I'm not a newbie - but feel like one!

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rob aylestone

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I don't think anyone has ever said this before, but as I just wasted quite a long time, I thought I'd post it here as a DO NOT DO THIS!!

Doing a little project, and it seemed simple enough, so I set up a click, and actually plugged a guitar in - which is rare for me to be honest. Took me about half an hour to get it done as I wanted, and then I added the drums and sorted them. Dragged out a bass and it only needed a bit of tuning (by ear, not tuner) - spent another half an hour on the bass, then went to add the organ - and only then discovered the guitar and bass were tuned to E and a bit. Not F, but half way and I didn't check. Now I have to decide to fix the tuning, or start again. In fairness I can tune it back easily, but after all these years why didn't I check the tuning?

Not everyone has a DAW that can pitch shift simply. Damn annoying
 
rob aylestone said:
I don't think anyone has ever said this before, but as I just wasted quite a long time, I thought I'd post it here as a DO NOT DO THIS!!

Doing a little project, and it seemed simple enough, so I set up a click, and actually plugged a guitar in - which is rare for me to be honest. Took me about half an hour to get it done as I wanted, and then I added the drums and sorted them. Dragged out a bass and it only needed a bit of tuning (by ear, not tuner) - spent another half an hour on the bass, then went to add the organ - and only then discovered the guitar and bass were tuned to E and a bit. Not F, but half way and I didn't check. Now I have to decide to fix the tuning, or start again. In fairness I can tune it back easily, but after all these years why didn't I check the tuning?

Not everyone has a DAW that can pitch shift simply. Damn annoying
Click to expand...

If there was no keys, might have made no difference nor even been noticed. :)
 
Here at home, the first thing I do is check the tuning of each instrument. I would start again, otherwise I'd get lost in the process of correcting the mess and never get it done.
 
Remember the old band days, when tuning at a gig was: "give me an E!" - if you had a keyboard player, great, otherwise it was whoever tuned first's pitch!
 
Don't feel bad, I recorded all of the music for an entire song before I discovered the key was too high for me to sing the chorus. I did test the verse before settling on the key but did not realize that the verse was higher. I jumped through multiple flaming hoops figuring out how to make that right. On another song I decided that the tempo was too slow after it was done. I could think of more examples.
 
rob aylestone said:
Maybe pitch change the organ then? That might be easier, or dump it for a second guitar. What just gets me is that I picked up the guitar and it was in tune, bar the bottom E. turns out the E was right!
Click to expand...

I have two strats that I’ll play often. When I’m not using a tuner and just tune to the guitar itself things get wacky.

One seems to like to go to E flat and one seems to like to go to E sharp.That relationship never changes. I dunno, maybe they’re happiest there. :)
 
You can't win! I decided to try to lean a bit of Entwhistle from "Don't get Fooled Again' recorded from Sky Arts. Did not get very rar but had some fun. A few hours latter I tried to jam along on bass to Pink Floyd. One of the fekkers was NOT at concert pitch! (or neither)

I have had an A 440Hz sine on the desktop for ages and so can tune a guitar to concert pitch pretty quickly.

BTW I bet Reaper has a pitch shifter in it? Free to download and use.

Dave.
 
Yeah if the organ is midi it probable is able to be tuned up or down by half steps...I have an arturia midi controller that does that for me when I am trying to learn an out of tune song on the internets
 
I've made that same mistake, pick up a guitar I thought was in tune and find out that I was wrong. I've tried using the pitch shift but I just ended up redoing things. It was just rhythm parts, so it wasn't a case of hitting the solo, and not wanting to dump a moment.

Now I pull out the TurboTuner first thing.
 
markmann said:
Don't feel bad, I recorded all of the music for an entire song before I discovered the key was too high for me to sing the chorus. I did test the verse before settling on the key but did not realize that the verse was higher. I jumped through multiple flaming hoops figuring out how to make that right. On another song I decided that the tempo was too slow after it was done. I could think of more examples.
Click to expand...
You could have rendered it and opened it up in Audacity where it is simple to change tempo without changing pitch. I do that often to fine tune tempos.
 
I would like to find a midi transposer box, with a 5-pin input, 5-pin output, and enough intelligence in the middle to shift all the notes around.
 
Caddy65 said:
You could have rendered it and opened it up in Audacity where it is simple to change tempo without changing pitch. I do that often to fine tune tempos.
Click to expand...
I have Audition and I can also change tempo and retain the pitch in Reaper but any program I use to change tempo more than a half note distorts the formant of the vocal more than I can tolerate. I tried a few different programs that can adjust the formant and one in particular did a really good job but I don't recall the name.
 
Another blunder: I record the perfect take only to discover that I hit the Play button instead of Record. That's happened a few times.
 
Hitting the record button immediately disengages my brain. Record; Stop: Delete: Record: Stop: Delete; Record; Stop; Delete; Record; Stop. . .

This doesn't happen in someone else's studio with them engineering.
 
Back in my 4 track cassette days I discovered, after recording several songs, that the speed control was one detent off. After they had been transferred to Pro Tools and subsequently lost to the mists of time. The very slight deviations of tape coupled with the speed difference mean digital pitch shifting does not get it in truly in tune. Auugh!

I had to tune instruments to the pre-existing tracks as close as possible for the best results.
 
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