Summary
Making Music is Dennis DeSantis's catalog of seventy-four specific problems that electronic music producers encounter, paired with concrete strategies for addressing each one. DeSantis, who works for Ableton and was instrumental in writing the company's Learning Music and Ableton tutorials, brings both compositional knowledge and an acute understanding of the software environments where most contemporary music is made.
The book is organized around three categories of problem: starting, finishing, and developing. The starting section covers the paralysis of the blank project — too many choices, fear of commitment, perfectionism that prevents beginning — and offers strategies ranging from the deliberately arbitrary (start with a specific constraint: no kick drum, only three pitches) to the procedural (start from a reference track and work backward). The developing section is the longest and most technically substantial, covering arrangement, tension and release, contrast, repetition and variation, and the relationship between musical elements. The finishing section addresses the problem that many producers never finish anything — not from lack of ideas, but from an inability to declare a work done.
DeSantis writes with clarity and precision. He draws on music theory, cognitive science, and production practice without letting any one framework dominate. The strategies are not prescriptive — he is explicit that most of them work some of the time for some people — but they are specific enough to be immediately testable. You can read a chapter, open your project, and try the thing he describes.
The book is explicitly aimed at electronic music producers working in DAWs, but many of the strategies apply to songwriting and composition more broadly. Readers with no interest in music production may find fewer useful strategies, but the book's larger contribution — a framework for diagnosing specific creative blocks and treating them as problems with identifiable solutions rather than as general failures of inspiration — transfers to almost any creative practice.
Talk to Making Music: 74 Creative Strategies for Electronic Music Producers like its author wrote you back.
Get the ideas that fit your life — not generic summaries.
- Chat with the book
- Audiobook-style main ideas
- Adapts to your life and goals
- Helps you take action
Key takeaways
- 1.
Creative blocks have specific causes. Diagnosing which problem you're facing — starting, developing, or finishing — points toward the right kind of solution.
- 2.
Constraints accelerate creative work. Limiting your options (one instrument, one scale, one tempo) forces decisions and produces results faster than unlimited freedom.
- 3.
Finishing is a separate skill from creating. Many producers have unfinished projects not from a lack of ideas but from an inability to declare a work complete.
- 4.
Tension and release are universal structural principles. Every compelling piece of music sets up expectations and either fulfills or violates them deliberately.
- 5.
Reference tracks are tools, not cheats. Analyzing how a track you admire solves specific problems is one of the fastest ways to develop your own solutions.
- 6.
The blank project problem is often about commitment avoidance. Starting with something arbitrary — any sound, any tempo — is more productive than waiting for the right starting point.
- 7.
Arrangement is about directing attention over time. Every decision about when something enters, drops out, or changes is a decision about where you want the listener to be.
Discussion questions
Use these on your own, with a book club, or as chat starters in Superbook.
- 1.
DeSantis divides problems into starting, developing, and finishing. Which of the three is the hardest for you in your own creative work, regardless of whether that work is music?
- 2.
The book argues that constraints accelerate creativity. Can you think of a time when limiting your options produced better work than having unlimited freedom?
- 3.
He addresses the problem of never finishing things separately from the problem of not being able to start. Do you recognize those as genuinely different problems?
- 4.
The tension-and-release model of musical structure implies that good music creates and resolves expectations. Does that framework feel limiting or clarifying to you?
- 5.
DeSantis is explicit that most strategies work some of the time for some people. How do you generally evaluate advice that comes with that kind of caveat?
- 6.
He suggests using reference tracks analytically — reverse-engineering specific decisions. What would the equivalent be in your own practice?
- 7.
The book is aimed at electronic music producers using DAWs. How much of the creative-block diagnosis transfers to other creative fields?
- 8.
Which of the seventy-four strategies do you think you'd actually use immediately if you had a current project stuck?
- 9.
DeSantis works for Ableton, which makes some of the most widely used music production software. Does knowing that affect how you read the advice?
- 10.
The finishing section argues that many people never finish work not from lack of ideas but from an inability to declare something done. What makes it hard to say a creative work is finished?
- 11.
If arrangement is about directing attention over time, how does that principle translate to the structure of a written argument, a presentation, or another non-musical form?
Themes
Frequently asked questions
-
What is Making Music about?
Dennis DeSantis's catalog of seventy-four specific creative problems that electronic music producers face — around starting, developing, and finishing work — with concrete strategies for addressing each one. It's organized as a problem-solution reference rather than a linear how-to guide.
-
Do I need to be an electronic music producer to benefit from Making Music?
Not entirely. The starting and finishing sections apply broadly to creative work in any medium. The developing section is more music-specific, but the underlying framework — diagnosing creative blocks as specific problems with specific solutions — transfers widely.
-
Is Making Music available for free?
Yes. Ableton released it as a free PDF as well as a printed book. The PDF is available directly from Ableton's website.
-
How long is Making Music?
Around 270 pages, organized into 74 short chapters. It reads in three to four hours cover to cover, but most people use it as a reference, jumping to whichever problem they're currently experiencing.
-
What's the most useful idea in Making Music?
That creative blocks have specific causes, not general ones. Distinguishing between 'I can't start,' 'I can't develop what I've started,' and 'I can't finish' points to completely different solutions — and most generic creativity advice conflates them.
Similar books
The Creative Act: A Way of Being
Rick Rubin
The War of Art
Steven Pressfield
Big Magic
Elizabeth Gilbert
This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession
Daniel J. Levitin
