Switching DAW Is Inspiring?

[Uncle E]

This might sound less ideal than what musicians are supposed to do, I guess? (Express feelings/emotions through music) But personally I really enjoy this process, because I make something I like very much and it feels so great when other people like it too.

It's perfect. The way things are going now with AI, you have to do music either for your own enjoyment or to get live gigs.

[jancivil]

I may have been lucky (great luck is as a function of being prepared) enough to have a fairly well-formed line or shape(s) in my head and then open the thing and execute; I may just have a nebulous sound world or such; I may have nothing coming in.
Then it really is a matter of the right sound(s), which drive the piece; just as you begin a screenplay with character ie., personalities and interactions, the instrument has a personality and a history; or if it’s electronic/abstract it’s suggestive or impressionistic.
But the sound is where inspiration really comes in.

Cubase enables connections and records the data that communicates with the instruments, I know where everything is and it’s easy. I have enough different jobs, extra dicking around is the opposite of inspiring.

[CrystalWizard]

Not a switch but i've moved almost completely to Reaper from Ableton live 9. I'm extremely glad i did but i don't think i would call it inspiring. A new instrument could be inspiring but the DAW not so much for me.

[hhuang9611]

apologies, i wasnt trying to say "i was doing it right, youre doing it wrong"
the only thing musicians are supposed to do, is make music.
how they do it, well, thats as individual as the musician themselves

was just saying where i am at the minute.

No need for apologies. I was merely acknowledging what other musicians do (in fact, I really envy the musicians who can use the music to express themselves), and I wasn't responding to any specific comments. Thanks for being super cool about it tho, and actually, I should be sorry for giving the impression that I was defending myself (which I wasn't). I'm perfectly happy with my current ways of making music, and I was just sharing some thoughts as well.

It's perfect. The way things are going now with AI, you have to do music either for your own enjoyment or to get live gigs.

Exactly!

[_leras]

I think switching DAW or trying a new synth, or new way of doing something, or even picking up a synth you haven't used for ages can he really fun and lead to some great ideas.

Of all of these I think the DAW is probably the worst one to learn into for inspiration, but mainly as switching DAW can have quite a big impact on productivity. And I find it's about 20% inspiration 80% perspiration, so having the best workflow in a DAW is, at least to me, very important.

[jancivil]

Per the point of music being self-expression:

I consider that music is, by its very nature, essentially powerless to express anything at all, whether a feeling, an attitude of mind, a psychological mood, a phenomenon of nature, etc… Expression has never been an inherent property of music…
It is simply an additional attribute which, by tacit and inveterate agreement, we have lent it, thrust upon it, as a label, a convention – in short, an aspect unconsciously or by force of habit, we have come to confuse with its essential being.

here
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2011/ ... C%20etc%20…
Brad Mehldau interrogates this, and finds

The over-publicised bit about expression (or non-expression) was simply a way of saying that music is supra-personal and super-real, and as such, beyond verbal meanings and verbal descriptions. It was aimed against the notion that a piece of music is in reality a transcendental idea 'expressed in terms of' music, with the reductio ad absurdum implication that exact sets of correlatives must exist between a composer's feelings and his notation.

It was offhand and annoyingly incomplete, but even the stupider critics could have seen that it did not deny musical expressivity, but only the validity of a type of verbal statement about musical expressivity. I stand by the remark, incidentally, though today I would put it the other way around: music expresses itself.

[Tj Shredder]

If you want inspiration & motivation then probably best to look OUTSIDE your normal DAW routine...

My inspiration comes from inside me. This or that software has nothing to do with it.

Yes and no. Coming from Max/MSP I could usually just implement my ideas. But if you need a sequencer/DAW, and want to do this in Max, you enter a nightmare. So in a way Live with its Max4Live integration should be the ideal solution. I tried and failed. Live did never keep the inspiration going. But when Bitwig came along that changed. It was instant inspiration into areas I would not have touched in Max alone. And that happened even before the Grid arrived!
I guess its much more a question of personal taste and the way our brains are wired differently. The experience of the OP might be simply due to the way Logic is better fitting for him and not so much about the change itself. I own Logic as well, but I only use it for mastering audio tracks to video. If I want to play with Logics instruments, I connect Mainstage to Bitwig…

[machinesworking]

If you want inspiration & motivation then probably best to look OUTSIDE your normal DAW routine...

My inspiration comes from inside me. This or that software has nothing to do with it.

Yes and no. Coming from Max/MSP I could usually just implement my ideas. But if you need a sequencer/DAW, and want to do this in Max, you enter a nightmare. So in a way Live with its Max4Live integration should be the ideal solution. I tried and failed. Live did never keep the inspiration going. But when Bitwig came along that changed. It was instant inspiration into areas I would not have touched in Max alone. And that happened even before the Grid arrived!
I guess its much more a question of personal taste and the way our brains are wired differently. The experience of the OP might be simply due to the way Logic is better fitting for him and not so much about the change itself. I own Logic as well, but I only use it for mastering audio tracks to video. If I want to play with Logics instruments, I connect Mainstage to Bitwig…

I would add on to this that some DAWs are more like instruments. I always write music in much the same vein, my style etc. but it does change drastically depending on whether I start on guitar, keyboard, drum pads, or with audio clips in a launchpad. It changes if I start by sampling my own sounds, if I start from bass, or from a melody in my head.

So, why would it not change a little if I'm using an MPC, Bitwig, DP, Logic or Reaper? Each have their own strong points and you are going to be affected by them.

[DrGonzo]

Maybe this could also be an UI thing? I do find Ableton's UI a bit ... too simplistic (insert joke about Ableton being Excel). Logic Pro looks a bit more vibrant and lively.

I don't know how many times I've tried to switch from Ableton. That damn thing drags me back every time. I tried Bitwig, Logic and Cubase, but the power of the ring ... sorry, Ableton, is too damn strong. I always go crawling back.

How long did it take you to "get" Logic?

/C

[Michael L]

So, why would it not change a little if I'm using an MPC, Bitwig, DP, Logic or Reaper? Each have their own strong points and you are going to be affected by them.

Miller Puckette, creator of Max and Pd, wondered in 2014,

"How, exactly, are the implications of software design choices insidiously affecting the practice of music composition and performance today? If software developers like me knew more about this, we could use the knowledge to inform our designs. The thing that limits us is not so much the time spent writing the code, as it is the limited understanding we have about what is needed."

http://msp.ucsd.edu/Publications/pdf_EMS14_puckette.pdf

[dupont]

it is like ice cream flavors? If you always eat the same flavor, will never know you prefer vanilla over chocolate !

And then, you find out you are equally like both, and also a strawberry one. In the past, it was easy, you bought a chocolate one and were happily eating it.

Now, you are hesitating to make a choice, and ice cream is not that appealing now. And even if you bought vanilla ice cream this time, you wonder if it was the right choice...

(The Paradox Of Choice by Barry Schwartz)

life is a matter of choices !

[zerocrossing]

I find switching DAWs to be mostly an annoying chore, yet adding a new and interesting instrument can be inspiring. Not sure why, but that’s how I feel. I just want to know what my DAW does and how to do it.

[Synthman2000]

This might sound less ideal than what musicians are supposed to do, I guess? (Express feelings/emotions through music) But personally I really enjoy this process, because I make something I like very much and it feels so great when other people like it too.

It's perfect. The way things are going now with AI, you have to do music either for your own enjoyment or to get live gigs.

Please point me towards some great AI music.

I think I would largely find switching DAW just annoying. I guess if you literally have no ideas or no ways to inspire yourself it might somehow make you take a different approach to starting music. Though what is the point of that if the rest is hindered by being stuck in learning DAW specifics and realizing some functions you relied on don't exist in said new DAW.

I would rethink how you become inspired to make music. You just cannot be in that much of a rut that DAW switching is inspiring, it's crazy talk.

[Uncle E]

Please point me towards some great AI music.

It’s not great. But it’s good enough that companies and studios will use it for advertisements, movies, and video games. Bye bye, music jobs.

[vurt]

.

I would rethink how you become inspired to make music. You just cannot be in that much of a rut that DAW switching is inspiring, it's crazy talk.

all kinds of things inspire creativity...