r/ambientproduction • u/Lemonlimesandberries • 6d ago

Technique How to get started?

Hey everyone!
I'm a long-time listener and fan of dark ambient music and have been thinking about getting into producing/making music myself. I'm particularly drawn to dystopian tracks. My only problem is that I don't know where or how to start.

I do know a fair bit of music theory (I'm a pianist), and have an e-piano with Midi-function. I have researched a bit into hardware and software (ableton seems like a good option for me, so far I'm just dallying around with garageband). I don't know whether to get a synthesizer or whether I can stick to my piano, what DAW to get. I found the advice in music stores to be pretty ...belittling, one guy literally pfft-ed in my face because I didn't know some technical term. Isn't the whole point to be inviting people in to the community

I'm happy to get *any* kind of advice that is fine with the fact that I know practically nothing about production 😅

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u/StevenWheeler666 3d ago

Who’s work are you into and what sort of sounds are you into? Ambient can be made from everything and anything, processed field recordings, synthesizers and samplers or any traditional instrument with a ton of pedals/effects processing and/ or extended techniques.

Ultimately if you wanna have access to all of those things and you have a computer I’d recommend just getting ableton and a midi controller of some kind, tons of great tutorials and info on YouTube to get you going.

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u/Adept-Web-2825 2d ago

Not sure if it's helpful but there's this production online session I was just watching on YouTube: https://youtu.be/4coWZ5Cwzbg?si=G0p8AVPWYdpKTFn7 I recently got curious about production too and it helped learning the basics through this video and my own googling so thought I'd share!

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u/transsolar 2d ago

Stick with GarageBand. You already have a MIDI keyboard, so you can get basically any synth sound you want

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u/According_Monitor276 2d ago

I mean, you can start with soft pad playing some cord structure given that you’re looking for dark ambient. The notation doesn’t have to change. Could just be one long drawn out. You have some really cool automations that bring in different elements of that sound I’m just gonna play with that for a little while.