Try these challenges to grow your music production skills

Are you getting too comfortable with the way you produce music? It might be time to switch things up a little and become more creative.

Even the best of us occasionally slip into a comfortable routine, accept what we're already good at, and neglect to push ourselves. While this may work for a while, in the long run, it may leave you feeling unmotivated, and creatively drained when producing music.

It's crucial to occasionally mix things up by trying something new, learning a new skill, and pushing yourself in ways you haven't before. When you venture outside of your comfort zone, you'll always learn something new about producing, regardless of experience level.

Below we have set some challenges you might like to try next time you sit down to produce a song or beat. Hopefully these will encourage and excite you to compose music in addition to helping you assess and develop your abilities.

Try to recreate a song as precisely as you can.

"The purest form of flattery is imitation." It's also among the greatest methods for picking up knowledge from people you respect and look up to.

Choose a song you enjoy listening to and try to replicate it as accurately as possible. To deconstruct it, use active listening, paying attention to each instrument, effect, and even automation.

You won't be able to recreate the song's exact sound exactly, but you'll gain a lot of knowledge and new skills that you can apply to your own music in the process. Without the original producer's tools and plugins, you may find yourself coming up with "hacks" to get the same sound. This is totally acceptable and can even inspire you to come up with your own original method of doing things.

Create a song that has no more than five tracks.

There is no limit to the number of instruments and layers you can add when creating a great-sounding song. But with just five tracks, is it possible?

When you are unable to divert the listener with intricate layers and effects, you must impress them with the most basic elements possible, which calls for powerful melodies, chords, and percussion. You'll need to make the most of the space you have and ensure that each sound has a purpose.

You never know—you might just write the next big hit! Some of the greatest songs ever written have very little production value!

Write a complete song in less than 60 minutes.

Of course, it takes much longer than an hour to produce a song, but setting this time limit for yourself will help you get better at following your gut and making snap decisions.

We are far too often afflicted by our own perfectionism and waste a great deal of time fine-tuning something that ultimately doesn't make or break the song. This frequently results in a lack of motivation and numerous incomplete projects.

If you have trouble finishing songs or being perfect, consider giving yourself just an hour to write a song from start to finish. You'll be astonished at how swiftly you can complete tasks when you follow your instincts and don't think twice about any choice you make.

Write a song for a scene in a movie.

For us musicians, movies provide a plethora of inspiration. Just pick a scene or montage from your favorite film, turn off the sound, and watch it without sound (if there is dialogue, keep the subtitles on so you can understand what is being said).

Consider that you are responsible for creating the background music or the scene's soundtrack. Is it possible to compose music that would enhance the scene's emotions and amplify the audience's response to it?

You never know—this might be the initial step toward a project that receives a sync placement!

Try working backwards

Establishing a routine for music production is very helpful and can save you a lot of time. However, it's also pleasant to occasionally change things up. Try performing things in the opposite order from how you're used to doing them, such as chords, melody, and drums. Although it might seem strange at first, you'll be pleased with the final product.

Try different genres

It's fantastic if you've honed your craft in a particular genre or style, but there are a ton of things you can learn from other genres as well. It's likely that you already enjoy a variety of musical genres. If you haven't already, try to pay close attention to what makes them special so you can incorporate these elements into your own music-making process.

Start by trying to recreate your favorite song in a different genre. Maintaining the melody while adjusting the production, arrangement, and embellishments to give the song a distinct vibe is the difficult part.

Why not attempt writing a song that blends two different genres once you're at ease producing in a couple of them? It's better if they don't go together—you might even discover your own distinctive sound!

Make a song using just recorded sounds (no instruments)

It's not necessary to limit music production to utilizing samples and instruments. Countless sounds can be found in our environment, and many of them can serve as a decent replacement for your drum kit or bass guitar.

Get a portable microphone so you can record the sounds around you, or just use your phone. Anything you can get your hands on, including dishes, paper, and elastic bands, can be used to create these noises. After that, take some time to re-process, adjust the pitch, and add effects to the sounds so you can use them in your production.

Remember that you can also play instruments with your voice and body: humming, clearing your throat, breathing, clapping, snapping, and tapping your chest are all acceptable examples!

Write a song intended for a different era

Most likely, you're working on a song that you think would sound fantastic on the radio right now, but what if you wrote something that sounds like it could have been released a decade ago? Even though the landscape of popular music has evolved over time, there is still much to be learned from our predecessors.

Expand on this concept by attempting to create something that might be well-liked in 2040. Even though it's impossible to know what that sounds like, it could still be interesting to try. Furthermore, the very process of creating "music of the future" is what gives rise to new trends.

Write a song in a tempo or time signature you've never used before

There are many chances to express your creativity with melody, chord progressions, instrumentation, and arrangement with every new song you write. However, the time signature—and occasionally even the tempo—tends to remain constant. It's far too simple to start writing songs in 4/4 at a pace of about 120 BPM without really thinking about it.

If you want to push yourself, try writing a song in a time signature you're not used to, like 3/4 or 5/4. If your songs are consistently the same tempo, experiment with increasing or decreasing the tempo. You're sure to pick up something new while listening to slow and fast songs, which demand entirely different techniques.

Try live looping

A quick and easy way to create music on the spot is with live looping. It forces you to be creative in the moment without aiming for perfection or passing judgment on what you come up with, much like when you set a one-hour time limit.

To experiment with looping, you don't need any specialized equipment because most DAWs allow you to program a keyboard shortcut to start the loop and support looping plugins.

Silence your device and compose a song without listening to the music

If you’ve been producing for a while, you probably have enough experience and knowledge to tell how something might sound just by looking at it in your DAW. Why not test this theory and try producing something without hearing it? Turn off your speakers and see how accurately you can translate what you hear in your head into music.

You’ll probably need to tweak it a bit (or a lot) after, but it’s a fun experiment nonetheless. It's even possible that you'll inadvertently produce something unexpected!