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Fit to improvisation


Daniele Scanziani

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As far as I know it's not documented in the manual,  but I understand that the "Fit to improvisation" command assumes  the value of every beat referring to the initial meter of the piece. That is: if the initial meter is 4/4 every beat will be a quarter note, if the meter is 2/2 every beat will be a half note and so on. My question is: what about if I want every beat to be a dotted quarter note as in compound meters? 

Edited by Daniele Scanziani
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A 'beat' is always a quarter note in Cakewalk, regardless of the meter, and that's 'non-negotiable' with Fit Improv. Set Measure/Beat At Now allows more freedom in specifying where you align the timeline to MIDI, and treats notes that cross tempo changes properly where Fit Improv has a bit of an issue as discussed in a recent thread.

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I just tested: if you set the initial time signature  to 2/2, "fit to improv" puts a tempo change every half note. if you set the initial time signature  to 4/4, "fit to improv" puts a tempo change every quarter note. 8/8= every eightenth note. 16/16= every 16th note. What if I want  a tempo change every  dotted quarter note?

Edited by Daniele Scanziani
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Hmmm... that's interesting. In most contexts, a beat is always quarter (actual tempo values are always 'quarters/minute', for example). That could actually be useful...

But to answer your question, I don't think it will be possible to get tempos on dotted quarters with Fit Improv. SM/BAN is the way to go.

What's the actual musical situation you're trying to address?

Edited by David Baay
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How tight does it need to be?

Your observation that Fit Improv honors the beat value in the meter gave me the idea that it would be possible to align the timeline only at measures by temporarily setting the meter to 1/1. This is often all I need to do for my purposes, and possibly would be adequate in your case - or at least give you a starting poiint for using Set Measure/Beat At Now to dial it in more precisely.

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