Favorite Music Software#

Here’s a list of my favorite music software. I tend to use free options–there’s plenty available, and the quality is quite good on many of them.

Music Composition#

  • Reaper ($60) One of the few non-free tools that I use, but worth the price. Professional-level DAW with a minimalist interface (and even its own programming language built in). I use Reaper primarily for composing and mixing actual audio files.

  • MuseScore (FOSS) Notation editor similar to Finale or Sibelius. I use this primarily for creating printable scores and music notation.

Synthesizers#

  • Surge (FOSS) An open-source beast of a synth VST with a massive library of presets.

  • Vital (Free) Absolutely phenomenal synth VST with jaw-dropping sound and a gorgeous user interface. The synth itself is free, but comes with limited presets. You can pay for additional preset packages.

Mixing / Effects#

  • Melda Productions MFreeFXBundle (Free) A fantastic package of free plugins. I especially like their equalizer and compressor.

  • OrilRiver (Free) Reverb VST. It goes well with more modern synth and pop music in my opinion, although it does decently with sampled instruments as well.

  • Wider. This is a great little plugin that does one thing: it makes instruments sound “wider”. You’d be amazed how much of a difference this makes though.

Sampled Instruments#

  • Spitfire Labs (Free) Every amateur musician on the internet knows about Spitfire’s Labs series. It’s a hodgepodge of very high quality sampled instruments and synths. Many of them are quite eccentric, but there are a few solid gems in the mix.

  • Steven Slate Drums (Free) Amazingly good drum sampler.

  • Orchestral Tools Sine Player (Free) They offer a few extremely high quality sampled instruments that rival Spitfire’s offerings.

Miscellaneous#

  • Kontakt Komplete Start (Free) No list of free music software would be complete without mentioning this. Native instruments sound amazing out of the box. I especially like the drums.