Sound Design Foundations

Effects, Sample Manipulation, Subtractive & FM Synthesis

Develop core sound design skills and learn the foundations of sound, synthesis and effect processing with over 40 hours of video content


Sound Design Online Course

Whether you are in hip-hop, EDM, Ambient, or crazy futuristic glitch-hop, a good understanding of sound is essential if you want to improve your music on a deeper level. Getting control over your sound is a powerful feeling; it allows you to be more creative and it makes mixing and finishing your songs a whole lot easier. Using unique and immersive sounds is a very effective way of getting the listeners attention.

You will learn a whole range of tricks and techniques that you can immediately apply to your music, but the real goal of this course is to gain a better understanding of sound and why it works the way it does. Besides making you look cool at dinner parties this will also enable you to take techniques you have learned in class and use them in new innovative ways.

The course is a blend of recorded lessons with instructor Jor van der Poel (ROLI, Pyramind, Loopmasters, ADSR Sounds) and video tutorials.

All students get lifetime access to the course videos (including updated lessons) as well as the opportunity for academic discounts on software and plugins.

What You'll Get With The Course

Most importantly, you'll learn how sound works. Getting a deeper understanding about the air vibrations that we call "Sound" will open up a world of new possibilities, you will start to recognise bad habits, identify problems during mixdown and learn how to develop your own sound.
After the course you will be able to:
  • Analyze the sounds you hear in your favourite songs
  • Identify the different characteristics of any sound
  • Use those characteristic to create sounds with more intent
  • Understand texture and expression; bring your sounds to live
  • Create more defined sounds that truly catch the listener's attention
  • Master the newest Synths, VST's and stand-alone applications
  • Understand different synthesis types and when to use them
  • Apply the learned techniques in new exciting ways
  • Understand Sound, and why it works the way it does

Course Curriculum


  Lessons
Available in days
days after you enroll
  NVO Videos
Available in days
days after you enroll

Frequently Asked Questions


When does the course start and finish?
The course starts now and never ends! It is a completely self-paced online course - you decide when you start and when you finish.
How long do I have access to the course?
How does lifetime access sound? After enrolling, you have unlimited access to this course for as long as you like - across any and all devices you own.

"Jor is brilliant at music production and sound design. I ended up purchasing both of his sound design courses (Fundamental and Advanced). They are super detailed courses and he explains them very very well. This is a very serious Sound Design course which requires a lot of time commitment. Thanks JOR, I am getting there :) ”

- Hussain Bhalwany

"This is the best synthesis course on the planet! I highly recommend it for electronic music producers and multimedia sound designers alike. The course is packed full to the brim with fundamental and advance theoretical knowledge and practical techniques. Jor is an excellent teacher, who explains and demonstrates things in such a way that totally make sense; there were many elements of synthesis I overlooked in the past because I thought they were not useful for my particular needs but I was mistaken. The great thing about this course is it has not just improved my sound design skills tenfold, but I have also picked up some super cool techniques for mixing too, which is my profession. The course mainly focuses on subtractive and wavetable synthesis but also goes into detail on the fundamentals of sound and effect processing, as well as an overview of other types of synthesis such as FM. To conclude, I am really happy I signed up for the course, I have learned so much and had a lot of fun while doing so, I am looking forward to progressing onto the Advanced Synthesis course."

- Paul Fawkes

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