Starting September 7th I’m going to conduct a series of 6 workshops on music production with open source software at De Bakkerij in Castricum. With software I also mean the operating system so the OS I’m going to use will be an open source based one (probably Ubuntu or Debian). So basically it’s a series of workshops on music production with Linux Audio.

Last week I had something like, what the heck, I’m just going to mail De Bakkerij to ask if they’re interested since they host more DIY initiatives like the workshops inititiative I proposed. I didn’t expect much of it but I immediately got an enthusiastic e-mail back from the promotor of De Bakkerij. So after a few mails back and forth it was a done deal.

Rough outline of the workshops:

1. Introduction and base principles of open source software and using it for music production. What is open source, why use it, how does the open source audio ecosystem look like and will my hardware work?
2. Recording with open source software. What software is available (DAW), how to use it during the recording process, base principles of recording instruments and vocals (I’ll be focusing on home recording and not recording complete bands).
3. Making music with open source software. Softsynths, samplers, drum machines, amp/cabinet modeling, sequencers, trackers, DAWs, MIDI/OSC, plugin frameworks etc.
4. Mixing and mastering with open source software. What software is available, what kind of hardware do I need, base principles of mixing and mastering.
5. Showcasing the possibilities of the usage of open source software with the focus on low-cost solutions like the Raspberry Pi and RockChip based devices.
6. Concluding workshop: listen to and discuss the musical projects made by the attendees, discussion on music production with open source software.

There’s no fee for attending the workshops but you do need a notebook or netbook and an empty USB memory stick of at least 4GB.