Vocabulary?

[lnitroburstl]

Ok, another question from your neighborhood newbie. Is knowing a ton of vocabulary necessary for creating good music? I'm not talking about pitches and chords, I already know quite a bit of music theory because I've played the trumpet for several years. No, I'm talking about oscilloscopes, enabling overdubs, tweak bands, and other seemingly unnecessary technological terms I've seen while screwing around in FL Studio.

[jarrydn]

yes.

[camoshark]

At 8/27/12 12:37 AM, lnitroburstl wrote: Ok, another question from your neighborhood newbie. Is knowing a ton of vocabulary necessary for creating good music? I'm not talking about pitches and chords, I already know quite a bit of music theory because I've played the trumpet for several years. No, I'm talking about oscilloscopes, enabling overdubs, tweak bands, and other seemingly unnecessary technological terms I've seen while screwing around in FL Studio.

Well unless you're working on a notation software, it's always good to actually know what you're doing when messing around in a DAW. You can always try out a few things and, if you've got a good ear for music production, achieve something decent, but that's taking a gamble.

As for some of the fancy terms, if you're not into electronic music, a lot of these terms are completely irrelevant, since using a 3x osciliator would be pretty unlikely in acoustic genres.

Greetings from a fellow trumpeter.

[jpbear]

as long as you know what every parameter in your synths do your good to go.

[HyperTrough]

At 8/27/12 12:37 AM, lnitroburstl wrote: Is knowing a ton of vocabulary necessary for creating good music?

Try it out yourself! Everyone is different :)

[Trampzy]

At 8/27/12 12:37 AM, lnitroburstl wrote: Ok, another question from your neighborhood newbie. Is knowing a ton of vocabulary necessary for creating good music? I'm not talking about pitches and chords, I already know quite a bit of music theory because I've played the trumpet for several years. No, I'm talking about oscilloscopes, enabling overdubs, tweak bands, and other seemingly unnecessary technological terms I've seen while screwing around in FL Studio.

You need to know the terms that relevant to you (as long as all your basics are covered already). So for example, if you were gonna be making just trumpet recordings with perhaps a drum track... I doubt you would be needing an oscilloscope much.
But basically know what you need to know, but it never hurts to know extra information either. The more you know, the more you can successfully communicate with other musicians.

[Step]

If you're just making music on your own without any outside influence, then it won't be much of a problem. If you know what everything does then you don't need to know their names.

However, if you take it up a notch and start accepting other people's guidance, criticism, etc... and even collaborate with them, then you need to know these terms to be able to express yourself properly. It will take a lot longer to explain yourself otherwise and it doesn't give such a good impression of you when you call an oscilloscope "the wave-y thingy at the top".

Don't fret about it though. This stuff comes naturally and is also easy to google. You can even ask here for some definitions; this is an audio forum and discussing audio is pretty much the whole point.

[zelazon]

I suppose it would be nice for someone to make a list of relevant terms so people can learn what they need to know without having to go though years of ignorance because everyone expected them to know the words...

But most of the terms I know intuitively... If anyone would be so kind as to list down terms for me (as many as you know), and then I can compile it in one of my post.

[Breed]

At 8/27/12 05:16 PM, zelazon wrote: But most of the terms I know intuitively... If anyone would be so kind as to list down terms for me (as many as you know), and then I can compile it in one of my post.

this is a BAD idea. Get a music technology dictionary if you want that.

[zelazon]

At 8/27/12 07:16 PM, Breed wrote: this is a BAD idea. Get a music technology dictionary if you want that.

I don't feel like asking because I know where this is going to lead, but why exactly is this a bad idea? I mean it doesn't have to be EVERY term thrown out there, but people at least need to know a base amount of music terms.

[midimachine]

At 8/27/12 07:43 PM, zelazon wrote:

At 8/27/12 07:16 PM, Breed wrote: this is a BAD idea. Get a music technology dictionary if you want that.

I don't feel like asking because I know where this is going to lead, but why exactly is this a bad idea? I mean it doesn't have to be EVERY term thrown out there, but people at least need to know a base amount of music terms.

It's not a bad idea per se, it's just kinda redundant with google and all...

FWIW I think everyone who makes should at least know what an envelope and ADSR is. I'm always surprised by what people don't know (but I do like explaining it, in person at least).

[zelazon]

At 8/27/12 09:26 PM, midimachine wrote:

At 8/27/12 07:43 PM, zelazon wrote:

At 8/27/12 07:16 PM, Breed wrote: this is a BAD idea. Get a music technology dictionary if you want that.

I don't feel like asking because I know where this is going to lead, but why exactly is this a bad idea? I mean it doesn't have to be EVERY term thrown out there, but people at least need to know a base amount of music terms.

It's not a bad idea per se, it's just kinda redundant with google and all...

FWIW I think everyone who makes should at least know what an envelope and ADSR is. I'm always surprised by what people don't know (but I do like explaining it, in person at least).

That's completely understandable... but like if you're a complete starter, google is not going to help you in any way lol. Just maybe like a general list of terms any starting artist (like OP) might want to know so they're not as lost?

[lnitroburstl]

At 8/27/12 09:26 PM, midimachine wrote:
FWIW I think everyone who makes should at least know what an envelope and ADSR is. I'm always surprised by what people don't know (but I do like explaining it, in person at least).

Ok, good, I know what both of those are.

[Step]

At 8/27/12 11:30 PM, lnitroburstl wrote: Ok, good, I know what both of those are.

Then dude why are you worrying about not knowing certain terms? I've been making music for nearly four years, I don't know what any of them mean and I'm getting along fine.

Writing up a dictionary of music production terms isn't a bad idea. I suppose Google will help there, but the thing with that is that you can't search for something you don't know about (i.e. you can't search for the meaning of oscilloscope if you've never heard of the word oscilloscope). In a dictionary, you'll find words you may have never heard of and you may recognise what one of the words refers to as well ("oh so that's what it's called!").

The only problem is that it has been done before.

[zelazon]

At 8/28/12 06:25 AM, Step wrote: The only problem is that it has been done before.

I like this alternative better... a lot better then buying a tech dictonary lol.