Is a Music Production Course Worth It?

Studio hardware and software has been getting increasingly affordable to the point where you don’t have to save up all that much money before you can take your first steps as a producer. Having the right equipment is one thing — having the skills and knowledge is another. So what’s your plan? Are you going for the trial-and-error approach? YouTube tutorials? Or a proper production course? Each path has its own pros and cons. Guest-blogger and songwriter Ben Govers is here to help you decide whether producer school is worth it.

You Can’t Buy Skills and Experience

Back in the day, it took a small fortune to buy everything needed to build a decent home studio. Nowadays, you can get a DAW (‘digital audio workstation’ — music production software) for less than a hundred quid. Studio monitors, microphones and other standard studio gear has also become amazingly affordable. For not too much money, you can build yourself a really decent set-up that offers a ton of possibilities. Those possibilities do however require the necessary skills and experience, and it usually doesn’t take long before fresh-faced producers find this out the hard way. It’s really easy to get stuck or hit a wall that not even YouTube videos can help you navigate your way around.

Music Production Courses

If you’re serious about becoming a producer, then I recommend that you seriously consider taking a proper music production course. There are countless different courses to choose from these days – both full-time and part-time courses – so don’t just go for the top result of a quick Google search. Look up various viable courses and see what they have to offer in detail. ‘Producer’ is a fairly ambiguous term and can refer to more modern, typically EDM-focussed producers that do everything themselves, as well as to studio mixing engineers and live sound technicians. Some courses even specifically train you to become a corporate representative for record labels. In short, take your time to decide on the best course for you and your ambitions.

What They Teach You

Before you pick a course, you need to decide what you want to learn and figure out what you’ll be taught. There are a number of subjects that I think need to be covered, and these are not always the most popular topics.

Acoustics: Tricky Stuff

The stereotypical novice producer is an eighteen year old who’s grown up in the digital age and has all of the time, energy and enthusiasm to learn their way around a DAW in a matter of months and already knows everything about the kind of music they want to make. For these young’uns, courses can quickly take a nasty turn: acoustics. I’m talking about acoustic ‘egg crate’ foam on the walls and absorber panels on the ceiling. The thing is that acoustics are governed by laws of physics. You can’t escape them. As sound techs like to say: large rooms create small problems, small rooms create big problems. In home studios, low frequencies can easily be a nightmare. The soundwaves are often several metres long (longer than the room), with some getting cancelled out and others getting amplified. If you know nothing about acoustics, you won’t know how to deal with issues like this. A proper producer course covers this kind of stuff and teaches you the basics.

What Else?

Other popular (and more fun) subjects that may be covered are:

• Mixing, microphones and peripheral equipment
• Synthesis and sampling
• Workflow tips and plugins
• The music industry and contracts
• Guest lecturers (so you can ask questions and engage with a pro)
• Practical learning (preferably in groups and with proper supervision)
• Educational outings (to professional studios for example)

The Most Important Part: Feedback

You can get feedback from professionals and fellow students, which is incredibly important because it can help you learn more about your style, about things you need to work on, and about parts where you’ve been sloppy. In other words, the good, the bad and the ugly. Your tracks might even remind others of specific producers and artists, which can be a good thing.

In Sum

If you add it all up, you can see that a course can offer different perspectives and cover different aspects. It helps you find out what you’re naturally good at and where you need to improve. It also allows you to see how much effort others put into it, in other words: what it takes to be a good producer — from all of the information to the expectations that the industry entails.

What If I Want to Learn Everything On My Own?

You might be thinking: that’s all great, but the internet is full of tutorials that explain literally everything, from more general subjects like standard studio hardware to small details like the function of that one button found in a submenu of your DAW’s settings menu. So why wouldn’t I be able to learn everything on my own? While you have a point, you’re overlooking the fact that, for the most part, you’ll be focussing on things you already know. Not only that, you’ll be missing out on entire chapters of valuable information. There’s also little structure to it when you opt to learn things on your own. Every tutorial and explanation is a potential distraction that might redirect your focus, and every tutorial maker has a different way of explaining things, which can be confusing. Most importantly, there’s no feedback when you go for the DIY approach.

I Don’t Want to Sound the Same As Everyone Else

If you’re worried about the windtunnel effect because courses treat students to the same subject matter, the same methods and the same exams, then it’s worth knowing that this doesn’t apply to music production courses. You’re simply taught how to work with the tools and technology that comes with the job. What you do with those tools and technology is entirely up to you. Other than the inspiration that fellow students might spark, there’s nothing that affects your creative mind. As I said before, the only thing you need to make sure of is that you pick the right course. So, if you’re dreaming of working with artists and bands, you need to take a mixing and mastering course, not an EDM production course.

The Downsides of Music Production Courses

So are there any downsides? Sure. For a start, a course takes time and money. If you want your investment to be worth it, you need to be fully committed. Hitting the books – literally or proverbially – isn’t always exciting and you’ll also want to be prepared for the fact that there might be students who advance and progress much faster than you, which can be a source of frustration. You want to avoid those ‘what did I get myself into’ kind of thoughts. On the other hand, a music production course can be a solid learning experience. Just remember, you can only spend your time and money once.

Thinking about taking a music production course? Or did you take one in the past? Tell us your thoughts below!

See Also

» A 5-Step Guide to Clean Recordings for Budding Mixing Engineers
» What’s The Best DAW For Beginners?
» Should You Mix with Headphones?
» Why artists use ghost producers
» Recording a Band: DIY vs. The Studio
» 5 Ways to Make Your Mix Sound Louder
» How to Make a Breakthrough as a Producer
» What Does a Producer Do?

» Alle Studio & Recording gear

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