The inadequacy of Sonar, Cubase etc. for the purposes of songwriting

[rumborak]

Does anybody else feel the pain? I have all these ideas of sections that go for a certain mood, and I will somewhat flesh them out with different instruments, all recorded in Sonar. But, then comes the problem of rearranging the song, cutting, pasting etc. For example, simply inserting a certain amount of musical time to allow for say a small bridge is a disaster in both Cubase and Sonar, because there's this notion of a "tempo track" that lives separate from the main tracks.
Overall I find those softwares are written with complete pieces in mind. Once you have that down you can set the tempos and meters nicely and record.

Is there anything out there that makes it easy to compose in the "prototype stage"?

rumborak

[Adami]

I write/record constantly in protools. I have written and recorded whole albums in a matter of weeks with Pro Tools.

[Gorille85]

I write/record constantly in protools. I have written and recorded whole albums in the matter of weeks with Pro Tools.

Yup. Pro Tools is a pretty cool guy. I hear Ableton is great, too.

[rumborak]

Is ProTools that much better with this stuff, or do you just not hit those problems in the first aplce? That is, when you sit down at the computer, do you already know what the structure of the song is? I find myself listening to my song so-far and often realize that the flow isn't as nice as I would like, so I want to insert something, or move stuff around. Or even more advanced, I would like to speed up a whole section to match the tempo of a following section. Is this easily done in ProTools? In Cubase or Sonar you're doomed. The speed you recorded it in is fixed.

The reality is, for me, that you do that kind of stuff in a band. But, I have realized for myself that I can't rely on the musicians that I know (who are excellent though) to make the progress of my music dependent on them.

rumborak

[Adami]

Editing, moving things around etc is super easy and fast in PT.


As far as changing tempo's, I know it's possible but I've never had to use it. You could google how to adjust tempo of prerecorded segments or something, but I think it's possible. However, is it really that difficult to just stick to a tempo or re-record a part? I mean if that's the only problem....

[rumborak]

Well, I would have to rerecord the vocals, bass, guitars (Bass and drums are MIDI, so those are fine).

There's just so many annoying things I find. E.g., say your project switches to 150bpm on bar 1, and stays on that tempo for 10 beats, when it switches to 120bpm. Then you decide you want to copy a part from beat 5-8 after beat 20. Well, because the tempo track message for 150bpm exists at the beginning of beat 1, what you're actually copying (beat 5-8) doesn't contain that message. So, you're pasting it after beat 20 and Sonar (and Cubase to my knowledge) don't realize that it's pastes 150bpm audio into a 120bpm section. Total mismatch of MIDI and audio, and you have to manually repair by adding a speed event at bar 20.

rumborak

[Adami]

Well, I would have to rerecord the vocals, bass, guitars (Bass and drums are MIDI, so those are fine).

There's just so many annoying things I find. E.g., say your project switches to 150bpm on bar 1, and stays on that tempo for 10 beats, when it switches to 120bpm. Then you decide you want to copy a part from beat 5-8 after beat 20. Well, because the tempo track message for 150bpm exists at the beginning of beat 1, what you're actually copying (beat 5-8) doesn't contain that message. So, you're pasting it after beat 20 and Sonar (and Cubase to my knowledge) don't realize that it's pastes 150bpm audio into a 120bpm section. Total mismatch of MIDI and audio, and you have to manually repair by adding a speed event at bar 20.

rumborak

I'm confused. You're copying a section from 150 bpm, and posting it in 120 hoping that the music converts to being 120? Or do you want the click track to switch back to 150 for where you paste it to?

[Gorille85]

Switching tempos is super easy in Pro Tools. You can even trace the tempo variations with the "pencil" tool.

[rumborak]

Adami, what I want to do is paste a section that is taken out of a 150bpm part, and paste it after a section that was is in 120bpm. Problem is, because the copied section doesn't actually contain the "switch to 150bpm" message, Sonar just treats it as 120bpm. With the result that all the MIDI parts run in 120bpm, but the audio tracks in 150bpm because that's what they were recorded in.

And don't even get me started on odd-metered sections, where even more stuff falls apart when it comes to editing.

[Adami]

Adami, what I want to do is paste a section that is taken out of a 150bpm part, and paste it after a section that was is in 120bpm. Problem is, because the copied section doesn't actually contain the "switch to 150bpm" message, Sonar just treats it as 120bpm. With the result that all the MIDI parts run in 120bpm, but the audio tracks in 150bpm because that's what they were recorded in.

And don't even get me started on odd-metered sections, where even more stuff falls apart when it comes to editing.

Oh I think I get you. Yea, in PT there's a top section that charts the tempo. You just find the beat you want to switch the tempo on, change the tempo with a few clicks and then post the section there. That way the midi and so forth keeps to the 150 format, just the click track changes from 150 to 120 back to 150 as you program it. Also with pro tools you can decided what note you want the beat to carry as well as decide the time signature.

[kirksnosehair]

What version of Sonar are you using?  I don't have any of those problems that you're referring to.  AT ALL.   I can copy/paste/edit/move/delete from one or multiple tracks with key/time sig/BMP all intact, OR not intact.  Either way. 

[Adami]

What version of Sonar are you using?  I don't have any of those problems that you're referring to.  AT ALL.   I can copy/paste/edit/move/delete from one or multiple tracks with key/time sig/BMP all intact, OR not intact.  Either way.

I used to use Sonar 8 and the only issues I had was that using the click track and changing it was a bit of a pain. PT's click track and grid set up is just so damn intuitive.

[kirksnosehair]

I'm not saying Sonar has no inadequacies, but I've never had any problems like the ones described by rumborak when it comes to editing songs.

I have to admit, though, I am very close to buying this, just because my producer has been pushing me in that direction.

rumborak - it sounds like you use a lot of midi instruments?  Maybe that's the reason you experience more problems than I do.  I don't really use ANY midi instruments except drums.  And that's only because I prefer recording with drums + a click track instead of just a click track.

Inserting time into the middle of a multi-track song is definitely a pain in the ass, though.  And I'm told it's easier with ProTools.

[rumborak]

Yeah, half of my instruments are MIDI, and that's exactly where the pain comes. Of course, if everything is audio-based, I'm not surprised you don't have those problems.

For the life of me I will also never understand it why the tempo track is completely separate from everything else.

rumborak

[kirksnosehair]

Well, screw it, Guitar Center sent me an email with a 48 hour 12% off sale so I took the plunge and bought the Avid MBox Pro with ProTools 9 bundle.   

Now I need a new PC 

[kirksnosehair]

Yeah, half of my instruments are MIDI, and that's exactly where the pain comes. Of course, if everything is audio-based, I'm not surprised you don't have those problems.

For the life of me I will also never understand it why the tempo track is completely separate from everything else.

rumborak

You have an actual "track" for tempo?  Don't you just turn on the click on the menu?

[Adami]

Pro tools is way easier with that. Yes, the click track is an actual track. The track has a click plug in that controls what the sound of the click is, and you can control the volume/mute whatever of the click that way. However at the top of the screen is the tempo mapping, visually displaying what the tempo is and where. You can change it anywhere, on any beat VERY easily. It all correlates to a grid on the screen that makes selecting/copying/pasting/general editing perfectly in tempo super easy.

[kirksnosehair]

Hmm, yeah, looking forward to digging into ProTools.  Just ordered my HP Z400 Workstation