Best AI Courses and Plugins for Music Production in 2024

Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly transforming the music production landscape. For music producers, understanding and utilizing AI tools can significantly enhance creativity, streamline workflows, and elevate the overall quality of their tracks. This article explores the best AI courses and plugins available, providing a comprehensive guide for music producers looking to integrate AI into their creative process. From generating unique melodies to mastering audio, AI offers a plethora of opportunities to stay ahead in the competitive music industry. This guide will help you navigate the options and choose the best resources to boost your music production skills.

Before diving into AI courses, let's explore some of the top AI plugins that can immediately impact your music production. Unison Audio offers a suite of powerful AI-driven plugins designed to streamline various aspects of music creation: * **Drum Monkey:** Instantly generates perfect drums using AI, allowing producers to quickly create grooves in various genres. * **Mangler:** Adds unique textures and character to sounds through AI-powered distortion, filtering, and modulation. * **Sound Doctor:** Cleans up audio recordings by intelligently removing noise and fixing frequency issues. * **Zen Master (Free):** Balances mixing and mastering, providing radio-ready results with minimal effort. * **MIDI Wizard 2.0:** Generates professional-level melodies and chord progressions using AI. * **Bass Dragon:** Creates hard-hitting basslines tailored to specific genres and styles. * **808 Machine:** Generates deep, punchy 808 patterns for modern music production. These plugins provide immediate access to AI-driven tools that can significantly enhance the quality and efficiency of your music production.

Several excellent AI courses cater specifically to music producers. These courses offer structured learning paths, hands-on exercises, and expert guidance on integrating AI into your music production workflow. Here's an overview of some of the best options: * **AI for Music and Audio by Berklee Online:** A detailed course focusing on creating original melodies and beats using AI tools. * **AI Music Mastery by Born To Produce:** An in-depth course emphasizing hands-on experience with AI software to improve music production workflow. * **AI for Music Production with Skygge by Aulart:** Taught by renowned producer Skygge, this course covers using AI to create unique vocal textures and instrumental loops. * **Generative AI for Music by Full Sail DC3:** A program designed to help you create original music from scratch using generative AI platforms. * **AI Music Composition by Udemy:** Teaches you how to create your own custom AI music apps, even without coding experience. * **Using AI for Music Production Explained by Groove3:** Focuses on using AI to improve mixing and mastering skills. * **Composing Music with Generative AI by Misici on Skillshare:** A comprehensive guide on creating music using simple AI software.

AI for Music and Audio by Berklee Online is a 4-week online course that provides over 16 hours of video lessons. The course teaches you how to create original melodies and beats using AI tools like Google’s Magenta Studio. It includes examples of turning basic MIDI sketches into full-blown song ideas. A key aspect of this course is blending traditional music production skills with AI-generated material. You'll also learn how top artists use AI in their tracks, with breakdowns of songs from producers like Skrillex and Billie Eilish. Hands-on projects allow you to train your own AI models, creating new drum patterns that fit your style. By the end of the course, you'll be able to confidently use AI to create original ideas faster, expand your creativity, and produce professional-level tracks in various genres.

AI Music Mastery by Born To Produce is an in-depth online course focused on hands-on experience with AI software to improve your music production workflow. With over 10 hours of video tutorials, you'll learn how to use AI plugins like Orb Producer Suite to automatically create chord progressions, melodies, and basslines based on your chosen style or genre. The course includes five hands-on exercises designed to help you produce a full track from start to finish using AI-generated elements. A highlight is the section on creating unique drum grooves with AI tools. You'll also learn how to integrate AI-generated material into popular DAWs like Ableton Live and FL Studio. This course is ideal for music producers seeking fresh musical ideas and faster song creation with high sound quality.

AI for Music Production with Skygge by Aulart is taught by renowned French producer Skygge, known for pioneering the use of AI in music creation. This course offers over 5 hours of in-depth video lessons covering topics like creating unique vocal textures, generating instrumental loops using text prompts, and mixing and mastering. You'll learn how to use AI platforms like Google’s Magenta Studio to transform text descriptions into professional-sounding loops. The course also teaches you how to convert recorded vocals into different instruments using AI tools. A key assignment involves creating a complete 3-minute song using only AI-generated sounds. Skygge also breaks down his famous AI-produced track “Hello Shadow,” demonstrating how he combined AI-generated elements to build a cohesive, commercial-quality track.

Generative AI for Music by Full Sail DC3 is a 3-week online program designed to help you create original music from scratch using AI. The course includes six detailed lessons covering topics like using generative AI platforms such as Amper Music and AIVA to produce custom songs based on your inputs. You'll learn how to create personalized AI prompts to generate instrumental tracks matching specific moods. A unique aspect of this course is its coverage of the legal aspects of using AI-generated music, including copyright issues and licensing. You'll also learn advanced techniques for editing and customizing AI-generated audio within DAWs like Logic Pro and Ableton. This course is ideal for those looking to stay current with music industry trends and demands.

AI Music Composition by Udemy offers a unique approach by teaching you how to create your own custom AI music apps, even without prior coding experience. In this 5.5-hour course, you'll learn how to build a simple tool that generates catchy trap melodies or EDM chord progressions automatically. You'll also gain hands-on experience coding an AI-powered drum sequencer that creates complex hip-hop rhythms. A standout project involves training neural networks to analyze hit tracks and generate new melodies or basslines in a similar style. The course clearly explains each step, making it accessible for beginners to build powerful music AI tools designed for creating chart-ready music.

Using AI for Music Production Explained by Groove3 focuses on using AI to improve your mixing and mastering skills. This shorter course (around 2 hours) provides real-life examples of how to use AI tools to enhance your mixes. Producer Larry Holcombe guides you through using popular AI tools like LANDR to get polished, release-ready versions of your mixes. You'll see how LANDR's mastering AI can enhance clarity, loudness, and depth. The course also covers using Drum Replacer to swap out drums with professional-quality samples and iZotope Neutron's AI to suggest specific EQ moves. The course is designed to be simple and easy to follow, making it perfect for quickly improving your mixes using AI.

Composing Music with Generative AI by Misici on Skillshare is a comprehensive guide on creating music using simple AI software. This course includes about 2 hours of video lessons that break down how to use generative AI to quickly create fresh musical ideas. The course primarily focuses on teaching you to use user-friendly music AI tools like Chrome Music Lab, where you'll learn to create melodies and rhythms by clicking and dragging colorful blocks. You'll learn how to export these AI-generated loops into DAWs like Ableton Live, Logic Pro, or FL Studio. The course is easy to follow and doesn't assume any prior experience with AI or complicated software, making it ideal for beginners looking to produce music quickly and easily.