FINDING TEMPO, OR CLICK-TRACK TO REMIX ACAPELLAS?

Michael-Warren wrote on 6/29/2021, 11:02 AM

When importing an acapella vocal or instrument recording (track) and attempting to add rhythm and music to it, I find that the automatic "beat mapping" feature is not very good. The flaw seems to be that it only uses one measure of the music and is not accurate when the tempo that it finds is extended to the entire song.

So, if I were to do this manually, maybe by intentionally changing the tempo of each sound-track, then how can I do this in the "Acid-Music-Studio-11", program?

I know you can change the tempo of the entire group by double-clicking on the BPM number that is shown, but how do you change the tempo (BPM) of one track, say the drums, to synchronize with the rhythm of vocal singing or any other sound-track?

 

Note: I know that if the acapella vocals, guitar, or anything else had a metronome or "click-track" then it would be easy to "beat-map" but usually there is none and the producer has to graph out the music on the screen and find the best synchronization. Most tutorials that I have found recommend using Ableton Live to do this, or pro tools, but I do not want to attempt to "tap" the rhythm because I don't feel that it's accurate enough to rely on my finger and the keypad.

Comments

Rednroll wrote on 7/1/2021, 2:36 AM

You could try splitting(Key=S) the song into separate events at a point where you would like to change the tempo of the beat mapped file. Then right click that event and select chop to new clip, which creates a separate file which can now be further manipulated in regards to tempo without impacting anything prior. Then select that event, right click "Clip Properties". Click on the stretch tab. Under that tab you will see the original beatmapped tempo which you can now change without effecting anything prior to the split you made. Increasing the clip tempo would make it play slower, and decreasing would play faster.

Michael-Warren wrote on 7/1/2021, 11:35 AM

Ok slow down I'm new at this and not familiar with the terms, I find that logically this will do what I need, but I am not familiar with the commands or key strokes. Can you work with me a little bit and give me some advice? Email?

Michael-Warren wrote on 7/1/2021, 11:37 AM

You could try splitting(Key=S) the song into separate events at a point where you would like to change the tempo of the beat mapped file. Then right click that event and select chop to new clip, which creates a separate file which can now be further manipulated in regards to tempo without impacting anything prior. Then select that event, right click "Clip Properties". Click on the stretch tab. Under that tab you will see the original beatmapped tempo which you can now change without effecting anything prior to the split you made. Increasing the clip tempo would make it play slower, and decreasing would play faster.

What is Key=S, which key? I'm using Microsoft Windows 10. Did you mean command key "cmd", or control "ctrl", or another? Can you reference specific directions for using this function?

Michael-Warren wrote on 7/1/2021, 11:44 AM

Actually "Splitting" just chops the track or perhaps "event" into two pieces. This is not at all what I want. Did you misunderstand when I said I am trying to match the tempo? That is the overall speed or time, in other words to synchronize the rhythm.

shkr wrote on 7/5/2021, 12:26 AM

Hey Michael,

there are many ways to manipulate the tempo, Rednroll gave you one. I'll give you another:

when you have an acapella that beatmapper wizard cannot analyze properly because there aren't any beats to stick to you can try the old school dj way which works quite good. Import your acapella to a track, change its properties to 'one shot', loop some part of it, turn the metronome on (you may want to change metronome from 4/4 to 1/4 form more steady rhythm) and play it back. While playing move the tempo slider untili your acapella plays well with a click track. When you're happy with your choice of the tempo, stop the track, enter clip properties of acapella and change it to 'beatmapped'. From this point you can freely change the tempo of the track and accapela will stay in sync. Hope this helps.

sheppo wrote on 7/5/2021, 8:27 AM

I've made lots of mashups with acapellas over the years (some available here -> shameless plug).. sometimes it's easier to just get the original track in the same project as your acapella and match the acapella with that to start with. e.g.

  1. Add the acapella and original track to 2 layers
  2. run the original track through the beatmapper wizard to learn the overall BPM
  3. Manually set the acapella BPM to the same as the beatmapped full version
  4. Visually align the tracks by dragging, or ALT+dragging the acapella track
Michael-Warren wrote on 7/5/2021, 10:12 AM

Sounds good, but what are the tools or keystrokes to "manually set the acapella bpm", I found one way to open clip properties and click the second tab, but it's sluggish and innacurate to just slide the object because it jumps; I wish the beatmapping would look at more than one measure, because by the end of a five minute song it's way off

Michael-Warren wrote on 7/5/2021, 10:14 AM

Hey Michael,

there are many ways to manipulate the tempo, Rednroll gave you one. I'll give you another:

when you have an acapella that beatmapper wizard cannot analyze properly because there aren't any beats to stick to you can try the old school dj way which works quite good. Import your acapella to a track, change its properties to 'one shot', loop some part of it, turn the metronome on (you may want to change metronome from 4/4 to 1/4 form more steady rhythm) and play it back. While playing move the tempo slider untili your acapella plays well with a click track. When you're happy with your choice of the tempo, stop the track, enter clip properties of acapella and change it to 'beatmapped'. From this point you can freely change the tempo of the track and accapela will stay in sync. Hope this helps.

I agree because I am an old school DJ that learned on Technics turntables, but I wish you would tell me the menu or keystrokes that lead to the functions you mentioned, can you try again?

sheppo wrote on 7/6/2021, 4:19 PM

Yeah, this stuff can be frustrating, but it's equally so in other DAWs, and a lot of them drift beats over the course of a auto detected song.

So, with that in mind, here's a video explaining how to do this in Acid.