How to deal with the tempo that is coming out of my body

[shin]

Hi,

I'm sitting in my little studio and try to improvise a little piece into my sequencer and wonder how you're dealing with the, well, natural tempo changes. I'm working with C4 and know there's the tempo track and some other little helpers. My question: Is there a way C4 (or any other Sequencer - maybe it's time to change it) can create the tempo track based on my free played midi performance? In that performance all the changes are like they should but I also want to have the notes on the right positions in the grid - not fully quantized but around the right positions, of course :-) I found that time warp util in C4 where I can move the beginning of every single bar to the right note and regarding to this C4 creates the events into the tempo track but I hope there's a more faster way to do it. Maybe automatically...?? Is there something??

Thanks for helping on.

My best
Stephan

[guy theaker]

An alternative way is to manually tap in a 'click track' on a spare midi channel, and then
use 'merge tempo from tapping' in midi/functions. There's no automatic way to do what you want.

GT.

[nickysnd]

Is there a way C4 (or any other Sequencer - maybe it's time to change it) can create the tempo track based on my free played midi performance?
I do what you describe all the time in Digital Performer - there is a function there called Adjust Beats (switchable to Adjust Measures) that you can use to align the beats/bars of the Conductor (tempo) track to your live playing. You do that alignment manually, i.e. you decide, visually, where your beats/bars are to be placed.

[EarlRShay]

Also in Digital Performer one can use Extract Tempo from MIDI or Tap Tempo. Both very handy tools in addition to Adjust Beats, depending on how your original file is set up.

[pietro7050@verizon.net]

go to tempo track under project and you can draw in tempo changes

[shin]

Hi all,

thanks for helping on. It's a good idea to tap it in with a several pedal. Will try that.

Thank you all.

My best
Stephan

[chest]

I found that time warp util in C4 where I can move the beginning of every single bar to the right note and regarding to this C4 creates the events into the tempo track but I hope there's a more faster way to do it
I've done that as well - and it's not always enough just to do every bar - time-consuming, as you say, but OK if the piece is short. I mostly play into Cubase with natural timing, which usually means I can't get a proper score and the grid in Key Edit is meaningless.

I once tried getting Cubase to follow my tempo (while playing), but without success. You had to specify something like how much and how quickly the tempo could alter, and then Cubase would try to track your speed. I remember trying it with an easy Chopin piece that had notes at equal (written) length almost throughout, but which I played rubato. I spent a long time trying out various settings but Cubase could never tell what was going on. At that point, I pretty well gave up trying.

So, how usable is the tapping method? What do you do? - record the piece in free time and then make another pass to tap out the pulse? (The logic, I suppose, is that your tapping represents equal notational intervals, so the metronomic speed simply varies in inverse proportion to the time between taps?) Can you get a meaningful score just through tapping, or is it necessarily also to add another process such as the time-warp method?

[paulwr]

This is one of the areas of midi mockups that will keep live players in business..............at least some of them, anyway..................... I hate that I must stick to click track, but that is what I do, and then adjust the tempo track as needed for feel, occasionally. If I am adding orchestra to a very dynamic piano piece (acoustic piano, not midi....), usually not for a client, but for a personal cd project, then I'll do it with no click and no way to quantize the orchestra. I don't anticipate needing to prepare a score so I don't worry about it. Just have to play the orchestra parts accurately.

Otherwise, I think you have discovered the best, yet time consuming way to apply tempo to a rubato or dynamically changing natural tempo. If you figure something out that is much improved, I hope you post it.

-Paul

[balbs]

I'm a Sonar newbie, and I guess this question applies to cubase users as well. Can you record 2 tracks at the same time? Sometimes when I play the keyboards I tap my feet which of course can show tempo changes. If the keyboard is on 1 track and the taps from a pedal recorded on another track, can Sonar or Cubase be used to interpret the taps as downbeats of a measure and then synch the keyboard track to the tap track. Hopefully the keyboard track will then know which note is what beat on a measure.

I guess what I want is Metronome = input from foot pedal

Balbs