to record, either at home or in the studio, it will cost money, so figure out where that money will come from, and figure out what your realistic budget is. I'm an amateur, and I've got close to $2000 worth of *cables*. Next, begin training your ears. You need to be able to tell a good room from a bad one, and the "sweet spot" for a mic, as opposed to the wrong spot. Find a guitar god you can work with.
Learn everything you can about mics, preamps, and acoustic room modification. Leave the problem of where the signal will go until you have a better idea where the signal will come from. That's enough for now. If it doesn't make sense now, it will later.-Richie

 

[moresound]

Yo Nate! Chili has given you one piece of critical advice. Do a ton of research before you spend a ton of money on stuff you don't need, which will use up the money for what you *do* need. Rather than specific advice, I'm going to give you some general advice:

First, you *can't* do this alone. You will need help. Why? Apparently, you are not a guitarist, you are a keyboard player. There is *no* sampler or midi based method that can allow a keyboard to substitute for a guitar. You will need a guitarist, and the technology to record guitars. This is simple in theory, but difficult to do in practice.

Next advice- tell us where you live in general, and find out who on the board lives in your general area. You'd be surprised how many people on this board are willing to help out a person in your position.

Third, and most importantly, you are making a fundamental mistake that most novices fall into- Thinking about the signal chain in reverse. You are already worried about what you are going to record the music *on*, which is the most irrelevent part of this equation.
First, you have a song. Then you have an instrument. Then, a performance. It takes place *in a room*. You may dial the room out of the equation for the keyboard by using samples, (although I advise against it), but you can't get out of it where vocals are involved. So you need a microphone (the *right* microphone, not the most expensive microphone). It needs to be in the right place. The mic is connected buy a cable (yes, the cable matters, and there are good ones and bad ones) to a preamplifier. Preamps vary from $2 per channel to about $5000 per channel. If the $2 one was the same, nobody could sell the $5000 one. The preamp is *huge* in importance, about the same as the mic. Then the output of that preamp is plugged into some recording medium, which may be the least important item in the signal chain, and the last thing on the list of concerns.

If you have a good performance of a good song in a good room, on a good instrument, into the right mic, in the right place, into a good preamp, I can record it on an old Tascam cassette recorder, and you can go collect your best new artist Grammy. If any of the first part isn't met, what you record the "Garbage in" on, won't change the "garbage out".

While sampling and MIDI can produce vaguely usable tracks, and is a very useful tool for composition, you'll notice that the piano tracks of your influences are more likely recorded on some old nice Steinway grand in a great room with real mics.

So where to begin? Increase your knowledge base and network a bit. You are in the right place. No matter what method you use to record, either at home or in the studio, it will cost money, so figure out where that money will come from, and figure out what your realistic budget is. I'm an amateur, and I've got close to $2000 worth of *cables*. Next, begin training your ears. You need to be able to tell a good room from a bad one, and the "sweet spot" for a mic, as oppssed to the wrong spot. Find a guitar god you can work with.
Learn everything you can about mics, preamps, and acoustic room modification. Leave the problem of where the signal will go until you have a better idea where the signal will come from. That's enough for now. If it doesn't make sense now, it will later.-Richie

Right on Richard!!! great advice. Especially when you come to #3