Hello

I am wanting to do a remix of a song and the original tempo is at 86bpm with the new one being at 111bpm.

Having tried to get Logic Pro to automatically adjust the tempo, it is getting it slightly wrong part way into the song causing the tempo to vary dramatically so have decided to do it myself via time stretching.

I have split a section of song off, and time stretched it, however it has done it in a destructive way, meaning it has only adjust that section of the song...so when I come to pull that section of song so it includes the rest of the song it won't let me.

Is there a non-destructive way to do this?

Thanks

 

I've been using Logic for the better part of the last Decade. Pitch/ Time-Stretching from the arrangement is where Logic falls very short compared to other daws like Ableton, Studio One, etc IMO.

Now to answer your question, there are several ways to do this. If you know the BPM of the original song , you can use time & pitch machine. The downside to doing it this way is that it's slow (and as you've mentioned), destructive to the whole audio file on your SSD. To make a a unique copy of the same audio file, right click the audio file before you use time & pitch machine and hit "convert to new audio file". This will make a copy of the same audio file so any changes will not alter the orig.

Watch some tutorials on how to use the different Flex modes in Logic. That should get you closer to what you're looking for paired with time-stretching. You're almost always going to need to manually move some beat makers or stretch some audio in a way to get things to line up nicely on the grid for certain sections (especially the larger the tempo change or depending on how complex the rhythm/ arrangement is )

 

If you are sure of the original tempo, open a new project, set tempo at 86bpm. Drag the song in.

Click the "flex" icon to activate time stretching.


Then click the "flex" icon on the header of the track you're stretching and select "polyphonic".


You'll see the track change colors and a bunch of markers will be added. Now when you change the project tempo to 111bpm it will speed up the song. Hope this helps.

 

Use Smart Tempo in your project settings. You do not want to use Flex Time/ Flex Pitch for everything. You should be able to do the tasks listed above manually; but unless something is actually played wrong or edited wrong within the waveform, you shouldn't even need to use them. If your song/track has actual tempo changes, click the D key to open the List Editors, and then click the Tempo Tab.

There is no reason to deal with the above stuff on every track. Zero. That is a colossal waste of your time. You sometimes will want to use Flex Time for moving transients around the tiniest little bit. But this stuff above can all be done non-destructively as each file is imported. Automatically If you want just the endpoints to fit, you set it to Set New Recordings/Imported Audio files options to On, or On + Align Bars. If you want it to warp to BPM like anyone making electronic music does using samples or correctly played music; set it to On + Align Bars and Beats.

If I had to re-time every single wave to put them into a project, I would switch to another DAW, immediately. Anyone who tries to tell you "they can hear the difference" in "sound quality" is making clickbait for youtube. Or re-inventing fire. Large % changes will affect the sound, but for that edit the Waveform via E key to editor. Or change the file with an external editor.

If you need to stretch a waveform in the arrange page, you sometimes have to change the Horizontal Zoom and Vertical Zoom to show the region larger. Zoomed out too far, and the tool will not appear. But after that, you just click the region, hold Option button down and then hover the mouse pointer over the bottom right corner of the region. The pointer will change to this thing below as soon as you get to the bottom right corner of that region. Click + Drag the region from right bottom corner while holding Option down still. If it doesn't loop perfectly, click E to open the Waveform Editor or Piano Roll and fix that one region.

Timestretch Tool pointer turns Mouse Pointer into this one. This also works with Midi regions:





Smart Tempo:

 

Last edited: Nov 1, 2023