How to keep chunk tempo when making song for live play?????

[JLEpperson]

I am using DP 7 for live performance. I have about 60 chunks. I want to make set lists before each set. I was going to drag the chunks into a song for my setlist but realized the the tempos werent inside the chunk. Is there a way to do this without setting a tempo in the conductor track? Or...is there a better way to do setlists on the fly before each set?

Thanks

[Eli Krantzberg]

Why bother with the Song Window for this? Why not just leave your Chunks Window open, and just select the Chunks (Sequences) on the fly. You can put them in the order you need them and just select the next/previous Chunks (Sequences) either with a mouse or via MIDI as needed. The tempo associated with each Sequence will be called up when it is made active.

[bricker]

Don't mean to sound rude - but you say "without using the Conductor track"... but that's the whole point of the conductor track, to store tempos, meters, clicks, and other things a "conductor" might keep track of. Why can't you use it?

[Martini Hill]

Each Chunk does contain it's own specific tempo!

[JLEpperson]

I would like to keep the chunks as a master list in alphabetical order and just drag chunks into the song for the setlist. I have so many songs, its hard to find them in a live situation to put them in order in the chunk list. Would be really hard once they are not in alphabetical order.

[wheever]

Now, admittedly, I haven't used the song thing in a long time, but as I recall, you can copy the chunk tempo(es) to the song conductor track.

So every time you make a set list in a song from chunks, you select them, then go to the mini menu and select copy conductor track, and it sets the song tempo changes to match the chunks.

Does this work for you?

[Shooshie]

Sorry, the song window will only accept ONE conductor track. The Song Window was developed for MIDI back in the early 1990s, and was fairly effective for building a song through "chunks" of music. For example, leaving out the melody, you could do the rhythm, bass, drums, and keyboards for a verse and a bridge, then drag them into the Song Window and make your whole song, then go lay down the melody and add any riffs that differentiate the verses. Makes a quick way to build a song.

BUT… the plan was always to turn it back into a chunk when you were done. The Song Window has no editing capabilities, nor can you follow the parts there. It's just for the building process. Then you convert it back to a chunk, and there you can continue to edit the "constructed" song.

It's probably not a good idea to use the Song Window for a live set list. If you haven't already figured it out, you will soon. The first clue is the lack of independent conductor tracks. Take my advice now, or do it after much frustration, but sooner or later you'll figure out that it's just not the best place for that. Everyone I know uses the Chunks Window for a song list. If you've got too many songs to make that convenient, you're probably risking a crash, anyway. I'd say probably no more than 100 songs in the Chunks Window.

Shooshie

[bayswater]

Sorry, the song window will only accept ONE conductor track.

Can you clarify this? I've always found the Song editor a bit of a mystery.

Are you talking about situations where sequences overlap, or are on one lane, or some other Song Window condition?

Suppose I have two sequences, both with tempo events in the conductor track. I drag them into a song window, the second following the first. Then select each, and then use the "copy conductor track" from the Song window mini menu. When I play the Song, the tempo value in the Control Panel changes as each sequence in the Song plays, to the value in the tempo track of the sequence.

So, yes there is only one tempo value in effect at a time in the Song, but it is the value in the sequence. I don't see how this is a limitation, unless you have overlapping sequences in the song (where I would assume the most recent tempo event from any of the sequences currently playing would be in effect) . This would seem to satisfy the requirements of the OP.

Even if there is overlap during fades, wouldn't locking the tracks in each sequence solve that problem?

[Shooshie]

Sorry, the song window will only accept ONE conductor track.

Can you clarify this? I've always found the Song editor a bit of a mystery.

Are you talking about situations where sequences overlap, or are on one lane, or some other Song Window condition?

Suppose I have two sequences, both with tempo events in the conductor track. I drag them into a song window, the second following the first. Then select each, and then use the "copy conductor track" from the Song window mini menu. When I play the Song, the tempo value in the Control Panel changes as each sequence in the Song plays, to the value in the tempo track of the sequence.

So, yes there is only one tempo value in effect at a time in the Song, but it is the value in the sequence. I don't see how this is a limitation, unless you have overlapping sequences in the song (where I would assume the most recent tempo event from any of the sequences currently playing would be in effect) . This would seem to satisfy the requirements of the OP.

Even if there is overlap during fades, wouldn't locking the tracks in each sequence solve that problem?

My memory on the Song Window is getting hazy from disuse. Now that I think of it, I believe you can take the top-chunk's conductor track, or something like that. Once you put a string of chunks together, you turn them back into a sequence, and as far as I know, you will then have the conductor track of each chunk in its proper place.

But if you stack them, it does not play each chunk at its own tempo. Only that of the chosen chunk. The one whose conductor track was copied. Ok, I think that works. So, maybe it will play a string of chunks according to their conductor tracks. It's been a long time.

The only way you can find out is to test it. That's not convenient for me at the moment, as I'm working in audio-only projects.

Shooshie

[bayswater]

Yes, that's why I tried it out before asking. Stacking chunks would not be a requirement for live playlists, or shouldn't be if you set it up logically. So seems to me, all the OP has to do is use the command to copy the sequence conductor tracks, notwithstanding your advice to avoid a project with hundreds of sequences.

Stacking chunks would naturally lead to the question of which chunk controls the tempo. But the much maligned Dr. T sequencer let you play multiple sequences at once, each governed by its own tempo and looping parameters.

[wheever]

Yeah, the song window copies the selected track's(s) conductor track(s) to the song window conductor track. I just checked. So, provided you don't drag the chunks around after copying the conductor, each chunk should play at the desired tempo.

So, what the OP needs to do is build his set list by dragging seqs to the song, and once having made up his/her mind about what goes where, then select all and copy the conductor tracks. Should work fine.

Stacking chunks makes no sense for this purpose, so we can freely ignore what happens if you do that.