Music Production

Music

Songwriting

Mixing And Mastering

Project Management

Modern Music Production Workflow

A modern approach to workflow and pipeline of modern music production that includes songwriting, composition, mixing, and mastering.

Oleh Chaplia

11 min readDec 9, 2023

Introduction

We live in such times where songwriting, music production, and audio engineering are tightly connected [1–3]. Also, the technical possibility of writing the music on any laptop with a MIDI keyboard and external audio interface is fantastic. Anyone with a related musical background can open the DAW and write a pop song or epic soundtrack for the movie.

In such a creative industry, every artist and producer has his own workflow for creating a song. Of course, their steps are based on the industry standard workflow and experience. More experienced producers know that well-defined steps and expected outcomes produce better overall results [2-4]. The workflow directly impacts the results achieved [2-4]. I also want to cite Conway’s Law [5], which states:

"Organizations, who design systems, are constrained to produce designs which are copies of the communication structures of these organizations.” [5]
— Melvin E. Conway

This idea was primarily introduced for software engineering companies. But we can make parallels between Agile software development and modern music production. Both of them have so many similarities.

Let’s also review some of the artistic questions. What is the difference between a fantastic song and a regular song? What makes a song great? How do listeners choose songs they like? How do we know a song has enough mixing or mastering quality? As songwriters or producers, how do we know when to stop writing and release the final product? These questions are tough. But the answers to these questions exist [3, 7]. It’s a theory combined with many hours of practice. As you know, a theory of 10000 hours says that a person is a master of his work when he worked on it more than 10000 hours [8].

Therefore, I would like to share some of my experience and knowledge of organizing an effective music production workflow using which you can work on your music without undefined elements or distractions. Most things are gathered from personal experience, so this is not a final statement of truth. All of us have different personalities and tastes. Therefore, you have an excellent opportunity to adapt this workflow to yourself and even optimize it a lot better.

The Mindset of Writing and Producing a Song

Music production workflow combines the mindset, psychology, teamwork, and technical aspects [1–4, 9]. Before planning the work, you and your team should be aligned with the same mood, goals, and expected results. The song results from teamwork [1, 2, 4, 7, 9]. Of course, if you are not the only one creating the song. It is vital to have answers to these questions before the work starts:

Your mindset — how do you perceive the music production process? Do you understand it well?
Team roles — do you and your team know what each person is doing and the expected results?
Team mood — are you and your team aligned with the mood and resources to work on the song?
Expected deadlines — does the team know the deadlines for each milestone and final release?
Tools and skills — does each team member have enough tools and skills to fit their role?
The final goal — does the team know what is expected as the final output? Have you prepared any music, photo, or video references?

By knowing the answers to these questions, we can move on to the music production workflow. Each step in the workflow uses the answers provided above to understand the expected results.

Music Production Stages

Anyone who has already written and produced at least several songs knows that several stages must be completed to finish the release [2-4, 9]. Each step in the music production pipeline is crucial and impacts the specific properties of the song of the final release. We will review and analyze each step.

Table 1 depicts all steps with the input and output results [2–4, 9]. Lyrics, composition, and songwriting are the initial steps that inspire the artist and provide the first kick-off to do the job. Then, arrangement and production steps are involved to finish the song and prepare it for the studio recording. Recording, mixing, and mastering are technical steps that take the song sound to the next level and prepare the audio file for the release. Exporting and converting are necessary for archiving and further distribution of the release.

Table 1. Stages of the music production.

The Music Production Workflow

Previously, we reviewed all the steps needed to create a song. They are executed in some order. This order is called a workflow or pipeline. To create the workflow, we need to take the stages defined before and put them into specific order that will lead to the successful creation of the song. Many workflow variations may exist and depend on the artist and producer's desire. However, in the current article, only one optimal workflow is suggested and reviewed.

Figure 1. depicts the modern pipeline of music production. Here, all violet blocks are grouped into one big block because, in the modern world, most of the song pieces are written inside DAW, and all stages are executed simultaneously without a specific order. These steps may be executed in any order the artist or producer wants or repeated many times until the final song version is achieved. Technically, mixing and mastering can even be completed when writing the song, but it is not a good practice and should be omitted. After the final song version is achieved and the artist has a demo of the song, studio work starts. In the studio, the artist, producer, and engineer record all remaining song parts on live instruments, for example, vocals, live drums, bass, guitar, and piano. Then, in the editing stage, the producer or mixing engineer will edit recorded vocals and instruments to fit the song. Mixing and mastering are the following stages. After that, the exporting and converting stages are executed. Ultimately, the artist receives its final product with all the necessary multitracks, stems, and song versions prepared for release.

Inspiration

This is the most artistic phase. This is just when inspiration comes to the artist’s or producer’s mind, and he starts singing the melody, writing some lyrics, or playing the riff on the guitar [3-4, 9]. This stage is the most initial in the overall workflow.

It is important to record everything that comes to your mind because you will forget it as soon as possible. This is just the limitation of our brain. At this phase, any recorder, even a cellphone microphone, may be used.

Composition, songwriting, lyrics, arrangement and production

These following stages are fundamental things that define the final result of your song [3–4, 9]. Having the best possible arrangement, vocals, and lyrics is crucial [6]. Because, without these fundamentals, the final product is just a waste of time and resources. The melody, rhythm, emotions, feelings, atmosphere, vibe, and the song's main idea are the most visible things to the listener [6]. They are even more important than the technical quality of mixing and mastering [6, 11–12]. I think that the main rule should say that:

A great song sounds great as a demo. It sounds fantastic when played live or after the mixing and can be easily rerecorded and remastered.
Inadequate arrangements or lyrics in a song do not connect with the listeners in any way. In this case, even the top mixing or mastering can’t fix the unsuitable vibe of the song.

Please focus on the remarkable arrangements, vocals, and lyrics. Try to make the song with some idea, vibe, and atmosphere [6]. Each song should provide the listener with emotions and vibes [6]. Each song should have a purpose [6]. The music genres define the distribution market — e.g., studio music, live music, video game soundtracks, and movie soundtracks. So don’t be afraid to experiment and try to create something unique. Creative and innovative approaches to music are always interesting [1, 3].

Music production in the arrangement context is tightly connected to the previous ones [3–4, 6, 9]. At this stage, artists can work with producers, or one person can be an artist and producer [4, 9]. Anyway, this is a particular stage that transforms the primary idea into a more final-sounding product. Here, the producer can add spicy sounds, back vocals, adlibs, and sound effects, change the arrangement slightly, or rewrite many song sections [2-3, 9]. Of course, the selected methods are related to the genre and expected final result defined by the reference. In jazz, classical, or even rock music, the producing techniques may be more oriented to getting the best-sounding melody or harmony from the artist. However, in electronic music, the production is based on electronic samples, sound design, and synths [3].

The artifacts produced from these steps are scores, MIDI notes, lyrics, some demo recordings, and the demo project within the DAW. I also want to remind you to write scores, guitar tabs, and MIDI for any music, even if you prepared the project inside the DAW. It will allow you to prepare rehearsal scores for other musicians, restore the broken DAW project, or even rerecord the same song many years later with the newer version of the DAW and plugins.

If you have spare time, always prepare scores, guitar tabs, and MIDI notes in addition to the project inside DAW.

Recording

The next step is recording everything you have written in the studio [2, 4, 7, 9-10]. At this step, we record all vocals, drums, guitars, bass guitars, synths, or other things you’ve created for the song. However, you may already have a recording of everything within the previous stage if you have enough expertise. For example, I prefer to record all guitars and bass with the highest quality while writing the song. Using this approach, I don’t need to re-record these musical parts once again because they already have high-quality sound and performance. But I always record vocals and live drums in the studio because it gives a better vibe to the singer, and a professional studio has better sound treatment than at home.

You may think that this is a very generic step. To some extent, it is. But the nuances are connected with cooperation with the recording engineer, producer, and your team.

Be well prepared for a recording stage. Know your music parts well. Do some training before recording. Refer to the song scores before the recording. Value your time and the time of your studio recording engineer.

The quality of the performance and recording is the foundation for your mix and mastering. The quality of the artist's performance is the foundation of the song’s emotions and vibe for the song [6–7]. So please pay considerable attention to how the song is performed and recorded. The recording engineer may help with the recording setup and technical preparations if you don’t know how to do it yourself [10].

Try to capture the best record take as possible. Or record several takes. Remember that it is better to record the take again than fix it later in the mixing stage. At the mixing stage, the mixing engineer combines multiple tracks into one. He prepares the overall balance, improves the sound of your instruments, and adds effects.

Therefore, I think it is essential to take this as a valuable rule:

Lousy performance and recording means the mixing engineer will fix the song issues.
Great recording means the mixing engineer will improve the overall sound and create a high-quality mix for the song.

Mixing

Mixing is a second technical step in music production after recording [2, 4, 9, 11]. It defines the quality of the sound of your song. At this step, the mixing engineer will receive the raw tracks from the artist [11]. What is it important to do?

Prepare your raw tracks — give considerable names, prepare the common starting point for all tracks, include the song’s BPM and key in the text file, and provide the reference song.

The artist will rely on the mixing engineer’s skills at this step [11]. The artist sends the prepared archive and waits for the first revision. Then, the artist listens to the song and prepares notes for the mixing engineer if any. Then, the artist will receive a second revision of the mix. This process repeats till the artist is happy. Of course, the mixing engineer may put some limits and comprehensive constraints. For example, only several mix versions are allowable, and the next ones should be paid.

A mixing engineer is a person. He works with music every day. His ears will be tired after several days of working with your song. The best way to mix the song is when the engineer’s ears are refreshed. If the artist wants too many mix revisions and changes, the mixing engineer won’t be able to effectively implement them because of such things as ear fatigue [11, 12].

Please remember about ear fatigue. Mixing the song only with the refreshed mind and ears is crucial. In other cases, the mix will have a poor sound.

Mastering

The mastering is the process of making the final mix sound great on different audio devices [2, 4, 9, 13–14]. The mastering engineer will improve the mix's overall volume, recheck your mix balance, and improve the frequency characteristics of the final mix [13–14]. As output, the artist receives the final mastered file or even different versions of the files — e.g., for streaming services, for YouTube, for CD, and other devices [13-14].

Please remember that the mastering phase is just for managing the overall sound to sound great on the different audio devices and polishing the small nuances of the mix. Mastering will not help when the mix is terrible at its core.

Exporting the final master versions and stems is helpful for future use, for example, using them for playing live gigs.

Final Product

Now, we have a final mastered song ready to be released. So, now you can take these master versions and distribute them [15, 16].

Archive and store your release pack with all final song versions, cover art, additional metadata for the song, tempo, key, scores, or tabs. This release pack may be used for rerelease or rerecording in the future.

Conclusion

In this article, the modern music production workflow was reviewed. Also, was reviewed and depicted each stage with its details. Each stage is essential and should be carefully implemented for the best result. But please do not forget about creativity and inspiration! It is essential when working with vocalists and musicians in the creative industry. Also, I shared some tips based on my personal experience and essential things to remember for each workflow stage. The defined goals, expected results, deadlines, and confidence in executing each step will provide an excellent result without any distractions or uncertainty. I hope you will have an excellent and productive music production workflow!