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This week, Steve Duda sat down to chat for the EDM Prodcast.

Steve Duda is the founder of Xfer Records and creator of the ever-popular Serum synth. He has been in the industry as both an artist and programmer and has a wealth of experience to share with producers.

We dive into his background and how he studied music composition in college, which opened the door to many different opportunities (despite the 'normal' career trajectory of becoming a teacher).

This set off a chain reaction of events, including a short DJ career in leagues with acts like Skrillex and deadmau5, which eventually lead him to learning programming and starting Xfer.

We also cover the massive success of Serum, and how it performed better than how he could have ever imagined, including the rent-to-own partnership with Splice.

Steve is excellent at drawing parallels between music production and programming and has many great pieces of advice for upcoming producers.

Links:

Serum Rent-To-Own → https://splice.com/plugins/15493-serum-vst-au-by-xfer-records

Songwriting For Producers → https://www.edmprod.com/songwriting-for-producers

Connect with Steve Duda:

Xfer Website → https://xferrecords.com

Twitter → https://twitter.com/steve_duda

Timestamps:

0:00 Intro

2:38 Interview start & moving to Mexico

5:23 Studying Music Composition in college

9:26 The evolution of DAWs and computers

10:41 Rejecting the traditional 'college teacher' route

16:01 Being a jack of all trades

17:10 Pursuing the opportunities around you

18:33 Rich EDM kids and buying careers

21:09 What are you willing to do to achieve success?

23:51 Avoiding 'purist constructs'

24:41 Meta-music and influencing music in indirect ways

27:14 The Reverb filter and Riddim

30:36 Future updates and constantly innovating

32:15 Serum overtaking Massive & visual feedback

36:04 Teaching himself programming

39:26 Make what you would like!

41:24 Splice and rent-to-own

46:03 Serum 2.0 and not charging for updates

50:03 Serum's competitors

56:51 Imagine yourself but younger

57:46 BSOD and prioritizing the tools over writing

01:01:54 Customer support and being accessible

01:05:20 What mistakes are producers making?

01:11:45 If you had a time machine, what would you go back and change?

01:14:42 What's coming up in the next 12 months?

01:17:29 Wrapping up

EDMProd:

Website → https://edmprod.com

Instagram → https://instagram.com/edmprodgram

Facebook → https://www.facebook.com/EDMPsite

Soundcloud → https://soundcloud.com/edmprod

Spotify → https://sptfy.com/edmprod

Aden Russell (Artsea):

Instagram → https://instagram.com/iamartsea

Facebook → https://facebook.com/iamartsea

Spotify → https://sptfy.com/iamartsea

Soundcloud → https://soundcloud.com/iamartsea