Nicky Romero - Khóa học Âm Nhạc Số Digital Music

Chapter 1: Introduction

This chapter serves as an overview of the course ahead. Nicky Romero explains what to expect throughout.

Chapter 2: Logic Settings and Template Overview

In this section, Nicky gives you a quick tour of Logic Pro’s general settings and takes you through the template that you’ll be working with for the remainder of the course. He explains the benefits of building templates so you can get your ideas down and your song off the ground quicker.

Chapter 3: Logic Project Settings

After taking a look at Logic’s general settings, Nicky spends this chapter quickly covering the program’s project settings. These settings cover different parameters that affect your individual project, not how the program itself behaves as a whole.

Chapter 4: Getting Organized

Now that you have some familiarity with the Logic Pro interface, Nicky opens up the template that you will be working from throughout the course. He shows you how easy it is to organize a session, including creating groups and color coding your tracks so everything stays in its place.

Chapter 5: Intro to Splice

In this section, we finally get the project underway. Nicky builds a drum group built using samples imported from Splice, quickly loading sounds and building loops so he can establish a rhythm to build from.

Chapter 6: Sidechain Compression

This section is a complete walkthrough of what sidechain compression is and a demonstration of how to apply it with Nicky’s signature plugin or with a native Logic compression plugin. Nicky also explains the exact purpose of sidechain in dance music.

Chapter 7: Sends & Returns

In this chapter, Nicky shows you how to properly set up and use sends for effects processing in addition to configuring a quick mastering chain that you can reference quickly whenever you need it.

Chapter 8: Kick Drum Design

Nicky explains that through all his years in dance music production, he’s learned that all producers have specific parts of songwriting that they love most. For him, it’s building a kick. In this section, Nicky goes in-depth into his kick drum design process, starting with tuning it to the correct key.

Chapter 9: Shaping Sound

Nicky explains that sometimes, in order to make sure all your sounds have room to breathe in the mix, you may need to adjust the duration of your kick drum’s wavelength. Using his signature Kick II plugin, Nicky shapes and manipulates the kick drum to fit it even tighter into the mix.

Chapter 10: Building the Kick

As we continue processing the kick drum, Nicky demonstrates how to manipulate the sound to make sure it mixes nicely with the rest of your track. Using his Kick II plugin, he shows you how to tune and stretch a sample without distorting it.

Chapter 11: Layering Drums

Now that the kick is established, Nicky gets to work on the rest of the percussion section. Watch as he layers samples to design full and effective claps before exploring transient shaping with the help of Universal Audio’s Oxford Envolution and LPX's Enveloper plugins.

Chapter 12: Cymbals

Up next – cymbal design. In this section, Nicky incorporates cymbals into the project. Because cymbals are so important in house music, he fills this section with general tips and tricks on working with audio clips and how to make sure your cymbals are clean and balanced.

Chapter 13: Sampling in Logic

In this section, Nicky uses Logic's native sampler to show you how to easily influence the behavior of newly imported project samples.

Chapter 14: Making a Hi-Hat

While loops are usually the way to go, Nicky knows all too well that sometimes you just can’t find the right loop. That’s where sound design comes in. Using Logic's ES P plugin, Nicky shows you how to create a hi-hat loop from scratch using only the sampler’s fundamental waveform.

Chapter 15: Intro to Music Theory

This section takes a small break from production in favor of a discussion on the importance of writing melodies. Nicky explains the importance of songwriting in dance music, and how focusing on the theory behind the tune changed his career forever.

Chapter 16: Constructing a Melody

Once you’ve gotten an overview of the technical aspect of chord theory, it’s time to actually write something for the song. Nicky spends this chapter constructing a melody and chord progression, using both his MIDI keyboard and the software’s piano roll.

Chapter 17: More Melody

Focused on building off a freshly composed chord progression, Nicky writes a new melody. He then shows you some quick processing techniques to add some dynamics and texture to your keys before building even more melody layers.

Chapter 18: Writing a Bass Line

Now that the melody and hook are programmed, it’s time to give the song a bass line. Nicky explains how he builds a bass sound, using the melody from prior chapters to inform the bass line writing process.

Chapter 19: Designing a Lead

This section shows Nicky designing and matching a lead synth appropriately to the melody of the tune. Using a sound he had already made for a previous track, Nicky shows you how to mix and layer your lead sounds to make sure they have depth and punch.

Chapter 20: More Layers

In this quick chapter, Nicky goes back to the ES P plugin to beef up the lead synth. Though the difference is subtle, taking this extra step can add some extra attack to your lead. When a synth’s transient has more clarity, it is easier for your ear to pick it out and follow it.

Chapter 21: Reverb

With the track’s key components in place, Nicky introduces the Valhalla Plate and Room reverbs as a way to add some space to the synths. He also teaches you how to quickly create a reverse synth build, which can be incorporated into transitions later on.

Chapter 22: More Bass

In this chapter, Nicky continues to strengthen and sculpt the bass line group. Using both Spire and Nexus, Nicky shows you how to properly craft bass layers that will add substance to your track.

Chapter 23: Processing the Low-End

Nicky pairs up the bass and the kick to form a more cohesive bottom end. With a combination of third-party and native Logic plugins, Nicky shows you some processing and mixing tricks to make sure all of your low-end elements are blending nicely together.

Chapter 24: Custom Risers & FX

Now that the track is mostly laid out, Nicky dives into one of the most important elements of any track – the FX! Though using samples is a common practice, Nicky shows you how to create and design your own custom risers and effects from scratch using the Serum synth plugin.

Chapter 25: Texture Techniques

In this section, Nicky explains that one of the most underestimated elements of a song is atmosphere. Using old tracks, he illustrates the ways in which various atmospheric sounds and sound design techniques can be used to spice up a track and take it an extra step further.

Chapter 26: Intro to Mastering

As we wrap up Part 1, Nicky dives into what he calls the “magic master chain.” Though he explains that there is no one specific master chain that is universally applicable, it is still beneficial to have a base understanding of what to expect from a standard mastering process.

Chapter 27: Introduction to Part 2

In this brief introduction, Nicky welcomes you back to the course with a discussion on arrangement and how to ensure your track is effective in a live setting.

Chapter 28: Reviewing the track

Before diving into the rest of the course, Nicky takes some time to walk you through the track you created in Part 1. This chapter serves to both refamiliarize you with the project and walk you through the changes Nicky has made since it was created.

Chapter 29: Arranging for an audience

Now that you’ve gotten reacquainted with the song, Nicky takes some time to talk about the arrangement process before going any further. Using his latest collaboration with Armin van Buuren as a reference, Nicky shows you how to properly structure your track for a live setting.

Chapter 30: The second drop

In this chapter, Nicky shows you how to further develop your second drop to make sure it stands out from the rest of the song. The goal here is to keep your track effective and engaging throughout, and to create momentum and energy for a crowd to feed and build off of.

Chapter 31: Sculpting the intro

Once you’re satisfied with the changes you’ve made to your second drop and the overall arrangement, it’s time to build out an intro. In this chapter, Nicky shows you some simple ways to introduce elements from your track in your intro.

Chapter 32: Building a bassline

With the track’s core elements in place, Nicky gets to work reworking the bass line in the first build-up. Using Logic Pro’s native ES2 plugin, he gets right to work, programming a deep sub bass pattern that helps fill the gap between the drop and the next section of the track.

Chapter 33: Room to breathe

As important as a memorable, powerful drop is to the song, it is equally important that your audience has a chance to catch their breath before the next climax. To further develop the build-up, Nicky shows you how to use different elements to grab the crowd’s attention again.

Chapter 34: Automation & tension

After working on the tone of his lead synth sound, Nicky jumps into the automation of the build-up. Using a filter sweep technique, he shows you how to use different elements from your track to supplement the build-up and reintroduce some energy and tension to the song.

Chapter 35: Finishing the build

As we approach a final version of the drop, Nicky takes some time to further refine its build-up and impact. After tweaking the drum fill leading into the drop, Nicky listens back through the build-up, making note of additional tweaks he’d like to make before the mixing phase.

Chapter 36: The second breakdown

As the final arrangement begins to take shape, Nicky gets to work on the second breakdown. Pulling impact sounds and FX from Splice, he crafts another build-up before adding a fresh piano layer to the second drop.

Chapter 37: FX & more energy

In pursuit of even more energy, Nicky goes back to splice to hunt down an impactful, unique crowd noise sample. Using it as a type of white noise riser, the sample adds an organic element to the track that will make it even easier for you to win over your audience.

Chapter 38: Building a snare roll

Moving ever closer to a finished arrangement, Nicky finishes sculpting the second build-up by creating a snare roll from scratch. He reiterates the importance of building your own sounds, both to help you stand out for a crowd and as an artist in general.

Chapter 39: Composing an outro

With the arrangement nearly complete, Nicky shows you how to quickly build an outro using earlier elements from your track as a reference. Then, he works his way through the track, checking for any automation or processing blemishes before moving on to the final steps.

Chapter 40: Cutting a radio edit

In the final chapter of Part 2, Nicky shows you how to cut the radio/streaming edit of the track you’ve just finished. By making some judicious cuts to the structure of your arrangement, you can quickly cull down your song without losing any of its impact.

Chapter 41: Introduction to Part 3

Welcome back to Part 3 of Nicky Romero’s Digital Music masterclass. In the previous two parts, you learned all about how to build a track from scratch and put together a cohesive arrangement. In this section, we will focus entirely on mixing and mastering.

Chapter 42: Getting Started

To kick things off, Nicky opens a new Logic Pro session so we can compare tracks that were mixed digitally to those mixed in analog. Nicky takes you through a handful of masters that were done on SSL consoles, pitting them against their digital counterparts.

Chapter 43: The Master Chain

As we get ready to enter the mixdown process, Nicky takes us through the details of his mastering chain. As you work your way through the track and the chain, Nicky experiments with different types of processing and shows you how they can improve, or destroy, your track.

Chapter 44: Bouncing a First Demo

In this chapter, Nicky shows you how to quickly bounce the first demo of your track. Then, he’ll show you how to check how your mix behaves in mono. This process can help you determine whether or not you need to make any significant mixing adjustments going ahead.

Chapter 45: Studio Monitoring

In this brief interlude, Nicky offers his thoughts on studio monitoring and whether or not the most expensive gear is really necessary. He also explains the way room acoustics can impact speaker output.

Chapter 46: Prepping for the Mixdown

As we get ready to start mixing our track, Nicky shows you a few different ways to get organized before you get started. You’ll learn how to properly bounce stems so you can work on your mix in a different session.

Chapter 47: Mixing Do’s & Don’ts

In this section, Nicky quickly lists off his major Do’s and Don’ts to keep in mind during the mixing and mastering process.

Chapter 48: Starting the Mixdown

Now that we’ve bounced all our necessary tracks and established some mixing guidelines, Nicky dives straight into the mixdown. We start the process by removing unnecessary elements from the project and enhancing a few that we've already got.

Chapter 49: Synth Adjustments & Automation

In this section, Nicky turns his attention to his synth leads. After making some adjustments to the velocity and length of notes in certain layers, Nicky makes some automation tweaks as we continue to improve the quality and dynamics of the mix.

Chapter 50: Further Adjustments & Processing

In this chapter, Nicky applies compression, EQ, and additional processing to the kick and bass tracks to enhance their roles within the mix. You’ll learn how to make your low-end elements blend and sound like a cohesive whole rather than a series of layers.

Chapter 51: FX Processing

Nicky spends this chapter further working on the synth leads, experimenting with reverb sends and multiband compression using FabFitler's Pro MB and iZotope's Ozone plugins.

Chapter 52: Percussion Optimization & More Tweaks

Now that the melodic elements have been refined to your liking, Nicky begins working through the percussive elements in the track. Then, after reminding you to save and bounce a new version of your mix every few steps, Nicky makes some additional tweaks to the synths.

Chapter 53: Revisiting the Master Chain

As you get closer and closer to a finished track, Nicky takes you on a deeper dive into his mastering chain. Though Nicky agrees that a solid mastering chain will add that extra punch to your track, the quality and impact of your song comes primarily from your mixdown.

Chapter 54: Final Steps

Before we finalize our track, Nicky reminds you to take another look at your track’s automation. Working his way through the session, he cleans up any sections of automation that went overlooked during the mixing phase or are simply muddying the track.

Chapter 55: Conclusion

In the quick conclusion of his masterclass, Nicky thanks you for joining him on this journey before giving the track one more look. Once he sees that everything is set to his liking, he bounces the track, officially signaling the track’s completion.