Hip Hop & Beat Making
Course 15: Music Fundamentals 2

Rhythm has a tremendous impact on music and how it is experienced. It helps create tension, stir emotion, and even drive cultural elements. At times, the power of rhythm is enough to change a listener’s perception of a piece. Rhythm-related concepts such as timing and meter must be mastered in order for us to feel confident in our artistic expression. After all, you can’t make great music without great rhythm!

Building on Music Fundamentals I, you will delve into the basics of rhythm, musical notation, time expressed in musical units of measures and bars, and numerical time notation in your Digital Audio Workstation (DAW). Also known as meter, time signatures such as 4/4, 6/8, and 5/4, greatly impact the feel, character, and groove of your music.

Developing a sophisticated ear takes time and practice. You will uncover the essentials of groove to better understand the magic that makes the right beat so captivating. After that, we will get into programming MIDI into your DAW and adjusting the grid, time signature, and tempo of your session. Such fundamentals are at the core of your knowledge base as a hip hop producer, so absorb all you can.

At the end of this course, you’ll be able to describe music through specific terms, explain the different facets of music, analyze music, and define different music formats. Your Listening Library will have you listen to 444 by Jay-Z and you’ll look at different sampling drum machines from Korg in your digital field trip. You will begin to build a social media following as well as the usual quiz, blog entry, and course review.