Acoustica User Forums

That is, recording yourself and fixing the imperfections. From Tiger's thread it seems like many of us do it. Or at least I'm not the only one. I always felt kind of guilty because I thought maybe I should spend my time practicing rather than recording then doing what is essentially "programming".

But then I get over it.

Anyway, my question is not philosophical but practical. No matter how much practice I have, I won't be able to play as fast as Carlos Santana. So rather than "dumb down" the solo I had an idea that I could learn it at half speed - record it in another project, save the clip and then import it and double it up. I'm sure it can be done, but what is the sequence?

My song is 110 bps. Do I record the solo at 55 bps in another project, double it up there, then save and import to my song? Or do I save it at 55bps, import it, and time shift that track only? Can that even be done - time shift a clip or track without affecting the whole song?

I'm not sure when next I'll get a chance to have some Mixcraft quality time, else I'd just experiment myself. But I can familiarize myself with the solo slowed down on the train to and from work. But I don't want to spend the time doing that if I can't "cheat" the way I'm envisioning.

I have done this myself before, and don't kid yourself the "cheat" of slowing down "tape" to record has been going on for decades. By much better musicians than us.

I have done it in the same project with out the clip transfer process.
I haven't found it necessary to 1/2 speed or perform any math.

I make sure I note the original BPM.
SAVE project
Identify the best tracks to perform against (drums, rhythm gtr, etc) for me the fewer the better. And mute all others
Make sure all clips in those tracks are set to match project tempo.
Drop the BPM to whatever works 120 to 90 or 80 or 70 doesn't matter.
Record new track at lower BPM until satisfied
Make sure new track is also set to match project tempo
reset project temp to original value.
if happy with the results
SAVE project

Thanks much - Sounds easy enough. And the advantage as you say is I can play / record using the rhythm tracks I already have.

Side note -
I'm amazed how even in the analog days recordings were done like this, or other "tricks" like punch in. I have a Doors CD with a bunch of outtakes with the engineer telling Robbie to replay an intro over and over again - at one point saying "I think I'll use that one, but let's do a couple more". And I'm thinking "How? It's tape, not a digital file".

Second side note - Geoff Emerick (engineer under George Martin for the Beatles) has a fascinating book about what he learned and how they experimented.

I used this method on lead for my song Funhouse King in the showcase forum. I'm not a very proficient lead guitarist, and my buddy who played lead in our band in the 80's was too busy to help out. So I found a way to at least put down something, warts and all. I like the imperfect and trying to catch the moment, not the ideal.

Bill,

I have had similar situations. My fingers just don't move like they once did.

What bothers me is when someone tells me that I am "cheating". For a while, I felt bad about what they said. Then, I realized that I'm not cheating; rather, I'm using the tools that are available in my toolbox. Look at it this way. Is a ditch digger cheating by using his shovel?

Now, I just don't give all the details of how I put my projects together.

Barry
(formerly known in this forum as "Doodad")

Never give away ALL your secrets.....

I heard an interview a few years ago where Robert Plant was talking about how they discovered the hard way that when touring live it was sometimes hard to figure ways around the tricks they had used in the studio on their early work......
Specifically the problem of trying to duplicate passages where they had sped up the tape a little to hit the high notes on the vocal tracks.
Yep, the original pitch correction.

A further advantage of that method is that the final result will sound more precise, the few microseconds of timing error being shorted when sped up. Furthermore, little noises such as string squeaks and suchlike can be more easily removed before speeding it up,

Back to the suggestion above:

It seems all my audio clips are set as "Time Stretch" rather than "Use Project Tempo". Since I have to go back to change all them I can't help but wonder why they are set that way. Is there a default parameter that can be set?

Mark Bliss wrote:Never give away ALL your secrets.....

...although if you must, just start with the dirty little ones. -h