Analyzing Fast Licks

Dave White · Post by **Dave White** » 12 Dec 2005 11:57 am

I saw somewhere on this forum a while back a post about how to analyze fast, complicated licks by slowing down recordings. I've come up with a different way of doing it, but you need a newer computer. Get the Sonic Foundry Acid Pro 4.0 program. This allows you to download music from a CD or tape, then loop it on a timeline. From there you can digitally slow the tempo without affecting the pitch, as a tape recorder would.(Although you can change the pitch as well, if you want to.) This program is primarily for sound editing and "beat matching/mapping," but it's great for this purpose as well. I use this program quite a bit in my job as a video editor, and it's very reliable. From there you can take the re-edited, slowed-down loop and burn a "study CD" to play along with, or just play along with the loop on the computer.

Ray Minich · Post by **Ray Minich** » 12 Dec 2005 12:10 pm

Once you get the track extracted and converted to a .wav file you can also use "Slowblast" (from the BIAB folks at PGMusic I believe) or Transkriber (available from a number of sources, do a web search on "Transkriber"). There's also "The Amazing SlowDowner" I've heard of but don't know where it is from, and a Yahoo search kinda indicates it is for the Mac only.
Nice to have several alternatives.<font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Ray Minich on 12 December 2005 at 12:19 PM.]</p></FONT>

Bill McCloskey · Post by **Bill McCloskey** » 12 Dec 2005 12:17 pm

I use Slow Gold and it has always worked well for me.

Lee Baucum · Post by **Lee Baucum** » 12 Dec 2005 12:29 pm

My teenage son found some free shareware that does that. I'm not sure where he found it. Sometimes, with a 17 year old son, it's best not to ask questions.

Lee, from South Texas

Billy Woo · Post by **Billy Woo** » 12 Dec 2005 1:54 pm

There is also a product called the "Tascam CD-GT1 which is usually red in color and you can slow down the pitch without detuning your guitar/pedal steel guitar to figure out licks, Guitar Center carries this product and it goes for around $100 bucks also Tascam makes one for bassist and vocalist.

Bronco Billy
Zumsteel U-12

Dave Little · Post by **Dave Little** » 12 Dec 2005 2:09 pm

Here's a free one http://www.xs4all.nl/~mp2004/bp/

Michael Haselman · Post by **Michael Haselman** » 12 Dec 2005 4:06 pm

www.renegademinds.com
Try this one. It's great. Not only slows down, but raises and lowers pitch for when you have to learn that tune that's a half-step off, or when the lead singer decides to lower the key.

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Marrs D-10, Webb 6-14E

Jon Moen · Post by **Jon Moen** » 12 Dec 2005 6:43 pm

The Amazing Slowdowner is for PC and Mac. It works very well.

http://www.ronimusic.com/

Howard Tate · Post by **Howard Tate** » 12 Dec 2005 6:45 pm

Audacity is a free program that will do it very well, and it will remove noise from bad tracks, it will compress or convert files,allow editing and adding effects, a versital program.

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Howard, 'Les Paul Recording, Zum SD12U, Carter D10 8/8, Vegas 400, Boss ME-5, Boss DM-3, DD-3, Fender Steel King, Understanding wife. http://www.Charmedmusic.com

Steve Stallings · Post by **Steve Stallings** » 14 Dec 2005 1:53 pm

I use the Reed Kottler TR1000 quite a bit. I also downloaded the amazing slowdowner. I think the software based approach sounds better at low speeds, but the TR 1000 is simply an incredible tool that has other useful transcriber functions. It has a channel isolation function which really works well to isolate steel parts. It tends to get a bit muddy at super slow speeds but it is still my first choice for day to day use.

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God Bless,
Steve Stallings
D10 9x7 Rains (On order)
D10 8x10 Emmons (Black Beauty)

David Wren · Post by **David Wren** » 14 Dec 2005 4:07 pm

16 1/2 RPMs.
Got me through "Tom Cattin'".

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Dave Wren
'95Carter S12-E9/B6,7X7; Session500; Hilton Pedal
www.ameechapman.com