7 Transition Secrets the Pros Use (and how to use them in your music!) 👀

how are you doing guys today i'm going to show you seven insane transition techniques that are going to take your music from sounding boring and amateur and well dull smoothly into sounding amazing and professional full of energy because most of us can get a 8 or 16 by loop and it sounds great but then we need to build that into a full track and you can click there for my video on how to arrange music but when you've got the different sections of the track like your verse your breaks your build ups your drops and choruses getting those to transition smoothly together is super important i'm will from edm tips and over the last six years i've helped thousands of bedroom music producers just like you get their music to a professional level so they can get signed and released on some of the world's biggest labels so using these seven transition techniques we are going to take a track that sounds like this [Music] which let's be honest is pretty cool but we want to add more interest more vibrancy to make it even more epic and we're going to end up today with a track that sounds more like this [Music] it's pretty simple once you get your head around a few key concepts and you're going to be able to understand and implement it in your own music too if you want more tips and tricks on professional music production you can check out my free training below or you can click on my link for the accelerator where we help our students get to a professional level as quickly as possible and released on some of the world's biggest labels okay let's hit these seven transition techniques and without further ado let's hop into the door and get it done oh yeah and if you like it please like subscribe and check me out over on instagram now quickly before we get started it's worth noting that transitions are super important for any genre of music but you want to use the right transition effects that are going to suit your style of music and more importantly suit the vibe of your music now the easiest way to do that is to listen to reference tracks in your genre to get some direction and again i'll put a link to a video on referencing there as well so let's jump into this first transition technique and this is reverse percussion so here we've got our build and again this transition could be anywhere in the track but we're going for the build to the drop here so let's add some reverse percussion which is just going to smooth things out a tiny bit and give it more of an epic feel so the first thing we need to do is find a a drum sound that is actually going to be the main impact and then we're going to reverse it so let's find a big snare in fact let's go to the edm tips creative toolkit and you can get that below this video [Music] that's quite a epic one so let's just put this in where we want our snare hit to be [Music] a nice big crash and what we can actually do is add some reverb to that as well which i'm just gonna do on the channel itself is for speed [Music] so kind of like the pride of snare idea and what we're going to do is just have a reverse version of this as well but i want to make things a bit more interesting than just reversing it so what i'll do is i'll copy it to a new channel i will reverse it like so but i actually want to make it sound like it's from a bit of a different space as well and that's going to make things just a little bit more interesting texturally i'm actually going to take off the initial transient where the snare hits so it's just the tail so at the moment it sounds like this which is the standard sound let's just solo that you've got this reverse technique and what i want to do to make this a little bit more interesting is i'm just going to add this free plugin from ozone the imager 2 and i'm just going to spread it out really wide and that's just so we've got a bit of a different texture when it comes to the reverse snare to the forward snare so now it's like this and that just makes things a little bit more interesting in the ears so let's have a listen now [Music] cool so that was a quick one let's go on to transition tip number two which is using risers now if you're making dance music this is quite common but even if you're making pop music it's still useful to have some kind of instrument that's rising in pitch which is going to build the tension so that when you change into the next section of the track we know it's coming and there's a little bit of tension and release when we actually get to that next section so in this i've just created a shepherd tone which is a very specific kind of riser and i can show you how to do that if you want just let me know in the comments if you want me to do a shepherd tone tutorial but in a nutshell it's just a tone that continually rises [Music] now let's listen to that in the mix you can hear it's just bringing up that energy [Music] which will take us up just before the drop and you can use much shorter rises as well if you're just going from reverse to a course for instance [Music] so that's the effect but let's just give an example of a shorter riser that you might also add and you can layer risers as well you know that's a pretty important thing to do so let's go to sample effect sweeps sweeps up [Music] like that would be another riser so we could just use a little bit of it and then fade it in with the volume and what i would actually do in this situation is have it end on that snare hit and then that's just going to give it a nice pause before we drop but again it depends on your genre and which part of the track that you are producing now what i'm actually going to do now is warp this so i'm going to choose complex pro so i can stretch it out and just make it a little bit longer and then i'm fading it in with a clip fade here for the volume and we're just going to bring this in quietly to layer onto our shepherd tone [Music] so i'm actually gonna stretch it a little bit longer that actually drops down a little bit just before the before the break so i'll tweak it okay on to the third transition technique which is something you may have heard of and that is reverse reverb but this is going to be boss level reverse reverb and you probably haven't seen this before unless you've joined my accelerator in which case you would have seen it before so reverse reverb is a way to introduce something before it actually happens and that can get people ready they can tell them this is about to happen and it can introduce the tonality of whatever instrument you're doing the reverse reverb for now the most common is to do it with lead vocals but you can also do it with lead synths as well i'm going to show you how to do it on a vocal just because that's what this track has it has a lead vocal so this is the vocal and it comes in on the drop or the chorus if you will don't wanna fall into your arms again [Music] and you can see my vocal processing there if you want me to make a video on vocal processing again just let me know in the comments below so we want to introduce this vocal more smoothly the way i'm going to do that is create a new audio track like so what i'm going to do is take just a little bit of this vocal probably the first syllable copy it paste it maybe a bit longer it's usually better to do it when there's an actual note playing so the d is a it doesn't really have a tone but the o of don't does so let's just take it to this so now we've actually got a note oh oh and that's what we're going to use next thing to do is consolidate that now we reverse it like so and now we want to add a reverb to that you can use any reverb really but i'm just going to use the ableton stock reverb for speed and then let's give it a nice long reverb time now i'm going to show you how to make a boss level reverse reverb don't worry it's still the same technique but we're going to add a couple more effects to this so i'm going to add an echo as well i'll add this before the reverb actually so it's going to bounce left and right so i'll just switch it to notes one quarter ping pong open up the filter and make sure we've still got lots of nice high end add some feedback i might make it faster actually maybe one eight smooth it out a bit with the reverb okay now we need to record that so again i'm going to create another audio track i'm going to take the input from this one let's just call this box input and let's just call it vox reverb at the moment so we need to select that as the input box reverb arm the track so we're recording and i think we'll probably need to oh no it's still going in anyway and then we can just record this hit with nothing else playing all the way until that reverb and delay dies out perfect now what we have to do is the clever bit so we can reverse this sound and it's going to give us a really cool sweep that is going to lead perfectly into those vocals so we need to clip the first bit out the first noise so this first transient here because we only really want the actual reverb and delay tail not the initial sound that we took it from so now if we delete this vox reverb track we've got a reverse reverb here let's just call that reverse reverb and we are now going to listen to that and then we'll listen to it in the mix so this is what we've got at the moment it's not quite boss level yet but it will be soon listen how it moves into the vocals now you can fade it out slightly so it's more of a smooth crossfade between this reverse sound and this but when you've got a long tail like this you can decide how long it is just by moving the clip in length and then using a clip fade to tweak it to taste so you can have it shorter if you like like this or we could even take out some of the very prominent delay effects and now let's try it so now let's make this boss level this is where you can apply extra effects to it so we could add a little bit of reverb on there smooth it down we can also and this is the thing i really really love is put an auto pan on there and then what we're going to do is just feed in a bit of panning [Music] and then what we can do is automate the rate of this auto panner so it gets faster just at the end of that and then you get this kind of spin-up effect let's just make it a bit smoother this is our boss level reverse reverb let's make it a bit longer and then listen to it in the mix and you'll hear how it smooths in transition [Music] and as i said you can do that for leads since pretty much anything with a tone that you want to introduce beforehand okay on to the next four super powerful transition techniques but before we do that let me know if you're enjoying this video so far and let me know what video do you want me to make next on this channel let me know in the comments and if you're enjoying it if you're feeling holy okay let's get on to transition technique number four and that is the spatial washout now what this is is a technique to take away some of the transient energy when you are transitioning from one part of the track into another which again is going to create more contrast between those two parts of the track now something i love to add this to is drums but you can again pretty much add it to anything and even the whole mix if you want to i'm going to show you how to do this on drums and let's have a look so these are our drums leading up to the drop and then we pause [Music] and you get a couple more drums come in on the new parts of the track which is fine now to illustrate this let's just take these drums all the way along uh because it's gonna more pronounce what i'm trying to do here now the most common way to add a washout a spatial washout is to actually use a reverb now it's important to use the reverb on the channel itself because if you use the reverb on an auxiliary channel that's not gonna take away the transient energy all that's going to do is keep the dry signal and then add reverb on the auxiliary channel we actually want to take away the transient energy so i put a reverb on the track it's 100 dry at the moment and i've put up the volume of the diffuse and reflect just so that it's pretty comparable in volume when you've got the reverb wash out and then i'm going to automate this dry wet control just to turn on as we get nearer to that transition point and then i'm making sure that it goes back to zero when we actually hit the new part of the track so we've got that full transient energy so now let's have a listen to our drums now we've got this reverb wash out on it [Music] so what we're doing is just taking away that transient energy which makes the contrast bigger so let's listen to it in the mix with everything else [Music] quite subtle but the addition of all of these subtle effects can have a massive impact on the contrast when you're transitioning from point to point in your track okay on to transition technique number five and that is the pitch bend something else that you can use with drums but pretty much any instrument the riser is a way of using pitch bend but what i'm going to do is create another track for the drums and i'm going to call this snare roll [Music] and again you can do this either in a very short space if you're just going from one point of the track to another or if you're in a big epic place like this build up into the drop then of course you can prolong it and make it longer so i'm just going to load in a normal simpler in ableton but it doesn't matter which sampler you're using really and then we need to load in a snare again i'll go to the edm tips creative toolkit [Music] i just use this short sharp snare and then we are going to program this in on every 16th any classic dance music and a build up [Music] so we can do this and you don't have to use this pattern you could do any pattern but the point we're trying to do here is to yeah to add a add a pitch bend to it now what i'm going to do is also make this increase in volume over time so i'm just drawing in a volume sweep as well with velocity so it's going to increase in volume but let's add uh some pitch bend to that as well now you can either draw a drum on each separate notes like going up like this what i like to do is add a bit more of a smooth transition so if we change this to a sampler we can control the amount of pitch bend the pitch bend range so i'm going to put this to 12 which is one octave and i'm just going to program in a pitch bend here so if we just choose automation midi control pitch bend and now just draw in our pitch bend going well we can keep it on zero and then just pitch bend up nearer the end near the point of transition like so and now listen to the snare when we get to the end of this transition it goes up [Music] now as i said you can use this in small ways as well so for instance if we have a small transition here um let's just copy this part of it and program in a different snare pattern for this let's go back to notes get rid of velocity [Music] so it's a much shorter drum intro let's take the pitch bend so it's just going from down to up and then you've got this small little transition effect halfway through this part of the track so a little bit of ear candy that really adds something to the track now before we move on from pitch bend i just want to show that you can actually apply this to instruments not just drums and risers as well so we've got our base so it's not going to work for every track in every genre but just another tip that you can use here if we go into the clip and we choose envelope midi control pitch bend let's just pitch bend up the bass as well now much like the sampler you have to make sure that you've got the correct um or the desired rather than correct pitch bend range selected so i've got two serum layers in this base i'm just going to go in and make sure that we've got 12 semitones up selected and i'll do that for the second layer as well otherwise they're going to go out of tune 12 semitones up and that means when we pitch bend from zero up to the max it's going to be one entire octave that the pitch bend is doing so now let's have a listen to it with the pitch bend on the musical element not just the drums listen to the bass now [Music] as i said not necessarily going to work for every track but a little extra tip that you've got for you there okay on to the next transition tip and that is filter automation this is where you simply take some of the frequencies out as you reach your transition yeah you take some of the frequencies out you can either take up the low end or the high end or both so we can see here on our bass bus i've just got a simple eq if we turn that on and have a look at the automation all i've done is automated a little bit of that frequency being taken out so watch this frequency range here you can see it automated in just taking out that low end energy so we can come back full power on the drop [Music] again it doesn't matter if it's a big transition or a little transition we could do that with our kick drum here as well so let's just put in a little kick drum fill [Music] [Music] we can take out the low end energy of that kick drum just very quickly and exactly the same way so let's just add an eq there go filter and we're just going to take it out and then drop it back in like so just to take out the low end energy from the kingdom [Music] go on its own another great way to add just a little bit of interest in your transitions and if you were to add in a reverse kick to this as well you're going to be combining well 0.1 and this point as well so you've got the reverse percussion and the filter automation so let's just see if we can do that quickly okay i'm gonna have to add another track for the kick that's will kick one so let's go to my favorites kicks will kick one so it's going to be the same kick although you could choose a different kick i'm just going to reverse it and then it's going to lead in to that next kick like so i'm just gonna make it a little bit shorter and now let's have a listen to this but take it down in volume so we've got now a reverse kick you have to make sure that it ends just before that another kick you're gonna get a transient build up which is gonna cause clipping so now let's have a listen to it with the filter automation and the reverse kick [Music] just adding that little extra bit of interest movement and groove to the track okay on to the final and potentially most important of my transition ticks sorry mom transition tips and that is to use the composition itself so this is where you can hint to perhaps the main hook of your track before it happens in a similar way to the reverse reverb did and again you can do this melodically so if we were to have our main melody which we do and it sounds like this [Music] [Applause] and that happens on the chorus or in the chorus so let's have a listen [Music] let's make it a bit louder so we can hear what's going on [Music] let's try and introduce that beforehand in the build-up um so let's have a listen we're not going to play the whole melody but we're just going to hint at it and then bring it in and this is very popular in pop music in particular because it gets people used to what's coming [Music] i'm actually gonna bring the whole thing in you might just use a little repeating bit of it but what i'm going to do is just push this right back in the mix using a reverb on the channel itself very short decay time and that's just to make this a lot more subtle [Music] [Applause] let's just add an eq as well take out the low end again to create the more of a contrast between the build up or the transition point and the drop itself i'm also going to add an auto filter which is harking back to my last tip so you can combine these all together and it's going to sound great so we're just going to take out the high end [Music] and it's just going to introduce it gently and you have to make sure you turn these effects off of course when you hit that point where you want the song to transition so we can do that just by grouping them together and then turning it off there [Music] now let's hear what it sounds like in the mix i'm just going to put an auto pan on this as well to add some more movement and interest now let's listen to our build up [Music] so it's very subtle [Music] people [Music] it's just hinting very delicately at what's to come [Music] and now to add to that we are also going to do the same with the vocal so we've already got the reverse reverb but again you can layer all of these techniques together to get the most ultimate of awesome transitions [Music] so we're just gonna have this don't want to and we're just gonna introduce this very [Music] so what i'm going to do is add again a filter on this so we're just going to use an auto filter bring in the high frequencies over time [Music] i'm also going to add a delay on this so let's use echo and again just get the timing right for how you want probably one two ping pong left and right [Music] today [Music] and again you can use that at any point but it's very popular in pop is to hint at the hook before it happens just so people subconsciously get programmed that that is what's coming in the track well there you go guys i really hope you've enjoyed this hope you found it useful don't forget you can check out my free training below this video or if you want some more advanced coaching you want one-on-one calls you basically want to get your music to a professional level as quickly as possible so you can get signed and released on some of the world's biggest labels like our other students do check out my accelerator program below this video and thank you very much for watching if you liked it share subscribe all of that stuff and i'll catch you next time until then cheers [Music]

Channel: EDM Tips

Views: 82,741

Keywords: music transition tricks, 7 transition tricks pro producers use, pro producers use these transition tricks, how to use transitions in production, create riser in ableton, reverse percussion, percussion ableton, how to percussion Ableton, add percussion in Ableton, make a riser in ableton, riser in ableton, riser sound effect, reverse reverb Ableton, spatial washout, pitch bending, pitch bend, filter automation ableton, ableton filter automation effect, EDM Tips

Id: veMIOXVSJZU

Length: 30min 3sec (1803 seconds)

Published: Fri May 20 2022