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Audio/sound engineering

have any of you taken audio engineering to improve the quality and style of your tracks?

i am taking this at my college in Febuary which is a 6 month intensive course at 8K

i am taking a loan for this course just to add passion of making professional beats

Theres a few courses that focus purely on the production side of things. Honolulu CC offers a degree in Music production, Uni. of MD offers a course that is "how to make EDM" literally. The final is the instructor hearing the track youve produced and his oppinion of it.

Classes are out there just gotta have the desire to go to a educational setting for things instead of on the fly.

I'm so glad I didn't take any of these courses. I'd rather invest 8k in proper monitoring (speakers) and other necessities for music production.

You can learn most of the things they teach you by yourself. Most musicians/friends I know that produce, taught the art of music production themselves. A lot of them have released on renown labels worldwide and some of them are even in the DJ MAG top 100. You don't have to take a class to become good/popular, that's my point.

If you're a starting producer then this course might come in handy for a quick start, but if you are an intermediate one the usefulness of these courses can be questioned.

Taking this class can give you skill sets that can be used outside of the world of edm, so do it. Chances are at 45 you will RAVE less.

An education will always give you a better shot at life than those without it.

good posts guys very true in what you have said.

quote:

Originally posted by elFreak Taking this class can give you skill sets that can be used outside of the world of edm, so do it. Chances are at 45 you will RAVE less. An education will always give you a better shot at life than those without it.

I disagree. References count, your productions count (which would be a reference as well). Nobody cares about your education on the musical aspect of your music production career.

An engineering diploma says you meet some random unclear requirements that can't be measured objectively in any way. In other words, virtually nobody cares.

The only worthy audio courses I've seen thus far take 4 years, full-time, including internships and the likes. Which actually cost less than 8k (!). It earns you a nice bachelor's degree as well.

An education will give you a better shot at life, unless it's an art related education. Art is way too subjective to provide you any insight on someones qualities imo, and therefore a diploma means shit when you want to comes to grading someones qualities other than him having some form of intelligence.

Of course if you think these courses are helpfull they're probably worth the money. But it is possibe to learn virtually the same at home with some competent people around you.

at 40, when you have no education and all you have to rely upon is the ability to make massive rave tracks in fruity loops, you will look back and remember what i said.

think outside the box.

music production does not pay the bills for 99% of the people that do it(even some "famous" ones), why not learn other uses for that skill set.

music production = working for yourself.
working for others = qualifications and training.

you will say no, but people who hand out contracts for projects will say yes.

there is more to sound engineering than art.

elfreak is right, i plan on enrolling in an audio engineering course to further my production career

with that education i'll be able to work with audio in almost every field, i want to get into film myself

also, audio engineering = working with audio before it reaches the speakers, album producers and such

sound engineering = working with sound after it leaves the speakers, like setting up club sound systems

just to clarify because audio and sound engineering are 2 completely different things

it was just a generalization

although sound engineers do more than just take care of what comes out of the speakers after the fact.

In a television studio, the sound engineer is the one that is involved with the mic set up to assure the best recording quality.

troof, sound is audio in a physical environment while audio is sound in a digital or other manipulatable environment, better?

I'm not saying diploma's are a bad thing. Just be careful which ones you enroll into. A lot of them overcharge, offer way to little in return and in the end learn you close to nothing. And then they hand you a shitty certificate virutually noone cares about. It's not so much about thinking outside the box, it's mostly being realistic. However, being capable of doing a wide variety of things in music is VERY important these days because there's demand for all in 1 packages. People don't want 5 different experts for the job if 1 person can do all (even if it means a slight drop in quality)

For now I've only met people that only care about references and my interests, not so much my educational background or my current one (Applied Art & Technology). I practice multiple professions and I'm self-employed. I'm studying for my bachelor, it's close to music but broad enough to be capable of doing way more than just that when graduating.

Maybe we're spoile here with our educational system. I guess so. You can do a 4 year bachelor (with optional master being a couple of weeks longer) for just 6K... Personally, I think 8K is rediculous for a 6 month course. I don't think it's worth it. You can't put price tag on proper education, but this just seems blatantly over-priced. That's the problem with commercial courses I guess... As I said, Dutch people are spoiled

the course i am taking is audio/recording engineering.

the course starts in feb and is one of the best in Montreal right now

not only is this course competitive to get into but the whole program has been upgraded with new computers and a midi and sound studio

i am taking this course i want to improve


1st TERM-

computers & the music industry- 45/hrs
synthesis- 45/hrs
audio theory & technology- 45/hrs
audio hardware & applications- 45/hrs

2nd TERM-

multitrack recording- 60/hrs
production & production studio- 45/hrs
sound design- 45/hrs
musical theory & technics II- 45/hrs

3rd TERM-

seminars- 60/hrs
music industry overview- 45/hrs
digital audio workstations- 45/hrs
electronic music- 45/hrs

i am just taking this course for fun

after i am getting into business management through my college

Good. Don't let me get you down too much. It's not about me anyway, you're taking the course

full sail is one of the best programs you can enroll in for audio engineering

http://www.fullsail.com/

my old college instructor said they were modeling their new production program (one of the top radio schools in canada) after it when i asked if he knew anything about it

looks like i'll wind up in vancouver though, i hear the program there is quite good and respected

what school in montreal?

if it is trebas...sorry fail.

vanier

so it is a 3 year professional cegep course or just one class?

its a 6 month program at vanier 645 hours

its not a cegep program

itsn going to be enough homework

Interesting posts in this thread.

Yes, you can learn engineering yourself (in fact you can theoretically teach anything to yourself with the right resources, but it's a shitload easier and faster to get relatively better at a given subject if you are taught it first.

I've looked (viewed and toured) at schools in London, Canada the USA, including:

UK - SAE several, Point Blank, university of Midx, Technics Academy.
Canada - Trebas, the Harris Institute, York, Recording Arts canada.
USA - Fullsail, Los Angeles Recording school (LARS), the Guitar Institute, SAE, UCLA.

I actually went to Harris Institute and it was, without doubt, THE GREATEST EDUCATIONAL EXPERIENCE OF MY LIFE. PERIOD. I could honestly write pages about how good the Producing engineering progrm (PEP) is there, but won't bore you with it. It's also only about $9k (CAD) for a year. it was a minimum of 40 hours per week, covering 14 subjects at any one time, taught by some of the music/sound industry's major players, including seriously respected studio and live sound engineers, Acoustic consultants and even A+R executives and entertainment lawyers. This is especially great as you won;t just get an education in technical ability, but also the basics of how to prepare yourself for the sorts of jobs you're going to go for. They teach you basic electronics and soldering, as well as music theory and history of contemporary music. They make you do things like assist in a club as coursework (they set it up). Basically, when you come out of there you will have a great grounding on the industry as a whole, but also be a superb engineer - the technical aspects of the course are so intense and the learning so full on. Nothing I have seen or heard about from any of the dozen or so schools I seriously researched has come close. Graduates from there go on to very good things, partly because of the contacts made there (through the school, or through tutors or through canadian companies respecting it as a school).


Fullsail, is a joke IMO. It costs $40K (yes) for a full audio engineering diploma and even though they do have good facilities and a really fancy website, that's mainly where your tuition money is going. I know a lot of people who went there and really pissed because there are a lot of rich kid wannabe's, who don't actually give a shit about the course (it's just something cool for them to do for a while) and many of the tutors cater to this class mentality. Some people I know did get a good education from it but they said it was only because they really put a lot in to making sure they got their money's worth. Even then, I wouldn't say their knowledge was that great, having seen their class notes and supplied course work.

SAE, is generally crap. You get out what you put in, but again there are so many idiots there and my experience is that their tutors really aren't that qualified or experienced. They also, aren't that cheap and their courses are quite limited.

Trebas just looked a bit run down and not really passionate about teaching - more of a business transaction, but at least it wasn't expensive. Their brochure was just a photocopy!

Recording Arts Canada - seemed OK but looked like a copy of the model that Harris set up, so why bother?

LARS - amazing facility, excellent campus and good course but at $24k rather expensive for just 10 months, especially as living in LA is not cheap and there is no parking at the school, meaning at least about another $3k for the year just to park near the school. Their reputation is mixed but at least the have an internship program to place you in job during the course. You better be rich for this one because the class times are such that you won't be able to work and they change each month - at least they're upfront about it.

The Guitar institute - Ghetto. The most Ghetto school I saw. Old, beaten up facilities, and it really feels like the audio engineering course is just tacked on to the guitar school as a way to get more money. The school is also just full of steve vai wannbees, and probably absolulely useless for anyone in to edm.

The others (the universities listed) are more or less the same - they all do courses, but in my experience there is absolutely no need to do a 4 year degree in engineering as you can learn it in a year as long as the tuition is good, and a diploma from a decent audio school will serve you just as well as a degree of you want to work in the industry. All the jobs I've gone for don't care if it's a degree or a diploma, just as long as you have been taught well. Unless you want to get really techy like audio physics for industrial uses/civil engineering etc.


If you want to be serious about audio engineering go to THE HARRIS INSTITUTE. If you want more info, PM me (I'm not affiliated in any way apart from I am incredibly greatful for the education they gave me). Living in Toronto is wicked too.

you forgot vanier

quote:

Originally posted by Imagin Theres a few courses that focus purely on the production side of things. Honolulu CC offers a degree in Music production, Uni. of MD offers a course that is "how to make EDM" literally. The final is the instructor hearing the track youve produced and his oppinion of it. Classes are out there just gotta have the desire to go to a educational setting for things instead of on the fly.

lol. actually, his opinion of the final track doesn't matter. as long as you show the necessary requirements, you can record anything. sean and
i told some dumb ass story with a guitar playing in the background and we got an 'A' for that, hahaha.
you could probabably record a track filled with farts just make sure you show you overdubbed, put some effects in , made use of a number of tracks and buses, etc, etc.
oh yeah, eat a lot of cabbage and beans before that session.

Oh yeah, Point Blank in London does production and software only courses, both part time and weekends. They're actually very good and worth the money (not expensive).

Don't know vanier.

Seriously, juts go to Harris in Toronto. Cost of living is really cheap and good, loads of EDM in Toronto, and the students who go there are serious about music.

Vanier is not a specialized school but a cegep (pre university in quebec similar to a jr college) that offers a broad range of subjects from university pre requisites to professional programs. It is way cheaper than a specialized school, though i can't comment on how effective the course would be.

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