Image by Alexey Ruban
Ask any American teenager the question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”, and there is a good chance they’ll respond by saying, “I want to be a musician.” According to a recent survey, about 6% of male teens and 9% of female teens in the U.S. dream about becoming musicians one day.
But unfortunately, very few people get the opportunity to live out this dream. Another survey found that more than two-thirds of American adults admit to not following through on the career plans they had when they were younger.
If you grew up wanting to be a musician and you haven’t gotten around to it yet, it isn’t too late to get started. Here is how to produce your own songs so you can put yourself in a position to become a professional musician.
Decide Which Type of Music You Want to Create
When you’re first trying to figure out how to become a musician, you might already know exactly what kind of music you would like to make. You may be a big fan of country, hip-hop, or pop and want to work to create that specific type of music.
Whatever the case, you’ll need to spend time thinking about which type of music you would like to record. It’ll play a big part in everything from the equipment you’ll need to buy to the melodies you’ll need to come up with while creating music.
Secure the Right Equipment to Record Music
In a perfect world, everyone who wanted to start producing songs would be able to book studio time. But this can be relatively expensive, especially for a newcomer, so a better idea might be to invest in the equipment you’ll need to record music so you can do it right at home.
This is the equipment you’ll need to piece together a home studio:
- Computer with monitors
- Digital audio workstation (more on this in a moment!)
- Microphone
- Headphones
Some people are under the impression they’ll have to spend thousands of dollars to set up a home studio. But in reality, setting one up can be done for as little as just $500 in some cases.
Image by Amin Asbaghipour
Invest in a Digital Audio Workstation
Arguably the most important part of your home studio setup will be your digital audio workstation (DAW). You’ll use your DAW to create the music you’ll sing and/or rap over and record your lyrics.
If you have the funds to do it, you may want to consider investing in a more advanced DAW like Pro Tools or Logic. But if you’re just getting your music career off the ground, a free DAW like GarageBand or Reaper will also work. These DAWs will provide you with virtual instruments and sound effects you can use to produce songs.
A good DAW will also enable you to import sounds from other places so you can use them in your music. For example, you may want to teach yourself how to perform an audio conversion to digital format so that you can take sounds and samples from cassette tapes and use them in your music.
Master Melody Making and Songwriting
You can purchase all the best home studio equipment, but it isn’t going to do you a whole lot of good if you don’t use it to its full potential. To do this, you’ll need to learn how to make catchy melodies and write great songs. This is the most difficult part of producing songs since there isn’t really a science to it. It’ll require you to tinker with different sounds and express yourself as best you can through the words you put over them.
At first, this might seem like a daunting task. But you should try to have fun with it by experimenting with the melodies you make and the lyrics you write. Your goal should be to use your music to connect with other people by making them feel something when they hear your songs.
One good way to increase the chances of your music landing an audience is by submitting lyrics or publishing song credits online so that people can discover more about your music. It’ll help you form a closer connection with your fans over time.
Image by Soundtrap
Find the Best Way to Market Your Music
After you’ve fine-tuned your music-making skills and recorded songs you’d like to share with the world, the last step will be deciding how to market it. Fortunately, you should be able to do it by using social media to your advantage. You can post your songs online and utilize social media to spread the word about them.
Your first one, two, or even 50 songs might not be hits, but as long as you’re willing to work at it, you should be able to begin producing songs that sound better and better. It’ll only be a matter of time before you’re able to create a small following and build it from there.