Making a Basic Beat

Have you ever caught yourself listening to more of the background beat then the actual lyrics of a song. The beat is what catches your attention causing you to end up nodding your head to the melody. Always wondered how they made it? In this tutorial I will show you step by step the basic knowledge you need to get started on your own beats.

Tools and Materials:
- Laptop

- Speakers

- Beat Maschine

- Piano

Step 1: Open Your Software

Make sure all your equipment is working, test your beat pads and piano to make sure everything is properly working.

Step 2: Set Tempo

Set the proper tempo to which how fast or slow you want the beat. You can adjust this in the software on the top center where it says “BPM” meaning beats per minute. The smaller the number the slower the tempo. Most rap beats are usually set at a tempo range of 100-140 bpm.

Step 3: Setting Groups

You can add groups straight from the beat maschine by holding the GROUP button and hitting the first pad lit up, by clicking it another group will pop up. You can continue adding groups by clicking the next lit pad. Go to your library on the top left and input a kit. Once you do so you should be able to tap your pads and hear a sound. Next you want to start off by putting your kits in separate groups. For example, you would want to put all your drums in one group, your piano or other instruments in another. To add another group do the same thing as above, hitting the same pad lit up would create a new group. This is so when you record and edit, it will not interfere with the other sounds you have in the other group. Not doing so will cause the sound you are using to repeat itself along with the other instruments you have in that group for as long as you have the bars unless you only place it in only one pattern and switch the next. You can then begin recording after this next step. Follow the next step for further process.

Step 4: Setting Patterns

To set up a new pattern you can hold the PATTERN button on the maschine and click on the first pad. You will see on your computer screen showing pattern one that will be your first pattern and you can continue added more by doing the same thing with a different number pattern. Next once you got a pattern set how many bar you wish to have in the intro. You can change this by holding the PATTERN butting and turning the nod right to where you wish.

Step 5: Lay Down the Beat

Start off by recording the first pattern of your beat. You would want to start by adding your drums, hi hats, snares, and claps to create a melody that gets the beat flowing. Remember they're still in different groups but you will also need to put them in different patterns so that it does not end up repeating the same one over and over. You will want to make sure to put different patterns for your intro, hook, and verse. Them being in different pattern allows your beat to switch melodies properly without it overlapping the same one.

Step 6: Quantizing

Quantize helps fix whatever is off on the beat to match the tempo. You can do this by highlighting everything and hitting shift+quantize. If you do not like how it turns out you can always arrange it yourself with the mouse and move it to where you would like.

Step 7: Converting to WAV File:

Go to file then click Export Audio to convert it so that you will be able to send and sale. You need to make sure that your source is set to Group Outputs so that it gets all the audio you have recorded . Also make sure you are saving it in your documents where you can find it. Hit export and wait till it downloads. Once it is complete you should be able to find it in your documents.