How do YOU compose orchestral / cinematic music?

Envato Authors AudioJungle
1

I’m starting this thread because it’s so hard to find quality and complete tutorials on the internet for creating this awesome music genre! Since AudioJungle is full of talented people who already mastered this, I thought why not asking here so that me and other beginners/or advanced folks can learn from the best :smiley:

For instance;

  • which DAW are you using, or find best for this type of music?

  • do you use midi controller and record midi with it, or do you just use a computer mouse on the piano roll to write music.

  • which libraries do you use the most?

  • the MOST important thing which is extremely hard to find anywhere when it comes to cinematic music is how to use EQ (since it often gets muddy or with too much mid frequency), how and where to use compression, how to create depth with reverb without getting everything messed up like I do with Altiverb , how to master the track (I suppose it’s a bit different process from mastering EDM)

I would actually buy quality tutorials with these things but there’s nothing out there…

  • What inspires you, which artists, or anything else worth mentioning?

  • you can even describe the process of creating one of your tracks, that would be cool :smiley:

AudioJungle has really forced me to work hard on my production skills and I’ve noticed that since I’m trying so hard to achieve the quality sound production, I don’t have as much ideas for the actual melodies as I did before I worried about these things. It’s weird because I had tons of ideas when I didn’t care too much about the production quality. If I could only master these techniques and make a few templates in FL Studio so that I can just open them and start composing with nothing to get in the way of my ideas, it would be great.

Please don’t hesitate to write/ask anything in this thread regardless of your composing/production level. Let’s just have fun and discuss these things :smiley:

Matt

2

I must show you what I’ve found today. Look how easy this man is composing music, and creating an awesome sounding score in less than 10 minutes! I would be happy to do this in 10 hours lol
The thing is that he already has the knowledge of orchestration, reverb use, EQ-ing etc… which he used to create a template with everything ready so that he can just sit and record his ideas out there without having to worry that much about mixing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGBfgaesP-4&list=PL4E0F5DAB1C67F3BC

1 Like
3

I hope you do not mind me submitting a response to your thread.

I love doing the cinematic stuff and I have some things to share with you if you do not mind!

I use Cubase 6.5 on a PC with 32gb RAM and 4 internal hard drives 2 of which are SSD’s which hold the bulk of my sound libraries. I use mainly 8DIO sound libraries with Project Sam Symphobia 1,2 & 3. I adore all things Spectrasonics and I bend, cut and mutilate the loops it comes with. Spitfire Audio has to be King especially HZ Percussion and with these you can get the expensive sound.

I render all stems (individual tracks) so I can compress and add reverb on every channel. Having loads of RAM helps as some of my stuff can wiegh upto a total track count of 40+. I love percussion and poly rhythmic tracks and this normally adds up to 20 - 30 tracks all by themselves. I use reverb from Rob Papen as it has fairly low CPU overheadsand sometimes I will use stereo delay on synths / pads etc from Steinberg’s own internal FX section. I also use the internal Steinberg Compressor for tracks.

Mastering is done in Wavelab 7 using Waves plugins - EQ and finaloutput using L1 Ultramaximiser (this has to be the greatest thing since sliced Roast Beef).

Enjoy doing cinematic tracks as I do although competition here is hot from Martijn and Jeff - they are Kings! :slight_smile:

1 Like
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gballx said

I hope you do not mind me submitting a response to your thread.

I love doing the cinematic stuff and I have some things to share with you if you do not mind!

I use Cubase 6.5 on a PC with 32gb RAM and 4 internal hard drives 2 of which are SSD’s which hold the bulk of my sound libraries. I use mainly 8DIO sound libraries with Project Sam Symphobia 1,2 & 3. I adore all things Spectrasonics and I bend, cut and mutilate the loops it comes with. Spitfire Audio has to be King especially HZ Percussion and with these you can get the expensive sound.

I render all stems (individual tracks) so I can compress and add reverb on every channel. Having loads of RAM helps as some of my stuff can wiegh upto a total track count of 40+. I love percussion and poly rhythmic tracks and this normally adds up to 20 - 30 tracks all by themselves. I use reverb from Rob Papen as it has fairly low CPU overheadsand sometimes I will use stereo delay on synths / pads etc from Steinberg’s own internal FX section. I also use the internal Steinberg Compressor for tracks.

Mastering is done in Wavelab 7 using Waves plugins - EQ and finaloutput using L1 Ultramaximiser (this has to be the greatest thing since sliced Roast Beef).

Enjoy doing cinematic tracks as I do although competition here is hot from Martijn and Jeff - they are Kings! :slight_smile:

Thanks for the response Graham, I don’t mind at all! 32 gb RAM is huge :smiley: I only have 8 and I doubt that FL even uses all of it… I must check that for sure since 32bit version can only use max of 4gb… Rendering stems you say, you mean like you compose the peace without any effects than you export every instrument as wav, dry and without panning so that you could do all those stuff later without torturing your CPU? :slight_smile: I can see that scenario in my case at least XD

5

I use Logic on a mac mini, my samples are on a slave pc and I sync it all up with Vienna Ensemble. My go-to libraries are Spitfire Albion, Cinesamples Hollywood woodwinds, VSL solo woodwinds, VSL Dimension Brass. I have the universally celebrated LASS but I have never got the violins to sound sweet enough, so this has been my single biggest regret purchase ever :frowning:

How do I compose? Well if I have time or, even if I don’t and I’m working on a feature length film, I start with piano and work out themes, progressions, motifs, chord progressions etc. first. Then I have a sound palette to work with and develop. But sometimes I just sit down and bang out a melody, or a riff and develop it just on the fly, by instinct.

I play everything in on an M-Audio keyboard, even though my playing is dreadful- so there is a lot of midi wrangling to do to get the phrases sounding right. I use a Korg Nano Kontrol too which is perhaps the best little “toy” I’ve ever bought- cheap, portable, easily programmable, and great for automating cc data.

I usually bounce down all tracks to audio and then start the mixing process, even though I may have done a little mixing in the original project file. To me this, makes the mixing process easier, especially if there is already lots of midi automation going on. It can just end up very messy with squiggly lines all over the d.a.w :slight_smile:

I learnt a lot from Mo Volans’ videos on Mixing and mastering. He talks about electronic music (dance) but you can apply a lot, if not all, to orchestral too. I keep compression to a minimum and really only use it to give cohesion to the overall sound. But then again, I don’t do epic cinematic and prefer to keep things more intimate piano, strings, woodwinds harp etc.

So how do you go about it Cyberwave?

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6

The best advice I can give you regarding creating orchestral/cinematic/epic music is to treat it like composing other music genres, but only orchestrated. Start with either an harmonic progression, a melody or a rhythmic pattern, and once you have those, well… there’s no way around it - you need to learn how to orchestrate.

There’s a book called the study of orchestration which does a really good job in teaching the usages and timbre of each instrument and instruments combinations. Beside giving it a read, I strongly suggest you to listen to well orchestrated music and try to identify what instruments are being used where and in what role, and in what combinations (e.g. violins+flutes playing the melody; horns+trombones playing guide notes, etc.)

That’s my one cent. Hope that helped. :slight_smile:

Oh, and as for that video - don’t feel threatened, That piece was pre-composed. For all we know it might have took him a month to write (not likely). What we see in the video is just him recording it. That’s why I don’t like the title of that video, it’s live RECORDING, not live COMPOSITION, that’s pretty misleading.

2 Likes
7

Small tip about Fl Studio (You mentioned the memory).
in the folder of the installation of Fl you have and .EXE That open an option for more memory.
-Fl studio (Extended Memory).
that could really help you :>
Hope I’ad helped a little…

8
Hezo said

Small tip about Fl Studio (You mentioned the memory).
in the folder of the installation of Fl you have and .EXE That open an option for more memory.
-Fl studio (Extended Memory).
that could really help you :>
Hope I’ad helped a little…

Also if you have 64bit system you can download new x64 Fl Studio from official Image Line site. It seems to be have no RAM limits. Of course you have to run 64bit kontakt there.

9
CyberwaveOrchestra said

I must show you what I’ve found today. Look how easy this man is composing music, and creating an awesome sounding score in less than 10 minutes! I would be happy to do this in 10 hours lol
The thing is that he already has the knowledge of orchestration, reverb use, EQ-ing etc… which he used to create a template with everything ready so that he can just sit and record his ideas out there without having to worry that much about mixing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGBfgaesP-4&list=PL4E0F5DAB1C67F3BC

Nice video! The template he uses is just amazing, how many CPUs and RAM can carry so much VSTi at once. Furthermore orchestral plugins are often heavy ones.

10
stardiva said

I use Logic on a mac mini, my samples are on a slave pc and I sync it all up with Vienna Ensemble. My go-to libraries are Spitfire Albion, Cinesamples Hollywood woodwinds, VSL solo woodwinds, VSL Dimension Brass. I have the universally celebrated LASS but I have never got the violins to sound sweet enough, so this has been my single biggest regret purchase ever :frowning:

How do I compose? Well if I have time or, even if I don’t and I’m working on a feature length film, I start with piano and work out themes, progressions, motifs, chord progressions etc. first. Then I have a sound palette to work with and develop. But sometimes I just sit down and bang out a melody, or a riff and develop it just on the fly, by instinct.

I play everything in on an M-Audio keyboard, even though my playing is dreadful- so there is a lot of midi wrangling to do to get the phrases sounding right. I use a Korg Nano Kontrol too which is perhaps the best little “toy” I’ve ever bought- cheap, portable, easily programmable, and great for automating cc data.

I usually bounce down all tracks to audio and then start the mixing process, even though I may have done a little mixing in the original project file. To me this, makes the mixing process easier, especially if there is already lots of midi automation going on. It can just end up very messy with squiggly lines all over the d.a.w :slight_smile:

I learnt a lot from Mo Volans’ videos on Mixing and mastering. He talks about electronic music (dance) but you can apply a lot, if not all, to orchestral too. I keep compression to a minimum and really only use it to give cohesion to the overall sound. But then again, I don’t do epic cinematic and prefer to keep things more intimate piano, strings, woodwinds harp etc.

So how do you go about it Cyberwave?

Very interesting! Good idea to start with piano there and work your way to a full song. I’m also not a good keyboards player so I’m struggling with midi editing a lot unfortunately. Korg Nano Kontrol seems great and the price is not too much. I guess it can be helpful for a lot of things so maybe one day I’ll buy something similar. I also enjoy listening and creating more intimate piano pieces but it’s such a pain in the ass to balance the sound. I think that mixing and mastering for piano is a bit different since it’s such a “frequency rich” instrument.

11
SoundSphere said

There’s a book called the study of orchestration which does a really good job in teaching the usages and timbre of each instrument and instruments combinations. Beside giving it a read, I strongly suggest you to listen to well orchestrated music and try to identify what instruments are being used where and in what role, and in what combinations (e.g. violins+flutes playing the melody; horns+trombones playing guide notes, etc.)

I would like to read some basic stuff so that it’s not too much for my brain at once! :smiley: You’re totally right about listening to music with orchestration in mind. I started doing that lately and it really helps to see how everything works together in a song. I especially love music by Arn Andersson (https://www.youtube.com/user/ArnAndersson) who creates everything with sample libraries and you can read what he has used in the description below the video. I thought buying his album and asking him a few questions after I listen to it since he seems like a friendly and helping guy

12
Hezo said

Small tip about Fl Studio (You mentioned the memory).
in the folder of the installation of Fl you have and .EXE That open an option for more memory.
-Fl studio (Extended Memory).
that could really help you :>
Hope I’ad helped a little…

I’m already using that feature, it saved my life discovering that after experiencing few nasty crashes due to RAM overload :slight_smile:

13

Cubase 7

Intel i3 (Windows, Duo Core, 6Gig RAM)

East West Gold Orchestra
Sample Logic Morphestra and others.
UVI Piano Collection

Tone Boosters EQ
I also like to use Cubase’s native EQ in the mix which shows the live spectrum of each track as it plays. This makes it a breeze to tweak the EQ where necessary.
Flux Stereo Tool
SLVR Exciter
W1 Limiter
(these are just my usual instruments and plugins, but I use others)

I love to warp and mangle the East West samples with guitar distortion and what not.

I like to do syncopated rhythms, as I believe this adds tension and intensity.
I generally begin with either a simply percussion idea, violin section idea, or brass idea,
and then just build on top of that.
Sometimes I like to just load a bunch of patches/instruments and just play --this sometimes help me come up with good ideas on a thematic level.
There really is no one way that I approach music composition.

Composers that inspire me–

Bernard Herrman
Ennio Morricone
Danny Elfman
James Newton Howard
Debussy
Ravel
Stravinsky
Tchaikovsky
Wagner
Sibelius

Films with music that inspire me:

Vertigo
Citizen Kane
Taxi Driver
Edward Scissorhands
The Ring
The Sixth Sense
American Beauty
The Good, The Bad and The Ugly
The Untouchables
Spirited Away
Princess Mononoke

14

Ditto to pretty much everything the guys have already said!

I use Cubase 7.5 on an iMac with 32GB of RAM.

All of my orchestral libraries sit outside of Cubase in VEP5 on the same machine. They’re positioned, EQ’d and mixed with reverb etc in advance. They are also broken down into their individual sections (1v, 2v, Violas, Trumpets, Horns, Timpani etc) and routed, so by the time they reach the DAW very little needs doing to them other than tweaking to fit the track.

The means the stuff that generally won’t change (unless one day I need ‘Epic Distorted Piccolo’ :slight_smile: ) is sitting there ready to go, then when I fire up my template I can add the synth and hybrid stuff when I need it.

For strings I use Spitfire, LASS, CS2 and the occasional sprinkling of others. I find layering with strings can make a huge different to the character and warmth of the sound.

Cinebrass and Spitfire are my go to for horns.

I very rarely print to audio.

For mastering I use a combo of the FabFilter plugins and Ozone 5.

As for influences. I can only say, hop on iTunes, search out those soundtracks that you love, buy a track that you love and learn from that.

15

I use Cubase. M-audio keyboard. I think that you need to listen more than works of this plan and to analyze. Then to try to do most. Use libraries qualitative, pay attention to dynamics and strokes, build composition so that there was a culmination and development. Good luck!

16

An amazing discovery today which could benefit all the FL Studio users up here! When you load a VST plugin which uses a lot of RAM (like Kontakt with some huge libraries), go to “Wrapping Settings” in the upper left corner of the VST, then click PROCESSING and check “Bridged”. This will allow your VST plugin to use RAM outside of FL Studio. I’ve tested this with more than 10 instances of Kontakt opened, filled with instruments and it all worked well. If it happens that any of your Kontakt instances suddenly has no sound, just assign it to other mixer track, coz you probably have too many on one output.

17

Here’s a look at my process for writing some game music last year. It was fun to stream it live and get comments from people, plus its a nice thing to link in threads like this!:

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Hey Matt! Nice thread. Wow, it’s cool to see so many people using Cubase - I thought I was a minority! So, yes, I use Cubase 6.5. Whatever DAW you’re most efficient in/comfortable with should be your go-to for cinematic (or any) music.

Since I’m a piano player, it’s essential for me to have a midi controller with at least a few octaves so I can play the melodies as they come to me. It’s also a nice feeling to map expression and modulation data to knobs/wheels as opposed to drawing in automation. It just feels better to record myself wheel moving - I can usually get a more realistic feel (which is nice considering everything is quantized samples).

My libraries of choice lately are LASS, EWQL Symphonic Orchestra, Drums of War, Stylus RMX, and Camel Audio’s Alchemy. Man, Alchemy is THE synth - I can’t get enough. Can’t remember the last track I did that didn’t use it for something!

Alas, the mixing of FX and processors like reverb and compression is my weak point (shh, don’t tell anyone). I have several texts on mixing, but you’re right - there aren’t any that are specific to orchestral or epic music. Someone really ought to write one! I typically mix the day after composing, just to give my brain a new perspective. If I work on something too much I start to lose my sense of it as a whole. But just use your ears, and get advice from other composers. Maybe even have an example song that you think sounds really good, and try to emulate the way it sounds by trial and error.

John Williams, enough said :slight_smile:
Ok, other noteworthy composers that I enjoy: Danny Elfman, Alan Silvestri, James Horner, Koji Kondo, Nobuo Uematsu, Tangerine Dream

Hmm, my process. Well, I usually just sit and think of melodies. Then, figure out what instrument would best emphasize the feel I want, and then it just evolves from there. Sometimes I’ll start composing with a style in mind, but often not. It’s a pretty organic thing - what inspires you?

Whew! That was a mouthful. I’m waiting for a couple of my cinematic tracks to be approved. It will be nice to have some more :smiley:

19

Awesome topic :slight_smile:
I’ve been listening to orchestral music since I was a little kiddo :slight_smile: and I think that’s the best way to learn how all instruments plays with each other.
Next step is getting some good libraries. I prefer 8Dio, ProjectSam and Soundiron. These folks are in my opinion major players in the vst orchestral music indsutry. Of course there’s also LASS and EastWest but personally I don’t like how they sound.
Getting midi controller is one of the next steps. I think 88 key one is the best. M-Audio keyboards are cheap and very good. When it comes to DAW there are thousands of pro and cons for various software. I’m using Cubase, kinda hate the UI but it’s powerful. Before that I was using Ableton Live and it wasn’t bad. It’s just more production software (lacking notation editor for example). For example Harry Gregson Williams is using Ableton all the time during his productions.

I compose mostly by ear. I love composing for screen ie: movies, adverts etc… Sometimes when I watch the movie for the first time I already hear the music in my head hehe :slight_smile:

Sometimes I came up with interesting melodies during funny situations ie: travelling by train. When it happens i usually record it by humming to my cellphone :slight_smile:

20

Great thread! Usually I will have an idea or melody in my head when I write something. When I start from scratch, depending on the track, I will get some percussion going and tinker around on the keyboard until something sound ok.

The best advice I can give is to set up templates and learn how to work with what you have. Learn all the intricacies of your libraries. With a simple template, I can concentrate on writing instead of loading libraries and finding the right sound. Once you get your ideas down you can switch samples libraries if you need to.

I usually do not render the tracks before mixing, but I do use the freeze function to free up memory if I need to (I use Reaper). I master in Reaper as well (in a separate project) and use various eq’s, compressors, and limiters.

My main influences are the music in movies I grew up with, like Star Wars and Back to the Future. Being a teenager in the 90’s, I was into a lot of different genres of music, especially metal, and often times my orchestral stuff turns into some kind of hybrid between orchestral and modern sounds.

Just remember, there are guidelines, but ultimately there are no rules, so just keep at it!