Composing a Piece from Beginning to End (Roadmaps Vol. 3)

Learn the entire process of creating a piece of compelling orchestral music as Benjamin Botkin reveals the step-by-step process behind the creation of the track "The Heart of a Hero." (Content taken from "How to Compose with MIDI and Virtual Instruments")

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Want to develop or improve your music creation process?

The wave of incredible new music creation tools that has swelled over the last 20 years or so has made a lot of things easier for the modern composer, and some things possible that previously weren't.

Yet in the midst of this tsunami of tech, you may still find yourself struggling to plan, create, arrange, and ultimately finish compelling music that... sounds really good.

So I developed a course to teach you how to create a compelling piece of music from start to finish. Featuring an original composition created for this course ("The Heart of a Hero"), I demonstrate my entire process from concept, to composition, to structuring, to orchestration, to performance fine-tuning (for realism), and I finish up with mixing and mastering.

Start with nothing - finish with a completed piece of music

I believe that one of the best ways to learn is to learn by DOING, so we will apply the principles we learn in REAL TIME and each compose a piece of music, side-by-side, step by step, throughout the course. I think that this is a systematic, practical and results-oriented way to teach the process.

Here's how this will work: in one lesson, let's say I teach some basics about composing a melody, and then I will apply the principles myself and compose my own. That lesson's assignment for YOU will be to create your own melody following the principles taught in the lesson. And then in the following lesson we will go through the next step of the process together, and so on until, by the end of the course, we each have a completed piece of music.

This course is part of my "Composer Roadmaps" Series, which are courses that focus on the beginner-to-intermediate end of the skill spectrum. As the term "roadmaps" suggests, these broad-in-focus courses are meant to help you move quickly to the next point in your composing journey.

SPECIFIC TOPICS COVERED:

The mindset of the computer-based composer
Melody writing basics
Structuring and plotting out your piece in your DAW
Principles of orchestration and voicing
Fleshing out an arrangement
Shaping performances
Handling dynamics and swells
Making orchestration choices
Fine tuning your piece
Mixing + mastering approaches

PREREQUISTES:

HARDWARE/SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS: You will need to be set up with a DAW and virtual instruments
SOFTWARE-SAVVY LEVEL: Basic knowledge of how your DAW and virtual instruments work is necessary, but it can truly be basic
MUSICIAN SAVVY-LEVEL: You do not need to be an experienced music. You do not even need to know how to read music, but I do recommend that. If you know some basic terms and concepts (like "melody", "harmony", "chords", "dynamics", etc.) and have some basic idea of how these concepts work on music, then you can learn from this course.

Included in This Course:

13 lessons (Approx 11 Hours Total) of Practical Video Instruction and Demonstration (lifetime access)
Extensive course notes
MIDI files for personal Study
Audio Stems for your own Mixing and Mastering exercise
Access to Private Forte Composer Academy Facebook Community Support group
Resource List for Further Learning

1 - Welcome and About This Course

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2 - The Composer's Mindset and First Steps

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3 - Melody and Structure

4 - Principles of Orchestration

5 - Virtual Orchestration (Part 1)

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6 - Virtual Orchestration (Part 2)

7 - Virtual Orchestration (Part 3)

8 - Virtual Orchestration (Part 4)

9 - Virtual Orchestration (Part 5)

10 - Exporting Stems

11 - Mixing

12 - Mastering and File Export

BONUS - 2022 Thoughts on Mixing and Mastering in your DAW Session

13 - Course Conclusion and What's Next

The Heart of A Hero AUDIO/MIDI ASSETS And Misc. Resources

The Heart of a Hero AUDIO, MIDI, and CPR Assets

The Heart of a Hero Feb19 320MP3.mp3

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21 Tips for Bringing MIDI to Life (PDF)

Resource List for Further Learning

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Are ya thirsty for more?

The material for this course was taken from my larger, 15-hour-long "How to Compose with MIDI and Virtual Instruments" course that I first released in 2019 (and since updated with newer information to be relevant to today). That course goes into additional depth on what hardware and software you need to set up a music workstation and covers basics on how to control a DAW and virtual instruments. In short, in includes the preliminary steps that lead up to the content in this course. It also comes with complimentary instructor feedback of the original composition YOU create for the assignment.

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