Building around a sample

[DavidStarz]

All of the songs I've tried to sample have been used throughout the entire song. Is there a technique to go about to using a sample for only a small section of your song (such as just on the chorus or bridge)? I'm assuming you need to find the key and use that to build around it, but idk. I'm confused. Some insight on how you guys go about this would be greatly appreciated.

 

[mbietenholz]

All of the songs I've tried to sample have been used throughout the entire song. Is there a technique to go about to using a sample for only a small section of your song (such as just on the chorus or bridge)? I'm assuming you need to find the key and use that to build around it, but idk. I'm confused. Some insight on how you guys go about this would be greatly appreciated.

Its pretty much up to you - there is no particular "technique". You can use a sample for only one note for only the 2nd and 3d verses if you want to, or you can have 8 different samples all going at the same time throughout the whole song. Where and how you use your samples, if you are making sample-based music, kind of is your style - so we can't really tell you how to do it.

Some general considerations that might help guide you: If, say, you have 2 samples, and you want to use one as the "backbone" of the chorus and one as the backbone of the verse, then generally you would want the samples to be in the same key and at the same tempo. There are lots of exceptions to that "generally" though - you might want a different tempo for the chorus, or even a key change. Some samples, such as ones with drums or percussion only, are not really in any key.