Re: [linux-audio-user] loop creation under Linux

OK...drifting back on topic [slowly....] noname wrote: Gdam [if you can get it running stable... currently it is totally broken under Gentoo] has a very nice DJ-style "pitch control" for modifying playback speeds. But it still alters pitch, so it is not technically time-stretching. Personally I find Ableton the most bone-headed software ever made! In blind taste-tests, 9 out of 10 electronic muscians who have been making tracks longer than 6 months can spot a piece made in Ableton, simply because it is only good for one thing: time-synching whatever kinds of loops you throw into it with a lockstep four-to-the-floor beat. Beyond that, it is a creative cul-de-sac. </rant> Yes, and so does PD. Look for an external called Syncgrain(s?) on the net, by Frank Barknecht, which offers a granular synthesis approach to changing playback speed w/o changing pitch. My own PD abstraction Particle Chamber [also based on granular synthesis] can also do similar time-stretches, but is made more for creating abstract sounds and textures. Many sample editors [Audacity, Ardour and Rezound, probably also Sweep, and also Ecasound] can change the playback length, but I am not sure if they all do this independent of pitch. Ardour in particular uses a library which is quite effective at time-stretching independent of pitch. Check the archives of this list for a thread called "stretching sound" for more details. AFAIK, there is not something which does this in such a "user-friendly" fashion as Acid. That said, I would also like to take this opportunity to dish on Acid a bit as well ;-) Seriously, though... back in my cracked-software-days, I spent some time playing in Acid. I found the arrangement possibilities alright, at least if you were into breakbeats and such. But its *worst* feature was its time-stretching algorithms, which would hopelessly distort any sound with even the most minor adjustments without a *lot* of tweaking around. I often found it was better to set my tempo, figure out how long my bars needed to be and time-stretch the samples in a sample editor with far better time-stretch algorithms. If I were doing breakbeats now, I would probably experiment until I found a tempo I was happy with, use Ardour to time-stretch, and do my arrangements in Hydrogen. A two-step process [no pun intended!], but one that would probably give pretty good results. Wine is fine, but lysergic acid diethylamide is quicker. Hardee-har-har... :-) D.