Drone Creation Tips

Drones underpin and set the tone of your track but how do you make them interesting and keep them evolving?

A good drone helps set and underpin the mood of your track, while allowing harmony to move freely above it. Drones are generally characterised by a long sustaining single note or chord (often on the root note of the track) and technically speaking (in musical terms) a drone is a ‘pedal note’. Of course, if your drone is just a single oscillator with no movement/modulation it’ll soon get boring, so in these next steps let’s use a few tools to inject some movement into our drone. Note: 12dB (2-pole) filters are usually good for drones as they have a solid low-end but still let some high-frequency harmonics/energy through even at lower cutoff settings. Here are a few ideas…

Start with two oscillators; slightly detune one to add movement. Add a sub-oscillator for low-end depth (triangle for softer lows or square for more defined tone). Add slop, oscillator drift or a shallow/slowish LFO to oscillator pitch to add harmonic...

Above a low-pass filtered saw or square wave, try layering pitched-down samples of string, woodwind or brass instruments for an earthy vibe. The original bowing or blowing noises within the samples will sound more exaggerated and add a more human feel.

Split your drone into three frequency bands (low/mid/high) and process each layer separately within your synth/sampler or on separate tracks in your DAW. Experiment with different filter types/FX on each layer, then automate.