How to make a trance pad
Pads are the warm bed every other part sits on, and the voice of the breakdown. A good one is slow, wide and always moving, without ever getting in the way.
Slow in, slow out
What makes a pad a pad is its envelope: it swells in and fades away.
A slow attack lets each chord bloom instead of hitting, and a long release lets it blur into the next, so the chord changes feel seamless. Full sustain keeps it there while the chord is held.
Pad envelope
- Attack
- 300–1500 ms
- Decay
- Any
- Sustain
- 100%
- Release
- 1–3 s
Width
Pads sound best wide. Stack 8 to 12 unison voices, detune them more than you would a lead, and spread them fully across the stereo field. The more voices and detune, the lusher and more blurred the chord.
Chorus and reverb
A chorus adds slow, swirling movement and even more width; a long reverb (3 seconds or more) puts the pad in a big space. Because pads are slow, they can take much more reverb than leads or plucks without washing out.
Put the reverb on a send and high-pass it at 300 Hz or so. Low-end reverb on a pad is the fastest way to a muddy mix.
Keep it moving
A static pad gets boring fast. Add slow movement: an LFO on the filter cutoff over several bars, a gentle tremolo, or automate the cutoff opening across a whole breakdown. In the drop, sidechain the pad to the kick, and it pumps with the groove instead of sitting still.
Fit it into the mix
- High-pass it at 150 to 300 Hz in the drop; let more low end through in the breakdown, when there's no bass.
- Cut a little in the upper mids (2 to 4 kHz) so the lead sits on top.
- Keep it lower than you think: a pad you can feel but barely hear is usually right.
More guides
How to write trance chord progressions
Numerals, why trance lives in minor keys, the raised V and voice leading.
How to write a trance melody
Call and answer, chord tones on the beat, rhythm, range and the peak note.
Trance basslines
Offbeat, octave, galloping and rolling: the four patterns and the sound.
Trance arps and plucks
Arp patterns and rates, the pluck sound, the dotted delay and layering.
How to make an uplifting trance lead
Unison, the octave layer, filtering, delay and the mix tricks that make a lead huge.
How to make a trance pad
Slow attack, long release, width, chorus, reverb and movement.
Trancegate settings explained
Patterns, smoothing and where the reverb goes, for gates that chop cleanly.
Acid in trance
The 303 sound, accents and slides, and the filter movement that makes it talk.
Programming trance drums
Four to the floor, the offbeat hat, velocity, swing, fills and sounds.
Trance track structure
Section lengths, timings at your tempo, and why DJs need the first and last 32 bars.
The trance breakdown
What to strip away, revealing the melody, and keeping it moving without a kick.
How to make a trance build-up
Snare rolls, risers, filter sweeps and the gap before the drop.
Mixing kick and bass in trance
Tuning, timing and frequency: a low end that hits hard without fighting.
Sidechain settings for trance
Depth, release and what to duck, for a pump that breathes with the kick.
Mastering trance for the club
Loudness targets, true peak, the mastering chain and streaming.
Getting your trance track signed
Picking labels, sending demos, premasters and what happens when a label says yes.