How to Make Hip Hop Beats: Step-by-Step Tutorials for Beginners

Hip Hop is one of the most popular music genres in the world. Here are 6 tips on how to make Hip Hop beats with video tutorials included.

The 3 basics you need to make beats:

1. Music Equipment
2. Free Music Software
3. Sounds: 15 Free Hip Hop Drum Kits & Free Hip Hop Sample Packs

Related: Music Production Courses Online

1. Select the Right Tempo

Hip Hop beats are between 75 and 100 beats per minute ( BPM ). Trap beats usually have higher tempos.

2. Start with Drums

Music producers usually start a beat by creating a drum pattern. Hip Hop beats usually consist of kick drums, snares, and hi-hats.

Choose quality samples. Quality drum samples are the building blocks for any professional-sounding beat.

You can also start a beat with a sample or melody. Follow whatever inspires you the most.

3. Add Melodies

The melodies are the instruments that are played over the drums. The instrument can be a piano, synth, bass, strings, live instruments, and more.

Add multiple melodies to make the song sound fuller.

If you don’t have real instruments, you can use VST instruments.

Related: Free VST Instruments

4. Add a Bassline

The bassline is another melody or riff at a much lower tone that plays under the main melody.

The bass in a beat can be synth bass or bass guitar.

Bassline Tutorials:

• Hip Hop Basslines for Beginners
• Tips for Creating Basslines
• Bassline Tips & Tricks
• Metro Boomin Shares Kicks & Bassline Tips

5. Create Variations of Your Beat

Create different patterns of your beat that can be turned into the intro, chorus, bridge, and verse.

Related: 30 Best Websites to Make Beats Online For Free

6. Arrange Your Patterns

Arrange your different beat patterns into a full 3 to 5-minute song for music artists.

Here are the most common Hip Hop song structures:

Intro – Verse – Hook – Verse – Hook – Verse – Hook – Outro

or

Intro – Hook – Verse – Hook – Verse – Hook – Verse – Hook – Outro

Those are the very basics of making a Hip Hop beat.

If you listen to most successful Hip Hop beats on the radio, you’ll notice that they’re not necessarily complicated.

Hip Hop is mainly about vocals, so you will want to leave enough space in the beat for the music artist’s vocals/rhymes to shine.

Additional Beat Making Tips

• Don’t make your beats monotonous. Add a drop after every 2 or 4 bars. You can always change this later on after you’ve added your synths.
• Another important aspect that you should take notice is to not overcrowd your mix with too many sounds. You should regard the spaces between sounds with the utmost importance.

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How to Make Hip Hop Beats Tutorials

How To Make A Hip Hop Beat (FL Studio )

This tutorial is by Ric of RicandThadeus showing you his process of chopping a sample as well as making a Hip Hop Instrumental.

Sikwitit Making a Hip Hop Beat in Reason

How to Make a CHILL Hip Hop Beat ( Ableton Live)

In this video Chris Punsalan makes a Chill Hip Hop Beat using Ableton Live.

Piano Hip Hop Beat Making Using Native Instruments Maschine

Traumah Makes a Beat In Reason

Music Artists Who Can Produce

Bruno Mars , Tori Kelly , Omarion , Tinashe , T-Pain , Justin Timberlake , Pharrell , Ryan Leslie , Phil Collins , J.Cole & Kanye Wes.

Related: How to Make Beats

Do you have tips on making a Hip Hop beat?

If so, please share in the comment section below.