Hi everyone. Recently I got a job offer to make songs for kids (stupid and catchy) for youtube. Like this channel https://www.youtube.com/@dbillions/videos

And now there is a question. What lays behind the success of those songs? Is it melody? Is it simplicity? Is it repetitiveness? Or it has almost nothing to do with sound and 90% of the work is video?

How this song should be done right? I mean do I need to make a song first and then video, or video first and then songs? I ask, because for me those videos are not like videos for usual songs, but more like part of sound design of a video, I might be wrong.

Anyone had experience in making that kind of music?

And as we are here, I`ll ask another question, how much should I charge for the job (per full song, per instrumental), considering that I`ll do:
1. Producing instrumental
2. Tracking vocals
3. Mixing
4. Mastering
5(probably) post sound design after footage will be ready (maybe that will be done by video editors)

 

Last edited: Dec 7, 2022

Erm.... the questions you pose suggest that the most honourable thing to do in this situation would be to be honest with your client and say that you are not their guy.

When they ask why... you can show them your post.

 

Yet here we are. I`m with an offer and you with a witty comment ;)

 

I have been into the situation like yours, and perhaps we can collab
anyway for kids song there are some music elements that you need to craft carefully

1. The beat must be using specific beat .. rarely a real drum
2. The sounds of music instruments .. Bells, Chimes, Lead sound, pad and others must be specific too .. KIDS are sensible to these kind of instruments.
3. Most of the keys are in C, D, F in my case Set the ambitus to very limited range not too complicated.
4. You can start w the music first then the video
5. Charge per project instead of hour ...mine was 8 songs at that time

that's it for now ..

My suggestion is you use premade music from Workstation such as KORG, ROLAND or YAMAHA PSS Series to make your life easier .. trust me, it works. Or Band in A Box .. to make your production time shorter.

 

Last edited: Dec 7, 2022

Narrow your age spectrum of 'kids' for each project; identify a specific age group and research what they listen to, it will help greatly.

Not only kids enjoy clappy clappy songs, hippies do too.

 

I know hippies are extinct, it was a joke.

 

Repetitive, simple melody with funny story, if lyrics. 2/4 or 4/4 for simple rhythm.

 

Low BPM
Simple song structure
Over compress everything a bit (to explain it a bit further, no very loud sounds)
No Distortion effects
Simple happy Texts
with Animals, Fire Trucks, Dino's, Fairies, Princesses,
Ad libitum,Non-lexical vocables like in the Baby Shark song

Baby Shark, doo-doo, doo-doo
Baby Shark, doo-doo, doo-doo
Baby Shark, doo-doo, doo-doo

oh, and repetitive stuff like

Baby Shark, doo-doo, doo-doo
Baby Shark, doo-doo, doo-doo
Baby Shark, doo-doo, doo-doo

sorry for the little joke here

About your payment:
https://gearspace.com/board/songwriting/780499-how-much-charge-composing-lyrics-song.html

"Writing a song, whether it's the lyrics or the music component, is usually done for the potential backend income (the royalties). There usually isn't any frontend income (upfront payment). In such cases, you "charge" the standard 50%/50% split from future royalties and license income. In essence, you "own" 50% of the song copyright."

or

"I was thinking something around 200-250$ .
And

A producer might charge something like 5,000 for just doing one track with no others"

 

Last edited by a moderator: Dec 7, 2022

1. All your instruments must come from "General MIDI Level 1 Instrument Patch Map", unprocessed.
2. DO NOT MIX/MASTER ARE YOU CRAZY? Kids haven´t developed a taste for sound yet and will adapt to whatever you throw at them cause the cannot compare and they rarely complain about it, giving yourself the advantage to create future adults that will adapt to shitty mixes/masters when they grow up. THIS IS A GUILD STANDARD. FEEDING CHILDREN WITH POLISHED/FINISHED PRODUCTS IS PAVING THE ROAD FOR CIVIL UNREST LATER ON ON SOCIETIES. DON´T DO IT.
3. Take any other song that complies with point 1 and 2 and invert the notes until is barely recognizable and you call it for the day. Everybody does this, don´t feel shame.
4. In case you run out of ideas do a "The [WHATEVER] on the BUS goes [WHATEVER sound], [WHATEVER sound], [WHATEVER sound]". Trust me. I saw Snoop Doggy Dog did it recently and he went fine with it.

 

Hello everyone. Thank you for all your help and advises. Here we go, finally launched the channel. Only 5 (not the best ones) songs uploaded right now, but more to come. I have made some bangers :D, I hope your kids and you will like it And of course if you have any tips on what and how to improve it, feel free to comment.

Here is the link to one of them

 

I like it for what it is.

It is a bit forced but there is a vibe that reeks a bit of trading on PinkFong's style, which traded on a simplified version of Sesamee Street songs. At a point for an adult it is bit too much and it comes across as Borat meets kid's K-Pop. I don't know if kids will pick up on that or not but if does a grate a bit sometimes.

Seems to be doing well though, I wish you success as it's a worthy endeavor and harder than it seems on the surface.

 

Yeah it does look and sound kinds cringey, but I guess this is what draws the attention of kids.

Thank you for your feedback. There will be some better and catchy songs, just waiting for channel to grow a bit

 

All those Trap 808 bassline midi's will be useful; finally. UVI toy collection. You will sound like an FL ice cream truck in 10 minutes.

 

Last edited: Mar 10, 2023

you did a great job!

 

The discussion of the creation before seeing the final work made it way funnier.

I'm instantly wondering what kind of trees are these? Where are we? Little pink riding hood then takes an orange from the tree and I think to myself that's unrealistic those clearly aren't orange trees. Then I realize there is no bamboo.. *mind blown*

But I guess the video is just a distraction. I think you certainly delivered on the promise of a children's song.

 

I think it's just what's needed. Good luck!

Spoiler

I'm sure you know all of this, still - take care you have all the copy-right(s) of any and all graphic/music/other elements + legal stuff sorted to avoid any headaches.. because I believe this can go big

+1

 

Great job! This song is fire ; My favorite:

Mani Svavarsson is the composer. Apparently, he used the default factory Kontakt library for the Lazy Town songs.

 

Last edited: Mar 11, 2023

Don't sell kids short, challenge them, and instead of dumbing it down, smarten it up. Remember, they are learning as they (we) listen.

 

Last edited: Mar 11, 2023

Previously, these music models were written by experts. People who were usually over 50 years of age and were generally in big music circles and had worked with great musicians for a long time.

To reach this level of perfection, one should study music and gain many experiences. At least they should meet a few hundred musicians and write lots of scores for them. They can't write these music without writing multiple scores or just using loops and rhythms that are used for dance music.

May God grant heaven to the persons who made repetitive dance rhythms the dominant rhythms for the production of modern music. We should really appreciate great people who think about dance rhythms from morning to night and their whole existence is defined by dance rhythms. What a great service they have done to the music community.