Introduction: Make Electronic Music? Sounds Great! Cheap! Super Easy! Tutorial

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About: I'm a middle aged married man! I like to work with electronics, computers, cable, test equipment. Making things work. Playing with electronics is my life I guess, but mostly discovering how it works. Beep! Bo…

Hey! Have you ever had an idea for a song, but didn't know how to pull it together i.e.
No experience.
No instrument.
Don't even know how to play an instrument?

Well look no further.  I want to introduce you to FL Studio.  With FL studio, one can start making electronic music right away with the demo version, and its free.  All you need is a computer that run FL Studio a mouse and a computer keyboard.  It does work better with a midi keyboard though, It really almost sounds to good to be true.  

Even for the professional, FL Studio can be your back up in a pinch, or even enhance your existing sound.  I imagine that professionals are already using FL Studio. Want to make that Wobble Bass sound, FL Studio is the package that can do it.

Even if you bought all the packages that they offer, what you get in my book it's a bargain.  Years ago, one had to fork out a lot of money for this stuff.  

Link to download http://www.image-line.com/downloads/flstudiodownload.html 

Imagine if you had all the tools you need to write that hidden song that's in your head, all that talent at the tip of fingers! Basically being able to start running like a track star as soon as you download the demo.  I'm sure it will be initially like driving a MAC truck without a drivers license, but unlike crashing with MAC truck, if you crash you, can start all over. How cool is that.  

To get started all you need is a computer that meets the requirements, your computer keyboard will map out to the keys on the keyboard. I eventually broke down and bought a midi keyboard. I saw a You tube tutorial and the  recommendation was that the M-Audio Midi key board Oxygen49 was a good keyboard to get started with for FL Studio. The interface was very simple.  Hook up a USB port Midi keyboard, go to the options and select refresh.  It mapped all the keys, and I was playing right away.  Defining a button was just as easy.  I'll save that for another tutorial, or look it up on You tube, super easy stuff.  

What you get with the demo is a easy to use sequencer, tons of effects, whole bunch of synthesizers, thousands of sounds and millions of possibilities.  I'm talking about mind blowing ear candy!

You need a computer.
System Requirements:
2Ghz Intel Pentium 4 / AMD Athlon 64 (or later) compatible CPU with full SSE2 support. The faster your CPU and more cores it has the more you will be able to do simultaneously. Download and test the demo!

32 or 64 Bit versions of Windows 8, Windows 7, Vista, XP (with service pack 3)

(or) Intel Mac with Boot Camp / Windows.
Running XP (with service pack 3), Vista or Windows 7 (in 32 or 64 Bit)

1 Gb or more RAM recommended

1 Gb free disk space

Soundcard with DirectSound drivers. ASIO/ASIO2 compatible required for audio recording (FL Studio installs with generic ASIO4ALL drivers)

In the past few months, I have uploaded to You Tube, Sound Cloud, Face Book. 

Check out my songs that I've written.  

I hope you will get lost in the world of electronic music as I have. 

Here are some of the tunes I've written, and I welcome any comments.  I'm no professional, but I sure have had a blast figuring out how to do this stuff. 

http://soundcloud.com/lancruz1

http://www.youtube.com/user/lancruz1/videos?view=0


The beauty of this software is if you want to figure out something, type in a key word in YouTube, and there is video on how to do it.   
Pick a certain Genre and it's there too.
From the basics to the more complex. 

Say, how about making a song for a video.  You don't have to worry about it being copy written since it was you that created it. 

Also if you need any pointers or some ideas, I look forward to hearing from you.  Tell me about your experience. 

I had noticed on Instructables that there is not very much about FL Studio.  So I wanted to share this with all my Instructable friends.

I've also added my tutorial on how to configure one of the synthesizer on how to create the Wobble Bass with my own songs!  Excuse the commentary with the ands and uhms!  Something I'm working on. 

Thanks for looking and any constructive criticism on this tutorial is welcome too!  I hope you enjoy what I put together.  I hope it is entertaining and enjoyable to watch and listen. 
Peace!

I will be posting how to connect to FL Studio with a Midi Controller.  In the meantime i also have a blog that I write.  You are welcome to comments on my reviews. 

http://crossroadsdimension.blogspot.com/2012/12/m-audio-oxygen49.html