Music Production courses in general (London)

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Posted by Matt_Moor on Oct-31-2010 14:01:

Music Production courses in general (London)

Things like SAE, Point Blank etc

Are any of them actually any good based on experience / mates ?

Interested in doing an ableton course in a weekend.

Posted by Looney4Clooney on Oct-31-2010 14:07:

nope

Posted by Lunar Phase 7 on Oct-31-2010 18:21:

There is very little they'll be able to teach you that youtube can't do for free and at your own pace.

If you get stuck you can ask a question on probably hundreds of message boards/forums and get replies/advice.

You'll lack that human interaction thing I guess, but then again based on what I've seen on other DJ type courses you sit through a tedious lecture whilst some clueless tosser poorly explains how to do the most basic of things. They'll be dozens of people there most of them no hopers and it would just be annoying.

Disclaimer:

I have never been on one of these courses so they may actually rock. But I have seen a few videos of them and they look like the suck hard ass.

Posted by tehlord on Oct-31-2010 18:55:

If you're going to study something make it audio engineering and learn the bread and butter basics. EQ, routing, recording, compression etc etc.

Everything else is garnish or creativity which really can't be taught imo.

Posted by DjWoody on Oct-31-2010 19:14:

I've been using Sonic Academy online for a while. I'm in the US, but according to their site, they are a real school in Newtownards. I dunno how far that is from London. Sonic Academy is really good. They specialize in all formats of dance music and in Ableton & Logic.

Sonic Academy
1 Green Gables Manor
Newtownards
Co.Down
BT23 7NT

http://www.sonicacademy.com/Contact+Us/
http://www.sonicacademy.com/Blog//S..._Report.cid2809

Posted by tehlord on Oct-31-2010 19:16:

That's about 500 miles and a plane/boat journey

Posted by Looney4Clooney on Oct-31-2010 19:20:

i would say actual recording and mic techniques would re the best use of those types of places. Still the only programs I would recommend are the tonemeister programs which usually are master degrees and require a music degree.

Posted by kevin shawn on Oct-31-2010 19:47:

quote:
Originally posted by Lunar Phase 7
There is very little they'll be able to teach you that youtube can't do for free and at your own pace.

If you get stuck you can ask a question on probably hundreds of message boards/forums and get replies/advice.

This.

Posted by DJ RANN on Oct-31-2010 20:13:

I actually went to point blank many moons ago, and did the electronic Music production course (I'd finished audio engineering school in canada which was incredible but it was real old school in terms of engineering and felt the place that I lacked in knowledge was electronic production techniques).

Point blank was actually good, but a lot of it has to do with what teacher you have...we were pissed sometimes because our teacher, while knowledgeable used to spend of a lot of time regailing us with anecdotal stories of drug filled studio sessions, while funny they didn't really expand our knowledge. In fairness at other times he taught us some great stuff and I was happy but some people asked for a partial refund at the end of the course.

Personally, I would do one on one electronic music production training with my good friend Alex:

http://16steps.co.uk/maincontent.html

He's in Sarf Lahndon and had many major releases across a number of Genre's and as his full time job he's actually a music teacher at a good private school so he's got it all, not to mention a very nice studio to teach you in, unless you want to just do the online version.

Tell him Tom (in LA) sent you and he'll look after you

Posted by LoveHate on Oct-31-2010 23:22:

try to get into the red bull music academy.

Posted by cammaxwell on Nov-01-2010 18:01:

I've done three of the PointBlank online courses and found them to be great. I've looked at several before that, and these were the only ones gearded toward EDM. It's true that the teacher playa a part in what you get from it, but the course material stays the same and therefore all the online tutorials are the same. The teacher only has one Q&A session a week where you can have a discussion, so it's not the be all and end all.

Have fun and good luck!

Posted by Matt_Moor on Nov-01-2010 21:07:

cheers guys

Posted by Beatflux on Nov-01-2010 21:10:

quote:
Originally posted by tehlord
If you're going to study something make it audio engineering and learn the bread and butter basics. EQ, routing, recording, compression etc etc.

Everything else is garnish or creativity which really can't be taught imo.

I think you can teach a person to be more creative.

Posted by daeus on Nov-02-2010 10:00:

quote:
Originally posted by Mad for Brad
i would say actual recording and mic techniques would re the best use of those types of places. Still the only programs I would recommend are the tonemeister programs which usually are master degrees and require a music degree.

+1

Posted by tehlord on Nov-02-2010 10:04:

quote:
Originally posted by Beatflux
I think you can teach a person to be more creative.

I think you can teach people methods that should lead them to be more creative.

Posted by Richard Butler on Nov-02-2010 16:25:

It won't hurt I guess to take a course but I doubt it will make a meaningful difference to your long term outcomes. J00F was saying on his site how he finds it incredibly hard to find gems in the thousands of Beatport releases as they 'all sound the same'.

Thats the holy grail for me, to try and find my own very distinct sound. Whether I will is another matter, but no course would help me do this.

Posted by Matt_Moor on Nov-02-2010 20:40:

I guess i feel i'm almost "there" but id just like to see a pro do it in front of me so i can ask questions and get instant feedback there and then.

As far as your own sound goes, its hard to invent a new sound i think. I mean airwave, oliver lieb, ferry corsten. Thats all i can think of when i think of people who have carved out a steady style of good tracks.

Tyas of course more recently.

Posted by Kev Boy on Nov-10-2010 16:34:

Re: Music Production courses in general (London)

quote:
Originally posted by Matt_Moor
Things like SAE, Point Blank etc

Are any of them actually any good based on experience / mates ?

Interested in doing an ableton course in a weekend.

I looked into all this in the summer of 2009. I had done a 1 yr course years ago but kind of lost interest then I wanted to get back into it.

Those courses like SAE are very expensive. They teach alot of theory but you might coming out having no idea how to make a tune! They are there to make money first and foremost.

I found a good one, it's just a guy in his house who charges �50 for 3 hours. It's all done in Ableton and its 1 on 1.

He used to teach at SAE and can make any type of music. He will do exactly what you want. I told him I have no idea how to make a tune but theory wise I know about ADSR envelopes etc. Over 1 year later I can now make a tune that sounds decent and I know what I'm doing.

If you want the details let me know.

Posted by tehlord on Nov-10-2010 17:17:

For the record I recently saw two of the Sonic Academy course. They were both rubbish imo. Just better presented versions of a million free videos and the Trance one was little more than an elongated Nexus promotional video.

Posted by Andy28 on Nov-10-2010 18:54:

Iv seen Sonic Academy's how to sound like simon patterson video, had the project file aswell that went with it.
If I had to pay for it though Id have been well pissed off, not very good at all.