Music production, do i need to actually now a lot about music?

[JulianVeloso]

Hey guys

Recently i've been releasing mashups/bootyss and etc, i know they're not the best, but i find them easy to do and not so challenging.

Now i wanna get into music production, starting of with making a bootleg (Adding some of my style to a song) of Miike's Snow - Devi'ls work, it's a really cool song but it's slow. I wanna add a more House/electro feel to it, So i was talking to my friend about this, he told me i need to know about notes and get to know music more...

What do i actually need to know about music? I know EDM music is divided in 16-32 beats and all that.. but.. what else?

[dope]

I'm learning production too, but because of personal "issues" and studies, I don't have time and more I don't have any place left in my head to learn musical theory, so I'm postponing this. But eventually this summer I'll try to learn.

In my opinion, musical knowledge is not necessary. But it's a HUGE plus. Your melodies will be way better, and overall your tracks will be more "musical" than simple "boom boom boom boom".
Knowing musical theory will help you express yourself and transmitting a real message/idea/mood through your tracks.

And last but not least, even though you can make nice melodies without knowing anything about music, knowing the theory will help you work faster.

If you know what you're doing, you know what note to play so that it sounds good. Time spent = 1 sec.
If you don't have a single clue, you'll play randomly on your keyboard to find something good. Time spent = 49/61/88 sec depending on the size of your midi keyboard.

Joke aside, it's a great way to write better music, and faster.

[JulianVeloso]

I see..Then it's good to learn music theory, but damn, i'm still learning how to master ableton and a couple vst's and i'm nowhere near to knowing anything, now i'm venturing into music theory...

Wish me luck

[TommyQuiet]

Take piano lessons will help you alot

[JulianVeloso]

Take piano lessons will help you alot

I think i might actually do this..

[Lysgaard]

You absolutely should. Some simple piano lessons will go a long way towards getting fluent in this.

Also, to make the entry super simple, if you have an iPhone or similar, there are plenty of music theory apps out there. Start there and never stop...

[botstein]

Music Theory all the way. If you like learning from software, check out Musition from Sibelius. I used it from time to time in high school.

[JulianVeloso]

I'll take a look into that. Thanks.

[Deejaesnafu]

i find this tool http://www.looknohands.com/chordhouse/piano/very helpful if youre someone (like me) who lacks music theory background.

[synthet1c]

you really just need to be able to count to 4 and then in multiples of 4 up to 32, then just realize 32x4 is 128 and that is about all the theory you need to start, but im not sure learning all the music theory is benificial, maybe just learn the minor chords are structured like this, each key on the keyboard is considered a semitone or in that diagram 1/2. you can start a key from any key on the keyboard of "root note" just count the distance between the keys

root, 1, 1/2, 1, 1, 1/2, 1 1/2, 0.5

here is a pic to show you

djtechtools music lesson.jpg

****there is actually a couple of ways to do minor keys, you can raise 1 at the end instead of 1 1/2 at the end, or in the case of A - minor all the white keys****

an easy way to start a melody for a track is to make the melody in natural A - minor then move all the entire piano roll to a different root note for a different feeling to the sound...