Let's make better music ... Together! - The Art of Sampling

Introduction

Hello Steemians!

It's been a few days since my last blog (sorry about that), but I am back again! This time with an entry regarding sampling.

What is Sampling?

In music production, sampling refers to the act of taking a piece of a recorded music – a sample – and using it as a part of a new piece of music. A sample could be the drums of a song or maybe the instruments or maybe the voice or maybe... you get the idea. It's a part of a different song.

This is quite similar to remixing, in fact I like to think of it as a gradient.

On one side we have using the smallest pieces of a song, like a sung word or a drum fill/transitional effect, and on the other we have a full blown remix, which is defined as a reinterpretation of a creative work. So where does sampling end and remixing begin?

Honestly, this is impossible to tell. Mick Jenkins – Comfortable 'sampled' The Turn – AKG Perception, but Joyner Lucas 'remixed' Gucci Gang, even though they basically use the same amount of the original song. I would say that the difference between the two generally lies in how you feel about it. If you think the song is more you than the original, it's a sample, but if you think the song is more original than you, it's a remix.

How do I set up a sample?

So you've been browsing through some music and you found a section of a song that makes you go, “Damn. I want to use that in a song.” You've downloaded it and put it into your DAW, but now what? How can we go about using this sample?

If you're using a whole section of a song, it may be important to figure out what the bpm of the original track is. I usually do this by tapping out the beats, but, if you are struggling, you can find most semi-popular songs' bpm on google.

Once you've figured out how fast it is, you should fit the samples tempo to your tempo. To do this in FL Studio, click on the little box at the top left corner of the sample in your playlist and select fit to tempo. Then click on type in bpm and enter the bpm of the sample. Doing this means you can now change the tempo of your song and still have the sample locked to your bpm. Pretty cool, right?

the little box

Another thing you want to do, is figure out what key the sample was playing in. This steps a bit trickier. If there's a section of the song where only one note a time plays, then gg ez throw that part into a tuning plugin and look at what notes it's playing. You can then use a tool like this to figure out what scale you're in. If the song is decently known, you'll be able to find out what key it's in with a google search. If neither of these things happen, you just have to go by ear.

Now that the basic part is covered and you've figured out what part of the song you want to sample, it's time to get into the creative process.

So what are some things you can do?

Cutting the sample up and rearranging it is, especially in hip hop, a class favorite. You can do this by dragging your sample into the Slicex plugin or do it manually in the playlist. I like to drop it into Edison to set markers and then throw that into Slicex, because this allows me to cut up the sample how ever I choose and then be able to play the sections I cut out on my midi keyboard.

The button in edison to set markers with. First, click where you want it, then, set the marker.

Another popular trick is reversing the sample before cutting it up. Reversed things have a mysterious vibe about them, so if that's the vibe you're going for, definitely try it out!

You can also try to mix and match different instruments in the song, by stacking the different parts of the song and EQ-ing them out of each other. This lets you take the bass of one section and the chords of another or the melody of the intro and the drums from the climax, just make sure to clean up the extra noise.

Note: this works a lot better with somesongs than others. If it doesn't have a lot of elements playing at once this can spice up the sample quite a bit though

Once you have the melodic order of you sample figured out, treat it as an instrument!

That means that any mixer track effects you want to add onto it you should. One of my favorites is half speed Gross Beat, but I'm a sucker for low and slow sounding things.

Be creative! Once you have the tempo and key of the sample, you can basically do whatever you want with it, so try things out! Remember, if you're sampling something, you need to make it feel like you want it to.

I feel like I've covered the gist of sampling. If you have something to add please do and untill next time,

LET'S MAKE SOME AWESOME MUSIC!