COMPOSITION

AND

PRODUCTION
OR
"WTF is this black magic?"

By: Reginald Young

About the author:

Reginald Young produces electronic music under the name Neon The Rex and has written a
music theory guide for electronic musicians, "Music Theory: The TL;DR Version."
Hear his sounds @ soundcloud.com/NeonTheRex

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0

International License.

INTRODUCTION
What do "composition" and "production" mean?
A) Composition
"Composition" refers to "music" part of music. The music theory, the arrangement of notes, the
voicings of chords, the chord progressions, etc..
If you're not familiar with music theory, STOP HERE and go check out my "Music Theory: The
TL;DR Version" @ http://www.edmprod.com/resources/
B) Production
"Production" refers to mixing and/or production. I like to think of it as photoshop for sound.
How do you make sounds and layers "fit" together well?
If you're not familiar with production, STOP HERE and check out all the awesome resources @
http://edmprod.com/resources/
So then what is "Composition AND Production?"
Some aspects of compositional production are simple and commonly used, others (like what I
mention in "Arlanda") I've never actually heard discussed before.
I use the term "composition and production" to refer to the overlap of compositional elements
and mixing. It's a train of thought where decisions in one area affect, and are factored into,
decisions in the other.
This guide intends to give you a structured approach to understanding that incredibly beautiful
overlap. Most producers tends to focus on production and under-utilize composition, and this
framework hopefully helps open doors for you to understand how to use it better.
EDM has very much centralized production and composition into one person. The musician is
the producer, and the producer is the musician. But EDM has focused so much on the
production side, that often the compositional aspect of music is forgotten. An aspiring EDM
producer is more likely to learn how to layer synths than to learn how to compose the music
those synths play. So let this guide--"framework" is probably a better word--show you why
composition can matter for production.

THE DIMENSIONS
I'll be using the word "dimensions" throughout this guide. What I mean by a "dimension" is the
"dimensions" of the mythical mixing box. If you're not familiar, then let me explain.
Producers often describe mixing as a box. The box has 3 dimensions: width, depth, and height.

THE PRODUCTION DIMENSIONS:

A simple way to break down these "dimensions":
Width refers to the left to right placement of a sound in a mix (think left vs. right and stereo vs.
mono)
Height refers to the spectrum location of a sound (think of it like: bass, mid, and treble; or low
vs. high notes)
Depth refers to the distance your ears place between you and the instrument. Most commonly,
this is achieved via reverb (think of it like a range of 0% reverb to 100% reverb)
NOTE: There's a fourth dimension to consider that often gets left out:
Time: When notes play in relation to each other (think of it like: before, during, and after)

THE COMPOSITIONAL ASPECTS

There are three "aspects" of music I'll be describing, too:
Melody refers to a series of notes played by an individual instrument (think of humming the
theme song to your favorite show)
Harmony refers to the progression of groups of notes played at the same time (think chord
progression)
Rhythm refers to the pattern of melodic/harmonic/noise beats (think: percussion)

THE FRAMEWORK
COMPOSITION ASPECT
Melody
Harmony
Rhythm

PRODUCTION DIMENSION
Height, width, depth, or time
Height, width, depth, or time
Height, width, depth, or time

This chart is meant to give you a concrete place to start with. It's best to start with a compositional
aspect and then apply a mixing dimension; We mix a composition, not compose a mix, don't we? (But, of
course, there is a lot of overlap, and most EDM mixing has become part and parcel of the composition
process).
THE PROCESS:
1) Choose a compositional aspect and picking a music dimension. For example, let's choose
melody and height.
2) Ask yourself, "how can I use that mixing dimension to enrich the sonic texture that aspect of
composition?"
So for our example, how can you use height to add texture to a melody? One way would be to vary the
"height" the melody plays at; on the 4th repeat of the melody, maybe you play the 3rd and 5th note an
octave up, for example. Or maybe after the first four bars, you change the first note of the melody a 4th
down. You can "vertically" vary a melody like this.
Melodic variation like that isn't all that "production" oriented, so here's a great example I use almost
every time I want to harmonize a melody:
The main melody is set in mono, and the harmonizing melody is set in stereo.
Composition aspect: melody
Mixing dimension: width
Once I discovered the effects this kind of mono/stereo harmonization has, I've never harmonized a
melody any other way. Check out my track "Arlanda" at the 3:00 mark for an example @
https://soundcloud.com/neontherex/arlanda-neon-the-rex
It gives an incredibly rich and full sound to the harmony, much more so than if both parts were mixed to
the same spot in the stereo image.
Side note: That harmonization also provides another example of composition and production,
too. The mono main melody is fairly harsh and biting, while the stereo harmonization of that
melody is a much softer synth without much high end.

Here are some more food for thought examples:

MELODY

Height

-Jump notes of a melody up or down intervals for variation

Width

-Split a melody between places in the stereo image; first note is mono,
second note plays slight right, third slight left, etc.

Depth

-Put increasing reverb on a melody the fourth time you repeat it, to give
the feeling like the melody's sinking away

Time

-After you've played the melody several times, change certain notes to
start early or play late

HARMONY Height

-Split a chord over several octaves to make it sound HUGE. Maybe the root
and 5th of a triad are in one octave, and the 3rd is an octave or two up

Width

-This is something I LOVE playing with: Split a chord across the stereo
image. Take a 7th chord, and put the root and 5th mid-right, and the 3rd
and 7th mid-left. Lots of potential here.
-Make your root note sit way back in the mix with heavy reverb, giving the
chord some sense of root note, but putting more emphasis on the other,
more colorful notes of the chord
-Play the upper notes of a chord first and then add the root later, to create
a chord that feels like it lasts longer, and create suspense/resolution

Depth
Time

RHYTHM*

Height

-Change the "tuning" of a hi-hat a bit higher on the 4th repeat, to give
some suspense

Width

-After four bars, change your mono hats to stereo, and your stereo hats to
mono. Same rhythm, different stereo layout

Depth

-Make the 1st and 3rd snare hits somewhat reverbed, which will make the
2nd and 4th snare hits sound more punchy and up front in comparison

Time

-Delay a hat pattern by 1/8 of a beat for a measure

*All the rhythm examples focus on percussion, but, of course, melodies and harmonies have rhythms
too. Really, you can consider the "time" dimension of melody and harmony to be rhythm, rather than
time.

CONCLUSION
This guide is meant to give a framework; It hopefully will light some fires and get producers thinking
about how to explicitly play with the overlap of composition and production. Maybe it helps you find a
new distinctive feature to call your own, maybe it sparks a new song idea. There's no "right" way to
make music but learning a new way to perceive it sure doesnt hurt.