What music software do i use?

Music composition software or digital audio workstation

Or in short what daw do you use?

Yes   I get this question a lot what software do you use by newbies and advanced experts.I must say it really all depends with what you are comfortable about with using. Music genre has no bearing on what daw you use since you can make any type of music with any daw. Classical,pop,R&b ballad,Hip Hop,edm pretty much anything you consider music you can also create in a daw,so the daw does not discriminate the genre.

A lot of the forums i see people ask what is the best sequencer/softsynth/daw for making trance? or making Techno? or Edm? etc etc,  The basic answer is anyone. Let me explain when i first started out i did not have much funds so i got the cheapest daw i could find i found xl home studio i think it was 89 dollars or 119 or something . The cd came to my house i was so happy until i loaded the program and  realized what mistake i was making.

   Basically the program xl home studio for one was very limited from its big brother/sister sonar.

So it is very limited with what you could do. Things like using a plug in such as a side-chain were impossible cause there was no way to route a vst. When i would  insert a midi or audio effect i had to manually go and do the routing yourself ,this can be tedious if you dont have all day to write your songs.

Another gripe with xl is if you want to audition a part of your song you have to write it first or record it,what if you dont want to spend time writing or drawing it in and just want to audition it!

So the moral of my story is if you just started producing do your homework before you go out and buy gear so you dont make the mistake that i did by just buying the cheapest gear when in reality to get the best results you have to spend a few hundred and even more to get some nice gear to produce good results.

So i just gave up on xl home studio eventually when i had the money and i went for  Ableton and never looked back since.When i first tried it i thought it was just for remixers or djs cause its very loop oriented and you can do a lot on the fly like for live performances thats kind of where they get there name from and there branding . As soon as i tried it out i was in love with it after i realized it is just like all the other linear daws but 10 times better.

 What is truly amazing working with it  is if there is something youd like to try out you can without recording it. its called the session view. You can just jam out in the session view auditioning all these different sessions and parts. I do admit there are times where my productivity slows down because i spend too much time jamming in the session view. (trying out alternate ways of composing  or arranging your song).
  Yes the one thing that is great about live is you can come up with so many different scenes(meaning arrangments you create in session view by adding  midi tracks into scenes and subtracting them you can come up with hundreds of different ways to make your song and thats great.

You can even record your song in session view if youd like by putting a bunch of different sessions into scenes and then just choosing scene 1,scene 2 and so forth.

Another great thing  is when you  insert a midi track an audio track some effects whatever you insert. Behind the scenes it automatically does all the routing for you so you dont have to spend time with routing you can focus more time on producing your music.. On top of that its loaded with lots of sounds in the sound library you can use rightaway. So like i said in the beginning it depends on what you like and are comfortable with

once you save up the money ,and money should not be an issue if your serious about your music you will make money when you get better of course ,start selling digital albums or start going on tour etc .So then.  i would seriously give Ableton a try.


When using Ableton you can do everything with your mouse which can be tedious at times depending on your time constraints ,or you can use a midi controller and map and program the knobs and sliders and buttons to do what you want,this can also get tedious but a little bit better than using a mouse to take things to the next level and jump right in and start making tracks with ease i highly suggest getting Push 2
As everything would be hands on ,on the fly on stage performing or in your studio and its made by Ableton so youd be using Ableton the way it was meant to be .

If Ableton is not for you then the next step down id suggest  Fl Studio as it is not as expensive but ,just as effective and may be all you need. So dont put all your eggs in one basket Ableton is great but ,it may not be for everyone it has a huge learning curve and is expensive but,once you get the hang of it your hooked. If your like most people Fl Studio may be perfect for you .I should post a tutorial on it soon.  As you may prefer it better than Ableton as Ableton is like its big brother it does so much more but,you may not need to do that much ,its all what you want to do so check out Fl Studio if your just looking to make beats then fl studio may be just perfect for you.
 In addition to me a lot of famous musicians use Fl Studio like
Deadmau5
Avicii 
Afrojack 
and
Seven Lions just to name a few.

If your not looking to buy a sequencer theres also a lot of great vsts you can download and use with no time limits but,remember if they are free they will still have limitations so be aware of that.
One of the best i have tried is Tracktion you can download  it here for free fully functional.