3.3 Variation and Intention
Repetition is one of the best tools that a producer has to make their track stick with their audience. If repeated sections are always the same, the song can get stale and boring.
Adding and subtracting chordal parts and changing the rhythm of the bass line in and between sections makes familiar parts of the song sound new and exciting. These changes are called variations and they help differentiate song sections and change the mood, energy, and power of a track over time.
The example song is “Walk This Way” by Run -DMC and Aerosmith. You can listen to it using the Spotify player below or on Youtube.
Terms
Variation: Changes in a musical element.
Intention: Creating with purpose.
1 | Think Like A DJ
Who is the audience and what is the outcome of your track? Choose drum, bass, and chord sounds that complement each other and support the energy and mood of the track.
2 | Reference Drums
Find a song that you like the drum part to. Look up the tempo of the song by searching the title of the song and the letters “BPM” in a search engine like Google. Change your project’s BPM to match your reference song.
3 | Create Drums
Use cycle mode to create a drum pattern with intention. Copy and paste the groove and remove the hihat and kick to create low, medium, and high energy drum parts.
4 | Create Slow Chords
Find a pad sound and write an original chord progression over one of your drum patterns. Copy the chord progression over to an “ideas” section of the timeline. Merge the regions on the left of the timeline.
5 | Create Fast Chords
Find a new sound that has a short decay like a pluck. Go to the chords view and select eights in the styles slider. Use the chord labels in the “ideas” section to recreate the chord progression. Change the rhythm of the pattern with intention.
6 | Create Arps
Create another chord track with the same progression and use the styles slider to find an arpeggio pattern that you like. Listen back and select the one that best fits the vibe of your song.
7 | Create Bass
Duplicate the first chord track you made and change the instrument to a bass sound that you like. Go into the piano roll and delete all of the notes except for the lowest ones. Duplicate the region and make a fast version with all eighth notes.
8 | Create Bass With Rhythm
Duplicate the fast eighth note version of your bass line and open the piano roll. Create a rhythm that matches or complements your chordal part by deleting and/or extending some of the 8th notes Use the same rhythm for each bar.
9 | Set Up Form
Move all of your regions over to the right and create song sections with the following lengths.
Intro (4 bars) | Verse 1 (8 bars) | Chorus 1 (8 bars) | Verse 2 (8 bars) | Chorus 2 (8 bars) | Outro (4 bars)
10 | Fill In Sections
Copy, paste, and duplicate the drum patterns, bass lines, and chordal parts into the song structure to create different sections with variation.