People wonder how it is done

It is something that has been with us for centuries

That something is music

For many, it touches the heart. It is something that is in our lives from the day we are born to the day we die. Some people are still deeply involved with music even after death, or better yet it is involved with them. We have artists make music and pump out new tunes and jams each day. Some say it is just a natural talent. Some say it is being in the right place at the right time. If music isn't your niche, but you want to do it badly enough, even you can learn.

There is this nice little thing called music theory. By little, I mean there are many aspects to it and it is such a giant ball of scientific enigma that we barely grasp. There is math to be learned and chords to be made. For now, we can cover the basics.

A basic understanding of how sheet music is written is required beyond this point. This is about making music and music theory down to the notes, but not the notation itself. If you have the proper preliminary reading, please proceed. Guides will often come with the instrument you purchase or are available online or in music shops.

Tools

Anything you have that can produce a note works. Any instrument is a great start. I would suggest starting with an instrument that is in the key of C. A C instrument is an instrument that sounds exactly how it reads, perhaps with the difference of an octave such as Guitar or Bass Guitar. Octaves are essentially the same exact note except higher or lower. It is a strange concept to grasp at first. You might be thinking Well then how are they the same note? We will cover more of that later. But basically, you want a C instrument to start with. They are simple. If you can get your hands on some software too, that would be especially good. These programs maximize learning and minimize frustration. I personally use FL Studio 10. I find it rather user friendly. Don't ever let anyone tell you it isn't a valid way to make music. It is still a rather arduous process.

If you don't know whether or not an instrument is a C instrument, don't fret, music shops are all over the world. Online music shops are also an option. There are many websites that answer questions as to which instrument falls under what category. Would you believe me if I said Saxophone was a woodwind? Well, I hope you got your instrument or program ready because now it is time to dive into some science.

Notes on a scale

2 2 1 2 2 2 1
That sequence of numbers is your best friend. I prefer to remember it as step step half, step step step half. There are these things called steps and halfsteps in music. One fret on the guitar is a half step. A single key forward on the piano is a half step. Going from F to F sharp (sharps are normally represented as hashtags) is a half step. Going from F to F flat (normally a little b looking thing) is, wait a minute! There is no such thing as F flat. A half step below F is E! We will find anomalies like this between B and C and E and F. There is no accidental between B and C or E and F. Sharps and flats are typically called accidentals. Some people, due to the instrument they play or otherwise, hate these notes because they do not fall on the typical C major scale. I refer to them quite fondly as pain.

So given that we have accidentals in weird places and places lacking accidentals, lets break down 2 2 1 2 2 2 1 a bit. The 2 is a whole step. 1 is a half step, hence my translation above. Starting at C, we have a C major scale with this formula. 1 step above C is D. 1 step above D is E. A half step above E is F. I think you get the picture. 1 step above F is G. To be honest, it took me a while to get it. These letters have names when they are in a scale. C major is C D E F G A B C. If you count it out, there are 8 letters. These are our notes. Each one gets assigned a number. C, being our first note, is 1. D is 2. The pattern continues up until 8. C major is the name of the scale, but there is also the C major chord. Chords and chord progressions are probably one of the most important foundations in a song.

Chords are your friend, and possibly your worst enemy

The nomenclature is just painful. So C is a note, a chord, and a scale? When talking about music conversationally, the difference can actually be quite easy to pick up on. Someone asks you to give them a C and you play the chord. Perhaps they just wanted the note? They'll tell you. Speaking of chords, a normal major chord is 1, 3 and 5. The 1st, 3rd, and 5th of the C scale is C E G. These are the notes you would play to make the chord. This is possibly the most important chord you will ever know. There are other chords from other scales that can be played on the C scale. Lets use G and F as some good examples. The G scale is G A B C D E Fsharp G. The G chord is G, B and D. This is G major. The F scale is pretty cool too. F is F G A Bflat C D E F. Our chord is F, A and C. All these notes align with the C scale. The scale has no accidentals, so any chord that lacks accidentals will work. We have 3 pretty nice chords here, C, F, and G. You can play them in any order but I would start with C.

Lets look at some minor chords. You might ask Well, what is a minor chord? My friend I shall tell you the simple trick to make a happy chord sad. That 3rd that you have? Well, it needs to be taken down a half step. C becomes C Eflat G. F becomes F Aflat C. G becomes G Bflat D. These chords together would actually work well on the C minor scale. To make a major scale minor, you take the 3rd, 6th, and 7th and you lower them a half step. The C scale starts to look like C D Eflat F G Aflat Bflat C. These chords are pretty sad. Playing only sad chords can actually make a song really depressing. Every good chord progression has a nice balance, perhaps leaning to one side a little.

Chord Progressions, do we have to learn 1000 chords???

In short, yes.

Basically, chords evoke emotion. They do. They're a beautiful thing. I'm going to draw some numbers from a random number generator and we will work with them. 4 2 3 7 4 Okay. These are our chords. Lets put a 1 in front of that and we have our progression. 1 4 2 3 7 4 We have our C scale. C D E F G A B C. Our chord progression is C F D E B F. Now you might be wondering How will we get these to fit on the C scale? Well, B can be tweaked to not be terrible. I personally hate the B scale and B chords and just B in general. We will make it work. So D major has D Fsharp A. If you remember from before, lowering the 3rd a half step makes the chord minor. We can have C F Dm E B F. Lets fix E and B now. E is E Gsharp B. We could make it minor or eliminate the 3rd altogether. We can make it go away and have a nice open sounding E5 chord. E5 is just E and its 5th, which is B. We could have a suspended 4th chord, which is 1 4 5. These are pleasant chords. E Fsharp Gsharp A B Csharp Dsharp E is the scale we are working with when construction this chord. Fsharp is the 2nd and therefore not an option. So now we have C F Dm Esus2 B and F. B is painful. Let me show you why. B Csharp Dsharp E Fsharp Gsharp Asharp B. Everything is an accidental. We could have B4 which is B and its 4th. Better yet, that is our only option. Lets do that. Now we have C F Dm Esus2 B4 and F. Play it on your instrument my friend.

Even if you don't like it, this isn't all there is to it. There are melodies to be made and lots of fun to be had. Nothing I could possibly say will change the song that you really want to make deep down. You listen and work and create and listen some more. It took me 2 years. Now melodies are made differently with different instruments and what have you my friend, but it is easier to test different melodies in FL Studio or GarageBand or even Dubturbo. There are many many programs. I would suggest starting with programs again to minimize frustration. Also, know your audience. Some people will like the chords above, some won't. It all depends on the person listening. The most important thing is that you like what you're doing.

And if you feel like you're failing, in the wise words of Billy Idol

Start Agaaaaaaaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiiin