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Renowned music producer Hilton Wright II, credited for his work with artists such as Mike Posner, Big Sean, Sofia Reyes, and contributions to the TV show “black-ish,” guides you through his signature workflow in this exclusive tutorial.

Hilton unveils the secrets behind his personalized production process in Reason, illustrating how to streamline your workflow for maximum efficiency and creativity. Discover the importance of crafting a default template that serves as the foundation for your entire project.

Learn how to seamlessly integrate MIDI OUT to hardware synths and players, adding an extra layer of depth to your sound. Hilton also shares insights into the art of arrangement with his specially designed templates, providing a great kickstart for any session. Moreover, Hilton underscores the significance of organization through Favorites lists, showcasing how curating the perfect collection can enhance your creativity and efficiency.

Bid farewell to the overwhelming array of instruments and sounds, as Hilton guides you in handpicking the essentials for your unique sound. Get ready for some serious music making!

Transcript

Intro: Hilton Wright II

What’s up, Reason fam, my name is Hilton Wright II. I’m a six-time Billboard number one, platinum record producer and songwriter, and my discography includes artists like Drake, Mike Posner, Big Sean, Sofia Reyes, the cast of Black-ish, Faith Evans, and many more. Today we’re going to talk about developing a signature workflow in Reason and how it can streamline your production process, so let’s get right into it.

Starting with a default template

When I’m thinking about my personalized production workflow in Reason, it all starts with my default template. If you’re familiar with the menu or the preferences of Reason, you have an option to select a template for your default song, and this is what mine is called: 715 Studio. 715 is the name of my company.

A piano armed and ready

At the heart of my template is a piano. The first thing I want when I fire up Reason is to have a piano active. I might be hearing some chords, I might be hearing a melody, or sometimes I might just want to play around, or my son runs in here and he wants to play the piano. So all I have to do is click in Reason, and this is armed in the sequencer, ready to go, as the first thing.

Maschine, Beat Map, and Drum Sequencer

Then I’ll go down. I have Maschine set up. If you all saw my prior video, I talk about how I use Maschine within Reason in a very unique way. Then I go down and I have the drums. Sometimes it might not be Maschine, but I just have it armed, and I have it preceded by Beat Map. I use Beat Map and Drum Sequencer interchangeably. Beat Map is a lot quicker, and they both serve their purposes. I thought that when Beat Map came out, it would replace Drum Sequencer, but I found that Drum Sequencer still has some advantages. But I love Beat Map, because I can just quickly…

Beat Map’s random density

Here’s one of my favorite things about Beat Map. If we load up some type of kit and then just hit the random density, we’re halfway home already, right? Now all I can do from there is adjust what I do and don’t like. I’m all about smarter, not harder. Work smarter, not harder. And obviously the random density is really random, I mean, watch this. Of course, you can go change your maps and change the kit.

Here’s the thing: I don’t have writer’s block or beat block, because I’m well prepared with the tools that I have.

A Dr. Octo Rex loop in every track

So I’ll go down. I always have to have a Dr. Octo Rex. Every one of the tracks I put out has some type of loop in it, whether it’s a shaker or maybe a guitar from the factory sound bank, doing something really minimal. Again, go back and watch the other video where I talk about some tips and tricks there.

Selecting slices by MIDI

One thing that’s different about this is I have some settings on here. I’ve selected “Select Slice by MIDI,” and what I’ll always do is, you see I have it folded down because I always load from down here. If you load a single REX file up here instead, it’ll override any settings here, so I always have “Select Slice by MIDI” selected whenever I load something in. Then we go back to play, and I can see where this is going.

Sketching a house beat with seventh chords

Maybe I should just make a beat off of this. Right? See, like we’re done. Now, I’m not going to go down the rabbit hole. I can sit up here and mess around with the chord progressions and whatnot, but you get an idea. I just hit, what, like an F minor 7 chord. Anything that’s a seventh chord over these types of drums is going to give it that house type of feel. Anyway, like I said, I could be up here for days figuring that out, but we’re halfway there.

MIDI outs to hardware synths

All right, cool. So I’ll go down now. I have three MIDI outs. These are going to three hardware synthesizers that I have: the SE-02, which is right here, and I’m going to turn all of these on, I probably should have done that before I started the video; then the D-05; and then I have the JU-06A.

Using Players with external devices

The best thing about having the MIDI out is that I’m not a piano player, officially. I know my theory, I know basic chords and whatnot, but this allows me to use Players with all of these external devices. So if I come up here to Players and, let’s take Bassline Generator, and go over to this SE-02, I’m going to mute… I’m going to turn that off, because I don’t know how this is going to sound. I’m going to load this up. Right, and so I’m triggering a hardware synth.

This one is actually analog; these other two are digital, doing an emulation type thing. The D-50 was a digital synth, and the Junos were analog, but the SE-02 is analog. So this is the best of both worlds, the marriage that I was talking about in the other video where I did the example with Maschine.

Puzzle piecing: start with the core element

Like I said, a lot of what I’m doing these days is more puzzle piecing, figuring it out and tweaking things. I’ll first think about the core thing, whatever that is. If it’s drums, I think of my drums, my sound selection, programming, and mixing. If I’m starting with drums, then I’ll make sure I have that right collection of sounds.

The factory sound bank

Surprisingly, the factory sound bank still has a tremendous assortment of sounds. Whether that’s me getting a patch for Kong, a patch from Redrum (or “Red Drum,” depending on how you want to pronounce it), or NN-XT, or just grabbing different sounds from there, and then using Beat Map, or vice versa, doing the same thing with Maschine and mixing the two. That’s what I talked about in the other video; those are the different ways. And then once I say, “boom, these drums, yep, that’s it,” I’ll start going and moving on. So that is the breakdown of my default song template.

Arrangement templates

One of the hardest parts for me in the track-building part of production is sometimes arrangement. So here’s something that I pulled up. If you come over here and you select “New from Template,” you can see this long list of templates that I have. Some of these are what I’m calling arrangement templates. If you look at this, it looks like a full, complete song. If I press play, it’s silent, there’s nothing here. But what I’ve done is, this is a particular song that I liked and was listening to, and what I literally did was I played the song on repeat and I mapped it out in Reason.

Now, I could be working on a song like that, or I could be working on a track idea that I have, and I might have built out 11 different tracks, instruments, and now it’s time for me to break it out into an arrangement. This gives me a guide for where I could go and how I could take that and arrange some of those instruments, or I could come in here in this template and literally start coloring within the lines. It’s something that I found to be useful.

Now, I’ve only used this maybe two or three times, and I made these arrangement templates a few years ago. The idea is to be prepared for whatever scenario you’re in, because different projects come my way, and the approach I take might differ from something else, and you never know where or how you’ll get stuck, so it’s just good to have these tools at your disposal.

Labeling sections: main melody, counter melody, and riffs

So I might come into the chorus section, and what I’ve done is I’ve labeled these and said “Main Melody,” so now I know that I have a main melody that is going to be… turn on the click… that’s one bar long, and this is 65 beats per minute, and so now my main focus is, let me just figure out a really dope melody that is that length. Then here’s a counter melody, and that counter melody is going to be double that same time. So this is a counter melody harmony; then this is a tonic riff, a fifth riff. I literally broke these songs down.

Like I said, this is just a starting point. I might come up with this melody and the counter melody and then be off to the races, and I might throw all of this other stuff away. But maybe you need to get something done, or you want to do a track idea and for some reason you just don’t know where to go or what to start with. This is a cool guide.

A 16-step Kong template routed to the SSL mixer

Here’s another template that I created: 16-step Kong to the SSL. With Kong, I’ll show you what’s going on here. I have the Kong routed out with each pad going to a channel on the mixer, and then I have a Drum Sequencer going to each pad in Kong. So yeah, this is awesome. Again, I can just load up the most basic factory Kong kit, and then here are your presets up here. Random. Yep, there we go. Boom, let’s see how this sounds. You can do something with that, I can do something with that. Now what if I went back up here?

Jumpstarting creativity with a random kit

That has a very early-2000s Neptunes feel, right? So if I had something like this, I just solo out the couple of parts that were good, and I might throw everything else away. These are the ways that you can jumpstart your creativity and your process.

Favorites lists

Probably, I’d say, the biggest contributor to streamlining my workflow and my production process in Reason is going to be my favorites lists. If you come over, you hit F3, and in this window here you can see I have a ton of favorites lists.

Favorites categories: 808s, loops, and basslines

The way that I approached these was I would think of different things I wanted to have readily available, or different categories, whether that is 808s, all the different 808s. Not only do I have one-shots in here from the factory sound bank, all factory sound bank, don’t sleep on the factory sound bank, I also have patches like a Thor patch, I also have 808 loops, and then I have Rack Extensions, like the Punch BD Rack Extension, which is just kicks and 808s. It’s just so many different things.

I even have 808 basslines. This is going to trip you out: these are basslines, maybe I heard a song and I just love the 808 bassline. What I could do is replicate that same pattern. I keep the click on, so now if I’m working on a song and I need a bassline, and you can see that I have the tempo switching, right? So I’ll take these and copy and paste them into another session that I’m working on, and then I’ll adjust it from there. Again, working smarter, not harder.

The “Nice Finds” list

Another cool favorites list that I’ve done is one called “Nice Finds.” Sometimes when you’re in the middle of making a track, or when you’re browsing your library, which I’ll get to in a minute, you might hear something that perks your ear, and you’re like, “Ooh, that’s cool, oh man, I could use that,” and I drag it over here. That way I’m not distracted, I don’t have to start working on something else while I’m in the middle of something, and then I can go back. Or when I’m stuck in another session, I can just go to Nice Finds and start a whole new track, a whole new song, off of the stuff in here, because it’s stamped, it’s certified: this is dope.

Favorites for chords and MIDI

So: favorites lists, favorites lists, favorites lists. You see I have one for chords: Chord Sequencer, EZkeys by Toontrack, my favorite PolyStep Sequencer. And then I even have MIDI stuff: MIDI keys, MIDI drums, melodies. So you’re thinking, “I need a melody,” Pattern Mutator… Honestly, I could spend the whole video talking about favorites lists, because it’s that important.

Wrap-up and Hilton’s class

So those are favorites lists. Get yours together. You can see me use a combination of all of these different tips and tricks in my class on Studio (studio.com/HW), where I write and produce the song “You Want It,” which was cut by the artist JaVonté and made it to editorial playlists on Apple Music and Spotify. Definitely follow me on social media (Instagram, Facebook), and we’ll include all that below. Check out my music everywhere music is available.

Thank you so much for checking this out. Hopefully you found some tips and tricks that are extremely useful in your music-making process. I can’t wait to see what you do with everything that we talked about today. All right, peace.

Class trailer

I’m Hilton Wright II, and welcome to my studio. I’m a six-time Billboard number one, platinum record producer and songwriter, known for my versatility across the industry. I’ve written and produced hundreds of songs for the biggest artists in the world, like Drake, Mike Posner, Big Sean, Sofia Reyes, Faith Evans, and many more. I’ve composed award-winning music for TV, including the song “Juneteenth” for the hit ABC TV show Black-ish, and I’ve scored commercials for the biggest brands in the world, from Walmart to Jeep and more.

To maintain this level of creative output, I’ve developed my own unique set of tools, templates, and techniques that allow me to consistently transform my ideas and inspiration and to finish tracks. If you’re the kind of person that makes tons of loops and voice notes but struggles to actually finish your tracks, you’re going to learn methods in this class to help you get to the finish line more often and more consistently.

During the class, I’ll bring you into my studio and share with you my entire creative process from start to finish. You’ll follow along as I transform a simple idea into a finished song, starting from brainstorming initial concepts, crafting lyrics and melodies, and producing the final track. Along the way, I’ll be explaining everything that I’m doing: my thought process, my techniques, the exact tools I’m using, and the decisions I make. I’ll show you how to create the perfect balance between verses, choruses, and bridges, and how to produce and arrange your song to enhance its emotional power.

By the end of the class, you’ll have new tools and techniques that’ll hopefully help you be more consistent and instantly turn your ideas into fully realized, finished songs. So come join me, Hilton Wright II, for this unique learning experience inside my studio.