How long do you spend on arrangement?

T

TDOT

New member
What up FP?

How long would you say you spend on arrangement?
Is it worth spending so much time? Should it take so long?

I have no problem composing and getting my beat started. I'll actually created all the pieces of the puzzle, but when it comes to arranging it into a full song, I am extremely indecisive.

I will play around with the arrangement for hoursss trying to find what I think sounds best. I'll do it once then maybe do it again the next day. Is this a waste of time? Should be a such a long process?

I think a huge issue is my transitions and drops. I make changes and play it back and criticize and the cycle continues.

Tips?
 
Give everything the time it needs, don't force anything. Arrangement is important, just as many other things it can make or break a song.
 
no doubt, it just seems funny to me that I spend a year on music theory, took a course for mixing and mastering and after all of that I'm stuck on something I thought would have been the easiest.

Maybe it's because I'm used to my 90's boom bap sampled type beats where arrangement wasn't as creative as it is today. I listen to new productions and it's all over the place but sounds so good, you get sections that are filtered, some with high hats, some slowed down etc and that's all in one track.
 
For sure it's important but how much time do u spend? How big a part of your work is it?
Any tips or workflow ideas?
 
Not enough time, that's one area I'm not very good at.

I mean throwing a filter on a loop is one thing, but I'd like to get to the point of having very distinct parts like breakdowns and what not.

My advice though is the same as I'd say for just about anything, imitate others.

Find songs with arrangements you like and in effect reverse engineer them.

The more you do that you'll get more and more comfortable with whatever concepts you're trying to grasp.
 
What I had to eventually overcome, and what I see alot of other producers getting caught up on is trying to force some major drum/tom roll or sweeping effect into the transition before the next four bars.

Most of the time simply dropping instruments on your next four bars is all thats needed or something as simple as taking out the entire beat on the last snare in your transition into the next four. If you do heavy vocal recordings you'll come to grips real quick to this.
 
TDOT said:
What up FP?

How long would you say you spend on arrangement?
Is it worth spending so much time? Should it take so long?

I have no problem composing and getting my beat started. I'll actually created all the pieces of the puzzle, but when it comes to arranging it into a full song, I am extremely indecisive.

I will play around with the arrangement for hoursss trying to find what I think sounds best. I'll do it once then maybe do it again the next day. Is this a waste of time? Should be a such a long process?

I think a huge issue is my transitions and drops. I make changes and play it back and criticize and the cycle continues.

Tips?
Click to expand...

I've never timed myself, but it doesn't take very long if i have the idea in my head. If I don't it will take longer.

How long should it take? Who knows, it should take as long as it takes to get it right
 
Thanks for the responses,

I think like Thee3ternal said, I'm going to start picking songs I love the arrangement in and applying the exact same practices to my own beat.

I also though like other dude said, want to be able to have nice breaks and all kinds of changes and variations in the beat.
Childish Gambino does that well I think.

Arrangement is so important, it just seems like I take too long, I'm sure there are people who arrange there beat in like 30mins-1hr
 
it depends on the track... house music.. it takes weeks.. rap music.. days and that's because i work different songs at the same time.. if i really sat there i could do it in an hour.. but i feel coming back and tweaking for days helps me hear new things and gives me new ideas on how i want to arrange it..
 
I let this one pass by a few times, but the honest answer is same as how long is a piece of a string? as long as is needed
 
Probably an hour or two with small breaks of course but I feel as though that's the most Important part of a song so that's why I take so long to sequence it.
 
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