some people who are thinking about getting into production have asked my advice regarding the best way to go about it - should i get a degree? should i just start producing tracks and see where it takes me?
a formal education in the field is not to be sneezed at, but if you look at the drug-addled faces of the producers ripping up beatport of late, it's clear that it is not essential. i am self-taught and not totally incompetent - in my experience, you can get very, very far teaching yourself, especially if your focus is electronic music, which is a far easier domain to master than the drum mic-ing, hum-cancelling hairiness of the physical recording world.
if you opt for the self-education route, my advice is to focus on one aspect of production at a time - obtain a reasonably deep understanding of that aspect before moving on to the next. for example, spend a few days really looking into drum sequencing, a few days looking into utilizing the stereo field using panning, a few days making your arrangements 'tall' by filling the frequency spectrum with sound elements (from down in sub-bass up to the sizzle on your high hats, e.g.). later, with these basics under your belt, you can move onto more involved techniques, e.g. spend a few weeks learning synthesizer design (again, taking the same approach - a day learning about oscillator types, a day playing with amplitude envelopes etc), a week or two focusing on compression, another few days programming delay units and so on.
if you tackle one aspect at a time, you can make steady progress without getting overwhelmed by how much there is to learn, and ultimately everything you come to understand will typically compliment and deepen your understanding of other topics. don't get me wrong - you're not going to learn everything there is to learn about synth design in a few weeks. audio engineering is a lot like learning to play guitar in that you can attain competence in a few weeks, but there is no upper limit to how much there is to learn and how good you can get if you put the time in. also, like learning an instrument, if you are making music as you are learning - for example, making songs which are experiments in whatever you are trying to master - you will a) be having a lot of fun b) gaining real experience and c) building up a catalog of tracks you can (usually) be proud of, all of which will renew your motivation to learn new things.
some good resources:
- Bobby Owsinski's the mixing engineer's handbook gives a good overview of essential topics: mixing, panning, EQ, arrangement. it's very accessible.
- wikipedia articles on audio engineering covers a wide range of topics (in more detail than you'd want!)
- other producers : get in touch with people who know what they're doing and talk shop.
- and in my experience, engineers like to show off their knowledge by way of writing tutorials and giving them away - capitalize on their vanity!
