Okay, so if you're into making hip hop beats, rap instrumentals, R&B beats, or even other types of music instrumentals, you're probably already familiar with the program, FL Studio by ImageLine, which you can visit at www.flstudio.com.  For those of you that are not too familiar with it, but have always been curious about making beats, you may want to consider purchasing FL Studio.

 

FL Studio is now on version 9, and has been around for some time.  There have been those that have defended, and those that have bashed on FL Studio, but when you look up reviews, it still ranks as a highly rated and highly used music production software.  It is a powerful program, and has many benefits to it that make it sought after not only by techno beat makers of the past to which it appeared to gear to, but to music producers of all genres.  It is a great tool to use to create hip hop instrumentals, rap beats, r&b instrumentals, and other styles of music such as pop, rock, and even movie scores.  It is very flexible, and also allows for the use of external VST effect and VST instrument plugins to be used within it, something that it's competitor, Reason by Propellorhead, still does not allow.  To add insult to injury to its competitor, FL Studio, by use of a ReWire plugin, allows you to sync up the Reason music production software into it, allowing for even further flexibility for your music creation.

 

And, for those who are interested in doing an all out music track, complete with vocals, FL Studio is a great tool to incorporate vocals as well.  Simply configure FL Studio within the settings as instructed within its extensive Help menu, and you can record vocals onto your instrumental and mix it down for a complete track.  FL Studio also allows you to connect it to hardware such as drum machines, music workstations such as the Yahama Motif, Roland Fantom, or Korg Triton.  You can also connect a MIDI Controller onto your computer with the right soundcard equipment, and simply sequence into FL Studio using sounds, musical instrument soundfonts via the FL Soundfont player, or VST instrument plugins within FL Studio that you choose to use, whether internally or externally.  ImageLine also provides an assortment of instrument plugins and sound packs that you can purchase to add to your program to create instrumentals with.  And, there are several third party websites that you can find for sound packs, soundfonts, drum kits, and other musical instrument sounds and plugins for your music creation.

 

Built within FL Studio are various effect plugins that you can use at your disposal to tweak and edit the sounds that you create within it.  It also has a large internal mixer that you can use to assign different instruments to different channels to create an even greater mix of your instrumental or music track.  Also, ImageLine provides other plugins that you can purchase, such as the Maximus plugin, which allows for enhancing and limiting your overall sound.  It serves as a limiter, compressor, and works well in mastering tracks.  If you do not prefer the FL Studio type plugins, you can always search for other VST effect plugins that you can purchase or download, and route them to be used within FL Studio as well.

 

With so much versatility and function, FL Studio is indeed a powerhouse for music production, whether creating instrumentals or complete music tracks.  This article by itself explains only half of what FL Studio is capable of doing.  If you've ever debated on purchasing a music production software, you may want to seriously consider FL Studio.  It is easy to learn, very versatile, compatible with many plugins, and if you purchase it online, you'll be entitled to lifetime updates of the next versions released!  Imagine getting FL Studio 10, and 11 for free just by purchasing FL Studio 9.  It is a powerful tool that is at times, criticized by those who either don't prefer music production software, or have not given it a chance in seeing all that it has to offer.

 

Written by German Lopez