Request: Global arrangement

[itzaStudio]

Hi!

Something I've wanted in CW/Sonar for a long long time is the ability to arrange and re-arrange parts of a song in an easy way by using what Reaper calls regions (not the same as regions in CW), or some kind of playlist where you can move around verse, chorus, bridge and other parts of the song witout needing to copy, cut and paste individual tracks.

Studio One also have this feature, and also Cubase? Reason too I think?

It is a very nifty tool when writing and arranging a songs basic structure.  Some early sequncers had a pattern based way of building songs, and even if that may explain the feature I'm looking for, it is important that you can work in a linear mode at the same time.

EDIT: SO happy this feature now is a part of Cakewalk! great job!

Oh! And one thing that would be great is to be able to start a song from bar 0.0.0 as a count-in section.

 

Thanks!

Edited February 13, 2021 by itzaStudio
Appreciating that the request came thru

[chuckebaby]

I was just mentioning this yesterday. A way to use Markers for "Marker jumping".

Love the idea, would be a great songwriting tool.

[Bill Phillips]

You can't do that in track view?

[chuckebaby]

12 hours ago, Bill Phillips said:

You can't do that in track view?

How ?

On ‎12‎/‎27‎/‎2019 at 7:32 PM, itzaStudio said:

playlist where you can move around verse, chorus, bridge and other parts of the song witout needing to copy, cut and paste individual tracks.

 

[Bill Phillips]

54 minutes ago, chuckebaby said:

How ?

Well my response was a question not an answer. But, I did have an approach in mind that I would try if I ever wanted to rearrange a song, though I haven't tried it because I haven't had a need to. So, I'm not sure it would work.

Starting with something I do for every project: I work with live recordings not recorded to a click track and use one track (usually acoustic guitar) to set the project tempo using Melodyne to extract the tempo. Before I do that I change all clip time references to absolute time so that clips don't move when the tempo map changes. This may help keep clips aligned when they are moved as well.

Now to the part I haven't done: After the  project tempo is set and any clip editing is done, couldn't the clips in each track be bounced to clips for each verse, chorus, etc? Then couldn't all the clips in the verse, chorus, etc to be moved be selected vertically in track view and moved in mass with the tempo map to wherever you like on the time line and inserted complete with the tempo map? If that works, what I'd do is save each arrangement as a separate project in the same project folder so that all arrangements share the same audio folder. Would this work?

Another possibility for projects recorded to a click track that I haven't tried is putting verses, choruses, etc in Matrix View clips where they can be shuffled but I think this would require bouncing all clips in each verse, chorus, etc into a single clip which would rule out track effect and automation tweaks during the rearrangement exercise.  This wouldn't work for me since my projects don't use click tracks.

[chuckebaby]

@Bill Phillips Yes sir. Those are great ideas for sure. Everything you outlined in the post above are great editing techniques.

I think though, that the OP is asking for a way to avoid copy/pasting clips around the timeline but instead,

1- Highlight a part and add a marker. Call it "Marker one-Verse"

2- Highlight another part and add a marker. Call it "Marker two- Bridge"

3- Highlight another part and add a marker. Call it "Marker three- Chorus"

 

Then have a Marker module for ordering these parts Vs. having to copy/paste everything.

Almost like a playlist within one song. A playlist for each individual part/parts of the song. And be able to arrange that playlist of parts to create different arrangements. To audition what would sound best.

[Michael Vogel]

It’s been a feature request of mine that goes back more than a decade. Long before any program had it I described a way to use a list of marker regions as a means to generate a “region playlist”. It would save having to copy, cut & paste sections.  Still waiting 

[Bill Phillips]

On 12/29/2019 at 5:30 PM, chuckebaby said:

@Bill Phillips Yes sir. Those are great ideas for sure. Everything you outlined in the post above are great editing techniques.

I think though, that the OP is asking for a way to avoid copy/pasting clips around the timeline but instead,

1- Highlight a part and add a marker. Call it "Marker one-Verse"

2- Highlight another part and add a marker. Call it "Marker two- Bridge"

3- Highlight another part and add a marker. Call it "Marker three- Chorus"

 

Then have a Marker module for ordering these parts Vs. having to copy/paste everything.

Almost like a playlist within one song. A playlist for each individual part/parts of the song. And be able to arrange that playlist of parts to create different arrangements. To audition what would sound best.

Thanks @chuckebaby. That does sound useful but I never imagined it being a DAW function.

[mettelus]

The introduction of Ripple Delete was the stepping stone needed to get to an arranger track, so it is a lot closer to becoming reality than it once was. It just needs the final push...

[user 905133]

This almost sounds like something related that I could use: The ability to have events inserted into the Event List (1) to trigger things at certain times (e.g., clips, settings macros, etc.) and (2) to jump to certain place in a recording such as markers.  I suppose if these were on one dedicated track it could be named "Arranger Track," but it would be nice if any track could have these trigger and jump to events. (Not sure if I posted about these before; might have started a post and not finished it--or deleted it because it was a distraction from a problem-solution thread.  It does seem directly related to this feature request, though.)

While the ability to Drop and Drag, slide, nudge, etc.  named visual things (markers, sections, etc.) might eventually be nice, for me it would not be as important as having them as in the first place (i.e., to be added in the Event List manually).