Help! Need to crossfade clips with contrary tempos

[jukeboxgrad]

I'm really hoping someone has a clever solution I didn't think of.

This is a DJ situation. Imagine that I want to play Track A at 120 bpm. Then I want to play Track B at 90 bpm. And I want to crossfade from A to B. And I want both tracks to be warped.

Live won't let me do this, right? I wish it did.

Basically I want a feature/command that works like this: "change the project tempo right now, but keep the old tempo for any clips that are currently playing, until they stop; the new tempo only goes into effect for any clips that haven't been launched yet."

I know about the trick of naming a scene with bpm. But that doesn't solve my problem, because it doesn't give me a way to hear a crossfade where A's outro is playing (warped) at 120 bpm while B's intro is playing (warped) at 90 bpm.

I realize I could sort of get closer to the result I want if I turn off Warp for Track B. But I want the benefits of warping for that track (like being able to loop that track's outro, for example). Also, B might have a natural tempo of 80 and I want to play it at 90, let's say.

This seems like a common DJ requirement, and I'm accustomed to doing this in Traktor, where each deck has its own clock. But in Live there's only one clock.

I'm hoping someone has a clever idea for how to get the result I want in Live.

Thanks!

[Patch]

Can't be done - like you said - Live only has one clock.

[hambone1]

Warp a track, render it, then play it unwarped. It will then still be more or less warped and not tied to Live's tempo. And if you quantize a dummy clip to launch it, it will still launch in sync.

I re-render every track this way, and end up with only one warp marker at 1.1.1 (which also reduces CPU overhead). Then if I don't want a track tied to Live's global tempo, I simply temporarily disable warping on that track. It still plays as if it were warped, but always at its original tempo.

Another way is to use two unsynched instances of Live.

[chrysalis33rpm]

I assign a button to turn warp on and off - that way I can do it easily and quickly, after the (beatless) into's over, say. I realize this does not completely solve the problem, but I think it's case of Live just not being a DJ player, really.

[chrysalis33rpm]

spelling: "intro's"

[longjohns]

I'm not convinced that this can't be done.

Maybe not in a completely spontaneous DJ performance type way, but I think it is possible to set up in advance.

You would need to shift your thinking a bit on what warping really means. It does not necessarily mean "bring an audio file in line with the set tempo"

It is a way to stretch and compress time on a sample, therefore all the "rubber band" analogies from Ableton.

So,

You could split either of the two clips into two sections. (the tail of the first track, or the beginning of the second track

And you'll be setting up what would look like "weird" warp markers on this special section, so that it will seem to play at 90bpm even though the tempo is 120, or vice versa

Then the new scene can be triggered @ 90 bpm after the fade is complete, and everything is back to normal.

Math should be easy to figure out the funky warping - you'd just get a ratio and apply that to the warp field on the special clip

At least that is how I visualize it, without testing it

[longjohns]

This would be easiest to set up in Arrange, but I think then the clips could be dragged back into session view

edit:

no, not easier! easiest is below..

[peeddrroo]

90=120*3/4
so one way to achieve this is to set the tempo at 90bpm,
if your clip at 120bpm is 100 bars long, take the warp marker at 75, and drag it to the end of the file (bar 100). it should play at 120.
then both files should mix nicely.
you'll probably have to use another warping mode than "beats" for the 120bpm file or you'll hear artefacts. complex should be fine.

if you want to keep the master tempo at 120, you'll have to do the opposite to the 90bpm file (ie reducing it by 4/3, which might be a bit difficult)

[longjohns]

you'll probably have to use another warping mode than "beats" for the 120bpm file or you'll hear artefacts. complex should be fine.

this is not necessarily true. if you do this with pure math (tempos are really truly 120 and 90) then there will not be any artifacts in beats mode (or repitch)

If your tempos are not _exact_ then you will probably be better off with another warp mode, true

after some testing here, i think this would be WAY easier to do to the end of the first sample, rather than the beginning of the second sample.

that's because of the firing timing since the bars and beats go out the window with this special clip once it's started to play back. so to just have the special one fade out rather than have to transition back to an actual tempo, is better

[longjohns]

yeah, just copy the first clip to a slot below itself, set the second one in legato mode, set the clip tempo (in the warp field) of the new clip to the new scene tempo,

done.



use beats mode instead of repitch,

repitch is giving me a little tempo glitch when firing the new scene

edit: this doesn't work either! doh

[longjohns]

hambone1's suggestion would also be a good way to get clips with exact tempos, so that you could do this trick more easily

[jukeboxgrad]

Wow, this place is awesome. Problem solved. The problem has a couple of easy solutions that I somehow couldn't think of.

ham: "Warp a track, render it, then play it unwarped"

I realize I could do that, but I want all tracks to have the power of warp available (so I can loop an outro, for example, and decide during the performance how many times the loop should play).

It would be nice if Live let me do loops in an unwarped clip, but it doesn't.

"Another way is to use two unsynched instances of Live."

That's clever. I didn't think of that. That idea is overkill for this particular situation, but I bet the idea will come in handy in some other situation.

chrysalis: "I assign a button to turn warp on and off"

I guess you mean a button on a MIDI controller. I'd really like to do the same thing with a keystroke, but I think Live will not allow that.

"that way I can do it easily and quickly, after the (beatless) into's over, say"

Bingo. This solves the problem! I had experimented with this idea, but the result was glitchy playback. You prompted me to try it again, and I discovered that I just have to match the tempo carefully. That is, the new project tempo has to be identical to what's in the "Seq. BPM" (or "Orig. BPM") field (of the clip that's playing when you turn "Warp" on and off).

I think the special trick is to paste the number back into the field ("Seq. BPM"), since the number stored internally could be different (i.e., more digits) than what's displayed.

So all I have to do is set Warp off before launching the clip. Then during the first few bars, I make the change to project tempo. Then I turn Warp back on. Done.

This is excellent! It means warping on this clip can only be used for looping, and not for the purpose of changing the tune's tempo. But in this type of situation the former is the main issue for me, anyway.

Your idea allows me to make a big, instant jump in project tempo in a way that sounds smooth, and without giving up the advantages of warping that matter to me most in this situation (the ability to do spontaneous looping on all tracks).

longjohns: "You could split either of the two clips into two sections … And you'll be setting up what would look like 'weird' warp markers on this special section, so that it will seem to play at 90bpm even though the tempo is 120, or vice versa"

This is very intriguing. I think this would basically work. The problem is that for any passage where this technique is used, the grid markers and metronome suddenly become meaningless. And quantizing won't work right. If I'm going to suffer with that, I might as well just render the thing and give up on spontaneity. Without quantization, it's much harder to do looping or other spontaneous things.

But your idea about splitting the clip got me thinking about another solution. I can create a clip section (the intro of Track B, let's say) that plays unwarped. While this clip is playing, I adjust the project tempo. Then at the right moment (maybe controlled with a Follow Action), I launch the second clip, which contains the rest of the track. This clip is warped. And all the tempos have to match, in the way I described above.

This technique allows me to do looping in the rest of the track, which is my main goal. So this technique solves the problem!

In many situations it's probably just easier to click the Warp button during playback (as Chrys suggested). But the two-clip technique allows the sequence to be somewhat more programmed, and in a way that still allows a lot of flexibility during the performance (unlike if the problem was solved by rendering).

Anyway, thanks to the various comments, I now have two good solutions! And this problem was driving me nuts. Thanks!

[chrysalis33rpm]

Wow, happy customer, nice.

PS yes you should be able to use a keystroke to do most anything a midi button does AFAIK.

[jukeboxgrad]

Darn it! I spoke too soon. Now I'm getting small playback glitches with both the methods I described.

Back to the drawing board …

chrys: "you should be able to use a keystroke to do most anything a midi button does AFAIK"

I know that's how it's supposed to be, but I think the Warp button is one of several exceptions. If it turns out you can make it work, I'd love to know!

[longjohns]

yeah, I know you lose the grid on the clip which is the tail of the first track.

but is that something that you really want to loop? I thought it was just a short fade-out section.

re: glitches - it was playing pretty good for me in beats mode, I only had trouble with repitch mode. what are you using