I wish I knew

[EdGrip]

I'm still reading the manual. I keep it open in a browser tab and dip into it at random when I've got a moment to kill, or when I want to know something specific.

Learning Reason specifically, and DAW/music/audio-production-speak in general, (for me at least) is a fairly haphazard process where you just read up on any and every little known-unknown that pops up. To begin with, lots of things you look up are full of technical terms and other prior knowledge that you haven't got yet, so you have to just file it all away in your brain under ??? until you have enough bits and pieces to start making connections and understanding.

It's a steep learning curve, basically, which is my favourite kind.

A friend of mine installed Ableton Live Lite, and we had a little session playing around with it, building a loop out of a drum pattern and a synth and so on. She was frustrated by the newness and the interface and how it feels hostile.
"Yeah. You've kinda just got to keep chipping away at it," I said. "Follow tutorials, keep coming back to it."
It's just a matter of persistence.

[decoder]

Its funny...
Creativemind just answered a question I've had for a while. Sidechaining has eluded me as a term, but you just defined it in a language that suddenly parted the clouds...

Sometimes we look too hard for our answers and it gets frustrating, but the again all it takes is someone to say something that 'clicks' and viola! So don't be too hard on yourself, sometimes it takes a while to figure this stuff out.

BTW, Thanks Creativemind!

[ravisoni]

It would be awesome to have a user-generated wiki of all the reason devices and their individual parts. Of course, there's always the manual, but it's just quite different when people are talking about it (and adding tips, etc).

[EdGrip]

Stems, since no one else mentioned it and it's the most important bit, are named for the way the waveform for a song-length piece of audio, as displayed in a DAW, looks like a long, gnarly, undulating stem - like the horizontal stem of the Beanstalk of Fresh Sounds. When you bring a whole track's worth of them in, you've got a whole row of Fresh Sound Beanstalks, with their various thin stems (silence) and mad leaves (noisy bits).

[EnochLight]

Stems... are named for the way the waveform for a song-length piece of audio, as displayed in a DAW, looks like a long, gnarly, undulating stem - like the horizontal stem of the Beanstalk of Fresh Sounds.

This is the first time I've ever heard this origins story. Are you sure that's accurate? I always thought they were referred to as "stems" in a literal sense. After all, the definition of "stem" (when not referring to plants) is:

• a long and thin supportive or main section of something.
• originate in or be caused by.

These would seem to literally describe the purpose of your DAW's audio tracks.

[KirkMarkarian]

It would be awesome to have a user-generated wiki of all the reason devices and their individual parts. Of course, there's always the manual, but it's just quite different when people are talking about it (and adding tips, etc).

Yep, that's a great idea - very tired of one person in particular flinging around "RTFM" for every answer. Why do we get cursed out for asking questions on a forum designed for passing along information? Not everybody retains info from manuals. People don't all learn the same way. Science. Look it up!

It would be handy to have a wiki, though!

That being said, nearly every type of function and its "how-to" already exist elsewhere on the Internet.

[EdGrip]

Stems... are named for the way the waveform for a song-length piece of audio, as displayed in a DAW, looks like a long, gnarly, undulating stem - like the horizontal stem of the Beanstalk of Fresh Sounds.

This is the first time I've ever heard this origins story. Are you sure that's accurate? I always thought they were referred to as "stems" in a literal sense. After all, the definition of "stem" (when not referring to plants) is:

• a long and thin supportive or main section of something.
• originate in or be caused by.

These would seem to literally describe the purpose of your DAW's audio tracks.

I'm sure you're right - I do wonder if the term has origins dating back to pre-computer-music times.
But that's the way I've always interpreted/understood it. Just thought I'd have a go at addressing the actual word.

[Darwin]

I so agree.. I stopped asking questions for the most part because I'm completely clueless and make s me fell like a Dumdum

So.. Does anybody have suggestions about taking a class? I've been checking out "Pyramind" school in SF. $400 dollars (OUCH!) for the beginners reason course. I'm so tempted but damn I cant spend that kind of money. I've spent a few dollars at Askaudio.com. They even talk over my head assuming I know the "Basics" of recordind and recording software. I do not!

I've been playing guitar for over 30 years and just have ideas but no tech experience in this realm. Frustrated as per usual

[Olivier]

2. "time shaping" . Dunno. Might be like time stretching(?)

Let me try...

Time shaping, i'd say that require something with huge gravitational forces, like a black hole doesn't it ?
Which is much like a DAW... a thing you can funnel all your time into, keeps pulling you in... not getting anything back in return but a huge void of nothingness ?


I guess a wiki would be good though.

[EdGrip]

I'd say, unless you really want to spend the money on a course, that anyone wanting to get on the learning curve should dive right in to YouTube tutorials. Of course Reason-specific ones are good, because all the commands etc are the same (I like the ones Boyinaband does) - but don't be afraid to go for tutorials for other DAWs too. Most of the principles involved are universal, and there are more tutorials for the more popular DAWs, such as Live and FLstudio. It's information overload, but just keep at it bit by bit.

[Creativemind]

Its funny...
Creativemind just answered a question I've had for a while. Sidechaining has eluded me as a term, but you just defined it in a language that suddenly parted the clouds...

Sometimes we look too hard for our answers and it gets frustrating, but the again all it takes is someone to say something that 'clicks' and viola! So don't be too hard on yourself, sometimes it takes a while to figure this stuff out.

BTW, Thanks Creativemind!

Thanks man. Glad to have been of help.

Yeah like I say, check out the Wickiemedia vids on You Tube. They really explain things very well and are very informative. They have videos on frequencies and harmonics, compression, eq and mixing consoles. Only about 5 mins long and to the point.

Like on the EQ one, one of the first things it says about EQ, is you're doing 1 of 2 things with EQ. 1 - Correcting or 2 - Enhancement. You always want to aim to record something good enough in the first place to never need corrective really.

Some other EQ things I've learnt are:- 1) You want to primarily cut frequencies (which is called Subtractive EQ) rather than boost. It's a bit like a stew. If you've added too much pepper to your stew, you don't want to add garlic or some other ingredient to try and mask the additional flavour of the pepper, you want to remove the pepper don't you? So try to cut rather than boost. And 2) When you cut, you cut narrow (a narrow Q or bell width) but when boosting, boost wide (a wide Q or bell width). Don't really know why, just something I've heard. Someone will probably tell me that's wrong now lol!

These 2 synth school video's are good as well, here's part 1:-

[RandomSkratch]

I'd say, unless you really want to spend the money on a course, that anyone wanting to get on the learning curve should dive right in to YouTube tutorials. Of course Reason-specific ones are good, because all the commands etc are the same (I like the ones Boyinaband does) - but don't be afraid to go for tutorials for other DAWs too. Most of the principles involved are universal, and there are more tutorials for the more popular DAWs, such as Live and FLstudio. It's information overload, but just keep at it bit by bit.

The problem I find with YouTube tutorials is that anyone can make them regardless of the fact they actually know what they're talking about. I've seen some pretty bad videos of people trying to explain a technique they're clearly not familiar with. If you are going with YouTube try to stick to the ones provided by the companies creating the software or that actually teach courses.

[EdGrip]

The problem I find with YouTube tutorials is that anyone can make them regardless of the fact they actually know what they're talking about. I've seen some pretty bad videos of people trying to explain a technique they're clearly not familiar with. If you are going with YouTube try to stick to the ones provided by the companies creating the software or that actually teach courses.

Yeah, it can be tricky to avoid bad information - but there are plenty of knowledgeable people who are good explainers on there, and you just have to trust your instincts a bit.
All the official Propellerhead tutorials are really good, and often smartly edited and funny too.

[Taff]

Many many thanks for the replies, and the kindness shown to a rank amateur!

A wiki would be the canine's genitals!

[dvdrtldg]

I also can't recommend reading the operation manual enough. https://a.phcdn.se/Reason9/Manuals/Reas ... Manual.pdf It could very well be one of the best written manuals out there.

+1 to this

Reading manuals can be a chore sometimes but the Reason manual is excellent. Very readable, well structured and full of examples tips & tricks

[NekujaK]

to diving into the Reason manual. Lots of great info in there. Like many folks on this forum, I've been using Reason for more than a decade, but I still manage to discover some new tidbit nearly every time I browse the manual.

Another way to learn more about music production in Reason is to load up some of the Reason demo songs and go through them in detail. Solo individual tracks, follow the FX routings, observe automation, and look at the mixer settings. At first, it will seem completely overwhelming, but you don't need to understand everything all at once. Start small. For example, pay attention to just the drums. Look at how they are triggered in the sequencer, audition the individual drum sounds and follow any effectss chains associated with them, turn effects on and off to see how the sounds are affected, figure out how the drums are routed to the main mixer, look at how the send effects are being used, and so on... If you have questions about what you find, bring them here and you'll get helpful explanations.

Good luck, and most of all, have fun

[C//AZM]

I'm sure you're right - I do wonder if the term has origins dating back to pre-computer-music times.
But that's the way I've always interpreted/understood it. Just thought I'd have a go at addressing the actual word.

Most definitely. I've had a few labels back in the day ask for stems because my mix couldn't possibly be good enough.
The most I've ever sent was where they got drums stem, a separate snare stem, Bass, Keyboards, Guitars, Strings, solo inst, bkg vox and lead vox.
But usually it was 1-Drums, 2Bass, 3Keys & guit,4 bkg, 5 leads. This was mostly R&B. This was always in case the exec producer of the A&R goober thought there was a problem. Usually they went ahead with my mix, since it was the artist approved mix and it wasn't for high budget acts...in which case they would've had a hotshot mixing engineer mix it.
In my case, I always included the "count in click" at the beginning on each stem. Later, it was da88s and ADATs which made creating stems easier because they were already synched.