Charlie’s Music Production Lessons

Challenging yourself to re-arrange a piece of music is a good way to practice your composing skills without having to start from scratch. For this episode, I made it my goal to transform a cheesy soap opera theme into something that I’d actually want to listen to. In the end, it turned into an old-school video game track.

This production lesson originally aired in Composer Quest episode 124 with Jon Brantingham. For more music production lessons and composer interviews, visit composerquest.com.

If you were asked to channel The Beatles and write a new song in their style, how would you do it? That was the challenge I gave myself in creating a jingle for my patron from Liverpool, Luke Thomas. In this episode, I explain my thought process behind each layer of this Beatles-esque song.

This production lesson originally aired in Composer Quest episode 122 with the TV composers Fil Eisler and Mac Quayle. For more music production lessons and composer interviews, visit composerquest.com.

Sometimes you have to expand your horizons as a producer and just experiment with as many different crazy effects as possible. Here are some mixing ideas I used in a sound collage I made for one of my Composer Quest patrons.

This production lesson originally aired in Composer Quest episode 121 with Noah Keesecker. For more music production lessons and composer interviews, visit composerquest.com.

I often start a song idea on guitar, but sometimes I add so many layers I have to pick and choose which ones should be highlighted, and which ones should be subconscious background layers. In this episode, I talk about my process mixing a commercial soundtrack.

This production lesson originally aired in Composer Quest episode 119 with Lisa Walkosz-Migliacio. For more music production lessons and composer interviews, visit composerquest.com.

When I’m composing at the piano, I often start by playing chords over and over until a melody pops into my head. In this episode, I talk about how I apply that method to a chiptune video game score. I also test out my new collection of chipsounds.

Sometimes the best way to tug at people’s heartstrings through a film score is by using familiar melodies. In this episode, I talk about scoring a short film by creating new arrangements of classical themes.

I started a stock music project that was part joke, part business venture, and part musical experiment. In this episode, I break down one of my sunny, ukulele productions designed to fit a cheesy commercial.

Musical chills have been on my mind lately, since I listened back to a past song of mine and got chills in the same spot I always do. In this episode, I share some of the science behind musical chills, to try and answer why this song gives me goosebumps.

I just got a new orchestral sample library, and I’m really enjoying messing around with these surprisingly realistic instruments. In this episode, I share some things I’ve learned while working on an orchestral score for a new video game.

I had the privilege of watching Rich Vreeland (aka Disasterpeace) give a live music production demo at Gamer’s Rhapsody. In this special CMPL episode, you’ll get to hear Rich composing a track on the fly. He shares his secret ingredients in scoring the video game FEZ: the Massive synth, with heavy amounts of reverb, bitcrushing, randomness, and tape warble. Here’s the video of this demo.