Example 2: Audio-Sync with multiple repetitions of the form

This is example 2 on how to sync an audio track to a progression in Mapping Tonal Harmony Pro.

In case you haven’t read the previous post, here’s a link:
How to sync progressions to audio tracks in Mapping Tonal Harmony Pro

Multiple repetitions of the form

Here’s this post in video format:

Now that you know how to sync one statement of the form, syncing multiple ones is fairly simple.

Remember when we sync the last marker to the end of the form (1st time through)? Well,  this time we will sync that last marker to the end of the last occurrence of the form in the audio track.

But first we need to know how many times the form is played in the audio track.

In the audio version I have of DOXY the form is played 9 times:
Head-In • 3x’s Trumpet • 2x’s Sax • 2x’s Piano • Head-Out 

So the first step is to set the number of repetitions in the Repeat Box to 9

The last marker will be linked to measure 145 beat 1

Remember you can enable the “#” button to view all the measures numbers in the multi-staff panel. So the first measure will now show: 1,17,33,49,65,81,97,113,129

Set the initial marker to the beginning of the song as we did before

Now let’s zoom in to the right and find the spot where measure 145 beat 1 is in the audio track. Select the last marker, play from a few seconds before the end and hit the Update Sync button at the downbeat of measure 145.

 

All the beats between the first and last have been re-calculated. The audio is sync to the progression already but there might be a few places where it is off (unless the tempo in the performance was perfectly steady)

I would expect the audio getting off-sync in some places. To fix this the best way is to make some of the calculated markers into keyframes. By doing this all the other markers will be re-calculated again and the sync will be much more accurate.

There’s no one way to do this, sometimes the audio sync will be perfect with only 2 keyframes. I will show you how I would do it in this example so as to show you the options you have.

So, I played the audio with the sync and in the 3rd chorus the audio is already one beat ahead of the syncing.

I’ve found the most effective way to solve this is to add keyframes to some first measures of the form. That’s where numbering the measures comes handy.

So the first measure has the following numbers: 1,17,33,49,65,81,97,113,129 meaning each chorus of the song starts on the first beat of those measures.

In the following video I demonstrate how I add a few keyframes to the first beats of some occurrences of the form.

The audio track is now synced to the progression. You can play the entire song or use the sync feature between chords in the progression and the audio to listen to what the musicians played over a certain part in the progression.

Visit mDecks.com to find more about all you can do in Mapping Tonal Harmony Pro