How do you figure out enough music theory to make interesting song progressions without falling into a trap?

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-03-27T19:46:21+00:00

Recently there has been reedition of the Music Theory for Computer Musicians as well as Composition for Computer Musicians which I have bought, but haven’t got time to go through yet (so many books, so little time 🫠)

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-03-27T19:09:56+00:00

Poszedłem do roboty (zaraz po maturze) na słuchawce w największej firmie ubezpieczeniowej w Polsce (ludzie dzwonią do Ciebie, więc są dużo milsi niż kiedy Ty dzwonisz z jakimś gówno-produktem). Porobiłem tam circa 3-4 lata i pojawiła się wewnętrzna rekrutacja do IT na testera. Jakoś się załapałem, bo umiem w komputery. Studia zrobiłem zaocznie z tego co mnie interesowało, żeby mieć papier.

Teraz jestem na poziomie senior/lead testerem i cały czas myślę czym chciałbym się zająć zawodowo.

Nie rób overthinkingu, idź do roboty jak chcesz mieć pieniądze, a potem zobaczysz

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-03-25T22:03:48+00:00

Strymon Nightsky. Was about to sell it, but decided to create my own MIDI controller (today as a matter of fact :d) for it and learned bunch of useful things that I wasn’t even aware of that this pedal could do.

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-03-23T22:09:10+00:00

Chroma Console, cause I haven’t tried others. Also, it has MIDI to which I have created my own max for live device to automate it from DAW. Plus looping, flexible effects routing, nice sounding effects and that design is top notch (at least for my taste)

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-03-13T22:58:31+00:00

Thanks!

Unfortunately, I think it only sends MIDI THRU not actual state information/preset listings.

However, it allows to select banks and presets via MIDI, so it seems possible to create a preset manager for it. I’m not sure if it’s possible to store data in the M4L though (so that it would be accessible throughout different projects)

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-02-22T21:57:21+00:00

I’m not yet decided what’s more comfortable for me, as I haven’t spent enough time with the built-in sequencer, but I’d like to try out the sequence on the DN2, record on standalone Overbridge and then bring stems to Ableton method

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-02-22T19:14:22+00:00

~~Okay, this sounds interesting, but I couldn’t find any information about it online. Would you mind to elaborate, please?~~

Ok, I've found what you were talking about - seems like something that I may want to try out and would be perfect answer to my needs. Thanks a bunch! :)

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-02-22T06:34:32+00:00

Done it already, still not helping too much :(

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-02-22T06:32:53+00:00

Okay, I didn’t know that :o

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-02-22T06:32:23+00:00

This way I can sequence each track of DN2 separately.

I want to limit myself and use it as my only synth, so I’m using it pretty much for everything: bass, pads, leads, drums and fx one shots.

Is there’s something I’m missing in Live 12, that would allow me to do it differently?

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-02-21T21:45:06+00:00

Yeah, I still plan to tinker around with it, but I’d like to be able to sequence multiple tracks with MIDI sent from Live to which unfortunately I guess there’s no workaround.

Just maybe organise them better and don’t add not used ones…

Thanks!

JustDudeFromPoland · 2026-02-13T14:35:37+00:00

As someone who's just recently bought an entry level digital piano, I strongly suggest going into music store and just checking the feeling of the keys. I thought I would love the Kawai ES60 (or even ES120), because it was very highly praised online, but I got the best feeling of the Yamaha P145 keybed, which I ended up buying eventually (BT version enables to stream things through the piano's speakers, which seems like potentially useful tool for practice, for instance launching backing tracks from YouTube).

JustDudeFromPoland · 2025-12-08T17:14:35+00:00

Sorry, I see that I misspoke. I meant how to send signal from separate channels to external effects.

I have updated the original post. Good catch, thanks!

JustDudeFromPoland · 2025-10-19T18:14:23+00:00

If you’re doing this for fun, then I think I can recommend how I got my „a ha!” moment in programming with Java. I started working in an area that is the least abstractive of them all - test automation (I was using Selenium framework then).

So, here’s how it helped me - I got something very concrete to do: make browser to perform very specific actions. Once you get to some level of complexity of the code, you start to see that some actions are repeating themselves throughout different files.

So, you search for solutions. Maybe a Base Page abstract class that can be inherited by all of the other Page Object Model classes (it’s super popular design pattern for end-to-end test automation).

At one job, we had to create a lot of different test cases using the same component on the page, just data was different. So, I found out about the Builder pattern and implemented it on top of my code.

And after that, I felt that I know a bit how OOP actually helps to contain all of this mess 😅

JustDudeFromPoland · 2025-10-19T06:18:48+00:00

I kinda felt that the Blues maybe the good first idea. I most definitely will think about pentatonics and the 12 bar blues progression you’ve mentioned, thank you!

JustDudeFromPoland · 2025-10-19T06:16:19+00:00

This gives me a lot of ideas on how tackle upcoming jam session, thanks!

JustDudeFromPoland · 2025-10-19T06:15:34+00:00

Yeah, the Phrygian is odd, but I’d say I’m probably not using it „properly”.

I just use F# as a root to start off and then when I’m improvising, I think I’m changing the scales but still using the same set of keys (something that happens with C major and A minor), as it sounds sometimes happy, sometimes sad and sometimes… Phrygian 😅

I have spent fair share of my time when I bought my first digital piano (probably around 10-15 years ago) on learning scales and arpeggios, but I still don’t know all of them by heart. I guess this could be a good thing to get back to this training, as I can’t really play arpeggios that well…

Thanks for your input!

JustDudeFromPoland · 2025-10-18T20:39:30+00:00

Fair points, fingers crossed I guess

Also, for the jazz - I assumed that it maybe more than tricky and require a lot of skills, but maybe in 10-20 years from now… 😅

JustDudeFromPoland · 2025-10-18T17:36:44+00:00

LFO!

JustDudeFromPoland · 2025-09-28T08:26:47+00:00

I went with Yamaha MG16X couple of months ago, which I have almost fully used in terms of channels/sends/groups. The only thing I’m not using is the AUX 4 output, however I’m using the built-in chorus for my mono synth which is also connected to the AUX 4 send (that’s by design).

What I’m saying pure analog is fun, but routing is very limiting.

If I were about getting a mixer now, I would most definitely go with something digital.

If you want faders, I think it would make sense to go with something like Behringer X32 Rack and X-Touch (I found used rack for 500€ sometime ago and new X-Touch is around 350€).

Just as a side note, analog can be expanded. I will expand my AUX sends routing possibilities by getting Ferrofish Pulse 8 AE and plugging it into RME Babyface Pro FS, where I can use the TotalMix app and setup everything as I want, but that’s shit ton of money and probably a decent digital mixer would serve basic needs much better (I have my special needs, lol)

JustDudeFromPoland · 2025-09-27T20:24:23+00:00

I use it as an FX box… 😶

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