Synth for a beginner

I'd like to take a shot at making electronica music. Before I even think about buying anything though, what material would you recommend I read to get my feet wet? I'm coming into this with absolutely no knowledge.

I'm also unsure about a few things. Should I start with a cheap midi controller, or maybe a full-blown synth instead?

Also, as far as making electronica music goes, do you need to know music theory? Better yet, do you need to know how to play a piano? I took lessons a while ago and only for about a year.

Much thanks.

edit - also, would it be helpful to make some type diy analog synth. I've wanted to do that for quite some time now. Have any of you made one? Any kits online that are good for beginners?

Have a look at these links :

http://www.tweakheadz.com/guide.htm

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/allsynthsecrets.htm

http://synth.freehostia.com/

http://www.computermusic.co.uk/page/computermusic?entry=free_beginner_pdfs

To get started with synthesizers, the first step would be to buy a synthesizer

My reccomendations would be :

Roland SH201

-very ideal for the beginning synthesist, has the process of synthesis all layed out for you, and there's no menu diving

Roland JP8000 (must be bought off of ebay)

-very similar to the sh201

Korg MS2000 (must be bought off ebay)

-basically a microkorg, but with full sized keys, and 44 of them

(only 4 notes of polyphony, however)

Dare I say... the microkorg? it only has 37 keys so that could definitely be a limitation, and especially the fact that they are mini keys... if you can put up with it the XL version actually can give you some pretty nice sounds

Novation XioSynth

I'm not sure what your budget is, but if you're willing to go a bit higher than the above ones (500ish) you could have a look at these :

Waldorf Blofeld (some menu diving though)

Nord Lead (2, 2x, or 3)

Korg Radias

after you have chosen a synth, you're gonna need something to record it with in which case you'll need DAW (digital audio workstation) software, or a hardware recorder i guess

it would be helpful to know your budget so I don't recommend something too far-fetch'd

but as far as DAWs go, have a look at these :

http://www.reaper.fm/index.php

http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.com/product/Steinberg-Sequel-2-Retail?sku=500313

http://flstudio.image-line.com/

just try out various trials/demos of softwares, and see what you like

there's tons more stuff out there...

and I'm not sure whether you have a mac or PC so just make sure whatever software you get will work with your computer (Cubase and Sonar don't work on macs)

just read the tweakslab thing, that will give you a lot of helpful, yet digestable information...

you will also be needing an audio intferace, and a midi interface-

read through tweak's guide and you'll learn more about all of this stuff!

good luck, hope I helped!!!

edit- I forgot, you will also need some source of amplification whether it be headphones, an amp, or monitors

lemme know if the stuff i recommended is out of your price range and i will edit as needed

also, it would be helpful to have some piano knowledge for playing keyboards

Thanks a lot, I appreciate all the stuff you posted. Those are fine for price range!

Personally, how much piano experience do you have?

>>Before I even think about buying anything though, what material would you recommend I read to get my feet wet?

the Computer Music Tutorial by Curtis Roads is pretty thorough.

I'm also unsure about a few things. Should I start with a cheap midi controller, or maybe a full-blown synth instead?

thats a tricky one. I would say the most important thing would be lots of knobs/ sliders. When you are starting out, its best to have a lot of control without having to use four buttons to program everything in. its way more fun. So if your trying to save money, go with a cheap midi controller that is covered in knobs to control soft synths, or if you have some money to burn, go for a full synth. getting a microkorg or an alesis micron would be silly as they don't have easy control over the sound.

Also, as far as making electronica music goes, do you need to know music theory? Better yet, do you need to know how to play a piano? I took lessons a while ago and only for about a year.

depends on whether or not your want to focus on melody as the main part of your music. IMHO, electronic musicians with too much of a classic theory backround don't really do so much interesting stuff with the texture of their music, which is where electronic stuff really shines. Unless you have a jazz backround, which would be different.

edit - also, would it be helpful to make some type diy analog synth. I've wanted to do that for quite some time now. Have any of you made one? Any kits online that are good for beginners?

you might want to play with some soft synths first to become familiar with the components of subtractive synthesis first, so you would know what your actually building when you choose a kit..

just remember, you can always find free soft synths..

I started in 2nd grade, but I really didn't like the classical kinds of stuff my teacher was giving me, it was sort of on and off..

I just really started taking it seriously this past year (8th/9th grade)

but I play in a band, and I can handle most of the stuff that's thrown at me

It's not necessarily how long you've been playing, but the effort you put in when you do play.

(I hope this makes sense, )

bump, just to get some more input

I got a Prophet 08 recently as my first synth. Imagine throwing a newborn baby into the middle of the atlantic and telling it to swim home... thats how I feel

What kind of electronic music? Depending on what you want to do the tools may be different.

No input really on the synth you should buy.

But, your comment about piano made me chime in.

I'm a pretty good piano player. I know most of my scales, and can play 5th and 6th grade stuff. Mozart, Beethoven, etc.

My experience has been that piano does not translate to synthesizer. The only similarity is they both have black and white keys. the playing style, technique, and skill sets are not very similar at all.

i cant recommend a juno 60 or 106 enough for a beginner.

very simple, easy to understand architecture, hard to make sound bad, great resale value, and you can still find them for about the same price as the newer virtual analogs.

i couldn't wrap my head around subtractive synthesis until i got my j60.

no, you do not need to know music theory.

and if you're new to synthesizers i'd advise against starting with a DIY kit.

I say Juno 6/60

I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that everyone else's recommendations, while sound, may not be what you really need. Bear with me for a moment.

Most of the gear recommendations in this thread have centered around performance synthesizers. These are great if you're playing music structured around melodic lines -- much popular and rock music fits into this category. Most electronic music, however, is structured around rhythmic patterns chained together. The piano- or organ-style keyboard is designed for the former, but for the latter, a sequencer is perhaps the better method for triggering notes.

NeonMarmot suggested using MIDI to connect a performance synthesizer to sequencer software that runs on a computer. While this is certainly a suitable setup -- and one that many, many electronica artists use -- it may not be the best choice for a beginner. Between the software and the keyboard, you'll have to learn at least two separate user interfaces at a time when you really don't need to be dividing up your attention. Better, I think, to pick an instrument that is both a synthesizer and a sequencer, all in one box. You'll lose some of the flexibility of a keyboard + computer setup, but you'll benefit from a single, focused learning environment.

Some keyboards come equipped with relatively advanced sequencers. Most workstations -- Korg's M50/M3, Roland's Fantom, Yamaha's Motif -- fall into this category. Workstations can be quite expensive, however: even a basic model, like the M50, starts north of $1000 USD. For a pro-level unit, expect to spend at least twice that. The advantage of starting out with a workstation, though, is that you can grow into it, if you decide that you're really serious about your music. As you increase your skills, you'll be able to take advantage of even more of the workstation's functionality, and you won't have to buy a new keyboard to do it. It'll take you years and years to fully exploit all the potential of a modern workstation, and by then you'll be experienced enough to move on to any music-making setup you want.

If you're not so certain about your commitment to the art, though, you might want to consider something a little less flexible and a lot less expensive. Grooveboxes are miniature workstations designed primarily for use by DJs and other non-keyboard-playing synthesists. A groovebox sacrifices a full-size keyboard (and a smattering of workstation features) in exchange for a small form factor and a streamlined user interface. Whereas the process of creating sounds and songs on a workstation requires navigating through pages upon pages of menus, the process of doing the same on a groovebox more often simply involves turning knobs.

There are limitations to the groovebox format, to be sure, but that's to be expected when the average cost of one of these units is around, and occasionally under, $500 USD. Consider Korg's EMX1 -- the unit I'd recommend for you. It's based on an analog-style synthesis engine -- the bread and butter of electronica -- capable of addressing up to four instrument parts simultaneously. One of these parts can be a percussion track that uses samples of real (and electronic) drums. The synthesizer parts, however, are monophonic in nature; if you want to play a chord, you have to split the notes of the chord across multiple parts. This doesn't mean you can't produce catchy music on an EMX1, but it does restrict your compositional options. Before you write off the unit, though, check out the YouTube videos of Denkitribe. He's a sequencer savant who has

If that sounds like the kind of music you're interested in, check out the unit in person. It's flexibile enough to get you started on basic compositions -- and in electronica, composition is arguably more important than traditional keyboard performance techniques -- and inexpensive enough that you won't be out too much cash if you decide that music really isn't the hobby for you.

Which brings me to the subject of books and education, which I'll cover in the next post.

About books: as a teacher myself (to be fair, of film and philosophy, not of music), I'm a firm believer that nothing is more important to success than a good learning curriculum. That means not just learning from good sources, but also wisely selecting those sources so that you can get started right away learning what truly interests you.

To that end, I would actually advise against piano lessons, at least for now. Most electronic music really doesn't depend very heavily on traditional performance technique. In most music genres -- classical, jazz, rock, folk -- performance is everything. In fact, some genres, like blues, are actually inseparable from the performance techniques used with their respective instruments. Without string-bending on the guitar, blues would just be amplified folk music.

In electronica, however, expressive performance is often used only as a garnish of sorts -- a finishing touch. The meat of an electronica composition is a chain of mechanical, sequenced patterns. Piano technique might help with those performance garnishes on your music -- and some artists, like I've Sound, actually make very expressive use of the piano within an electronic music context -- but it won't provide the core of what you need to learn. If anything, it will take you further away, since many piano curricula concentrate on classical music and pop standards.

What you need to learn is sequencer technique: how to program patterns into a sequencer, how to chain those patterns together, and how to tweak them so you create evolving variations in those patterns -- these variations produce the sense of forward movement that characterises electronica. For this, you will need to learn at least some basic music theory. One book I can highly recommend for this is Michael Hewitt's Music Theory for Computer Musicians. He takes you step by step through the basic principles of Western music theory, all the while firmly explaining their use within the context of a workstation-style sequencer. This approach will require some translation if you use something like an EMX1, but Hewitt still provides the best description I've yet read about the principles of theory and how they interact with one another (and I've been through Alfred's and Edly's, the two most frequently-recommended theory books). Hewitt has a couple typographic glitches and the occasional inaccuracy -- ignore his early section on synthesizer sound generation; it's riddled with errors -- but his book is, on the whole, quite solid.

And if you make it through Hewitt's book on theory, he has another that explores electronica-style composition in greater depth: Composition for Computer Musicians. I haven't yet read that one, though, so I can't give you a review.

In addition to music theory and sequencer programming, you'll also need to know how to program sounds using a synthesizer. This is admittedly a thorny area, and if you really want to dive into the deep end, you'll need to know some algebra. kooki_sf recommended Curtis Roads' Computer Music Tutorial, which I admittedly have not read. From what I've heard, it's a bedrock text that belongs in any synthesist's library. My concern, however, would be that since it is a college-level textbook, it might work better as a second book, with something more basic serving as your first.

For a basic first book, I always recommend Mark Jenkins' Analog Synthesizers. Jenkins uses a remarkably clear writing style -- uniquely among authors of synth books, he describes the effects of various synth modules in terms of how the sound feels; most authors just explain, technically, what the module does, and leave it at that -- that makes it easy to grasp basic synth concepts.

Jenkins is also -- again, unlike some authors -- not above explaining the clich

Klaus, I appreciate the extensive effort you put into your posts. I have one question for you though:

I've come to realize I'm not going to drop $500 on something that I think sounds cool. Can I start with just downloading some free-trial of Cubase, Reason, etc...and buy some cheap midi controllers, like the Korg NANO products?

I don't have any personal experience with any of these items but the akai ones look better built, and for just a few more bucks I think it's worth it.

http://www.akaipro.com/lpd8

http://www.akaipro.com/lpk25

as far as a (keyboard) midi controller, you might wanna go for 49... 25 could be pretty limiting

in which case I'd suggest looking at the

Edirol PCRs

Emu Xboards (comes with a library of sounds, i dont know too much about that though)

M-audio Axiom

and perhaps the novation x station is the perfect solution for you, because it combines a midi controller, onboard sounds, integrated audio card thing, and usb connectivity all in one...

edit :

I really think you should get piano lessons,

Even if you were to just learn basic keys and triads, it would still help a lot

(although I would advise getting a lesson a week for an hour or so, because there's always more to learn or whatever you can afford)

If he's just using the controller for programming, and not for performance, then 25 might work fine.

And OP, if you're at the point where you're only going to consider controllers in the $60 price bracket, I'd advocate just skipping the controller entirely and using the PC keyboard to enter notes. Some DAWs allow that input method, and other's don't, but it would let you check out the demo versions at zero expense. Besides, the Korg NanoKey basically is a computer keyboard; the keys are just sized slightly differently and dyed white and black.