How To Become A GREAT Beat Making MASTER
Do you want to take things to the next level and become a GREAT MASTER of Beat Making?
Do you sometimes hear beats in tracks or even from other bedroom producers on the internet and wonder what makes their tracks so damn good while yours continue to have an “average” feel to them?
These tips will help you to take your beat making to the next level and come at this game from the angle needed to really improve your tracks and beats from a creative, technical, and artistic stand point.
Often times it’s the simple things that we overlook when trying to improve our craft, but knowing what needs to be done and doing them are 2 completely different things. My advice? Take these words to heart, let them sink in and you can put yourself in a league with the greats like dr dre, eminem, and kanye west.
3 Things that Set Pro Beat Makers Apart from Average Amateurs
If there’s 3 things that really make the difference between an amateur and someone who is on the path to producing top shelf tracks, then these would be it. I’ve come to these 3 points after nearly 14 years in this production game and have seen many beat makers rise and fall, and some never even get up off the ground!
(in reverse order)
#3 – Waiting for Inspiration
Don’t wait for inspiration to hit you like a lightening bolt, it’s a common pitfall that many new beat makers fall into. They sit and wait for good ideas to come to them and if they aren’t feeling inspired then they just don’t work on anything. They might mess around a bit with their production tools (which is not necessarily a bad thing) but they never get themselves into working mode.
You should always be working on something even if it’s the most uninspired, unoriginal piece of crap you could come up with. Why? Because this is the time when inspiration is most likely to hit you. When you are in the thick of writing music on a daily basis. So this means you need to get in the habit of working on beats every day. If you do, inspiration will find you in the right place at the right time.
#2 – Balancing Play & Creativity with Practicing & Learning
Another common pitfall that prevents people from making significant progress with their music and production skills is not balancing the work/play factor. Play & Creativity means you’re just having fun and being imaginative and just letting go and creating music for the sheer enjoyment of it. Practicing & Learning means you are working hard to overcome obstacles and improve your skills.
If you want to be a great beat maker you need to balance both of these factors. Too much play & creativity will result in an unbalanced development. You won’t take the time to improve your technical skills or learn music theory or actually practice the keyboard.
On the flip side of this is people who spend too much time learning and not enough time to doing. They learn all of the equipment and technical aspects of production and how to make music but never put it into action and unleash their creativity.
My music teacher used to tell me that I should spend 60% of my time playing, and 40% practicing. They both feed into each other and enrich the enjoyment and satisfaction you get from music.
#1 – Giving Up Too Soon
Learning to make your own beats, like anything else worth pursuing, takes time to learn and master. I see people get into it for a few months and compare themselves to people who have been mastering their craft for 5, 6, 10 years and get discouraged and give up WAY to soon.
Producing tracks and making your own beats takes time. That’s why it’s important that you follow tip #2 and make sure you are taking time to enjoy yourself regularly and just make beats for the pure enjoyment of it.
Having fun and being creative is what makes great music, not rigid perfectionism. I’ve heard tracks from brand new producers that weren’t great in technical quality but had that “spark of something special”. Likewise I’ve heard kanye west tracks that were technically perfect but just totally lacking in any “life”.
So don’t give up because you’re not perfect or you don’t “measure up” to some flashy beats and tracks…
I’ve seen up and coming beat makers with a ton of talent and HUGE potential who gave up just way to soon. These were people that had a real creative spark in them, but their skills just weren’t developing as fast as they’d like. Know this, it’s going to take time. So just stay at it and get a bit better every day and feed off the small successes and NEVER GIVE UP!
Be Humble and Look Up to The Masters
Humility doesn’t mean you put yourself down, it means you don’t blow yourself out of proportion and lose sight of the reality of your skills, beats, and tracks. So find some producers and musicians who you look up to and make them your role-models and be inspired by them.
Always remember that you can be better by reminding yourself of just how good the beat makers like the Neptunes, Dre, and Jay Z are. But also tell yourself that you can be as good as them. Balance your humbleness and your confidence
See Yourself as a Tue Beat Making Artist
One of the best things you can do for the quality of your tracks and beats is to shift the way you think of yourself and your craft. You’re not JUST a beat maker or someone who produces tracks. You’re and ARTIST.
What does it mean to be an Artist?
It means that you are tuned in to the world around you and always looking to understand it and to interpret it through your music and your own creative imagination. Being an artist means taking in the world, re-creating it, and expressing your view point.
It means opening yourself to having a sense of wonder about the world.
This means growing as a human being and not just becoming a great beat maker. So take your life and your moral, spiritual, physical, and social health seriously. Always be trying to improve yourself and connect with the world around you, so you can understand it better.
This is what helps you to connect with other people through your beats, tracks, and music.
This is what makes a GREAT Beat Making MASTER.