How to set up a home studio when your budget is less than Rs 25,000

A common misconception among budding musicians is it takes expensive equipment to produce quality music. This is far from the truth – there are plenty of great products out there that can help you get started with very little money.

Here are a affordable way a beginner can start making music right away.

Focusrite Scarlett Studio USB audio interface Recording Package

The sound cards installed in your PC’s are not meant for recording and therefore plugging a mic or your instrument will do you no good. You will be stuck with terrible sound quality and of course, you will encounter massive delay in recordings. This is where a interface comes in.

Focusrite’s scarlett series have attained a legendary status when it comes to recording equipment. This particular package will give you everything you need to get recording straight away.

It includes USB powered recording interface (no external adapter required), a high quality condenser microphone coupled with xlr cable and studio headphones. You will also receive:

Cubase LE 6, a powerful recording software

Focusrite Scarlett plug-ins which can help you polish your music with effects.

Bass Station soft-synth, a software synthesizer that you can use to add additional bass or melody sounds to your music.

Loopmasters samples – pre-recorded samples that you can use to fill up your compositions.

The entire package is available on Amazon for Rs. 17,303/- which is pretty sweet deal.

M-Audio Keystation 32 Mini Keys

A major requirement to produce electronic music is a midi-controler. Yes, most mainstream recording softwares will allow you use the computer’s keyboard to control the electronic instruments (which are also included in the Recording software). However, you will have a very limited number of keys to work with and also quite uncomfortable.

M-Audio Keystation 32 which is available on Amazon for Rs. 7,400 is quite a decent midi-keyboard to help you get started. It does not have the full functionality of a full fledged midi-controllers but it gets the job done.

Why this device is truly worth it is, it is super portable and light – you can easily tuck it in your laptop bag. Here’s more, you will get a copy of Ableton live lite recording software and also ignite music making software which includes 275 electronic instrument sounds.

Mind you, unlike most other Midi-keyboards in this price range, the keystation 32 mini has 32 keys rather than 25, giving it more range.

Ableton Live Lite that you get with the M-Audio Keystation 32 Mini might have limited features, but you will be able to upgrade it into the full fledged Ableton Live Suite in the future, which will cost you lot less than buying a fresh copy.

Korg nanoPAD2

The objective of this article is make you a self sufficient musician and therefore this device makes the list. It is basically a drum pad which can help you in playing digital drum instruments. Yes, you can do this on the Keystation 32 Mini as well, but the velocity-sensitive trigger pads of the nanoPAD2 make it more easy to get your timings right. It also has arpeggiator touch pad that is brilliant for adding fast drum rolls.  

This device is super cheap for what it offers, available on Amazon for Rs 4,700.

Watch the below video to see how this works

Now let’s total that –  You will only need to spend Rs. 24,703 to have a fully operational setup, with the addition of  Rs 4,700 extra, if you decide to go for the Korg nanoPAD2.