Organizing Your Samples

In this video, we're going to be talking about organizing your samples. Now, I know this isn't the most fun or interesting thing you can think of when it comes to music. When you think of music, you don't picture someone sitting in front of a computer making files, folders, and organizing things. However, I'm going to tell you this: it makes your life so much quicker and easier when you are producing.

"This is just the nature of being an electronic or computer-based musician."

The Digital Equivalent of Gear Maintenance

If you were playing a guitar or another instrument, the equivalent task might be changing out strings or fixing gear. This organizing task is the digital equivalent of that. It's important to ensure you do this so that it makes your production process a lot quicker.

My Samples Folder

Here's an image of what my samples folder looks like when it's very clearly organized. Let me show you how I have it set up in Ableton:

• Drum Loops: I open this folder and it contains only drum loops.
  • I can browse by genre or BPM, such as "funky house" or "dubstep."

This structure allows me to find exactly what I'm looking for, whether it's loops, single shots, instrument loops, or single instrument one shots. It's a lot better than when I first started with a gigantic list of sounds that confused me.

Tips and Tricks for Organizing Your Samples

Structure Your Folders

When you look at my organization, you'll see the first section consists of:

• Drum Loops
• Drum and Percussion One Shots
• Instrument Loops

If you pick one of these, it opens up to a new folder. For example:

• Drums and Percussion: Opens to various categories such as:
  • Drum Kits
  • Glitch Sounds
  • Tuned Percussion
  • Untuned Percussion

This organization becomes very specific. I choose a major folder, which then goes to another subset of folders.

Guidelines for Creating Organization

Here are a few guidelines I recommend:

1. Break It Into Groups:

   • If there are more than 10 samples, try to categorize them.
   • For example, if you have a variety of percussion sounds, create a folder labeled "Drums." Inside that, you can have subfolders for each specific type of drum.

   "If you have a tabla, create two separate folders for each side of the tabla set."

2. Only Keep Usable Samples:

   • Avoid keeping samples that sound bad or that you know you shouldn't use in your music.
   • Copyright: If you don't have the rights to a sample or you're unsure of its origin, don't include it.

3. Add Keywords for Easy Searching:

   • For example, if you have a sax loop, you can add keywords like "jazzy," "dark," "verb," "120 BPM," and "A minor" to make it easier to find in your browser.

   Example: If I search "jazz," I can quickly see all associated samples, like "killer jazzy break 102."

Sample Activity

As a cool example to test your knowledge and make sure you're organizing your samples, I created a sample activity. Here's a PDF you can download to follow along.

• Organize Samples Activity:
  • Open your sample library (whatever samples you have).
  • You can use samples from your class collection or your own.

Steps:

1. Organize your samples into larger folders by type (e.g., instruments, drums, sound effects).
2. Break it down further into more specific folders.

No Hard Rules

There is no hard rule to this; it's completely up to your style and the sound you prefer. Use some creativity here! You don't have to strictly follow an example structure.

Adding Folders to the Browser

• In Ableton Live: Navigate to the browser on the side.
• Use the "Add Folder" option to choose your organized folder location. This will make it easily accessible from your places in the browser.

Conclusion

There you go! That is the activity for organizing your samples and considering the file structure.

Keep in Mind:

• Break down your samples as you go
• Ensure a good bit rate
• Respect copyright rules
• Use good keywords

Organizing your samples will allow you to find what you need quickly. I remember spending two frustrating days reorganizing files after years as a producer. Now that I'm organized, it's smooth and easy to navigate; you'll be lucky if you start fresh and implement these strategies from the get-go! If you already have a backlog, it's time to clean it up.

That's it, organizing your samples!