Help, tempo & beat map advice?
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The only thing stopping me from making a song is the tempo & beat map, Ive watched the videos & Ive also tried it myself to understand it better but no such luck, apparently its also a step that trips up others as well, is there a simplified way to explain tempo mapping & beat mapping (dont know if theyre the same thing or not), honestly Ill get into charting once I get this beat mapping/tempo mapping down finally.
What’s tripping you up? Have you picked a simple song to start with? Can you figure out the tempo of that song? Can you hear a riff and/or drum beat that repeats regularly?
What you want to do is put your song audio on REAPER, look up the tempo of the song (or use an app to tap the tempo to figure it yourself), and put a tempo marker of it at measure 1. Then turn on the metronome in REAPER and listen to see if it is aligned. Mainly the easiest thing to listen for in the song is the drum beat, if that is aligned, you should be good. If there aren’t drums, try aligning it with the guitar. Also the peaks on your song audio should be aligned with each measure. Something that has helped me a lot is to expand the SONG AUDIO track so you can see the peaks more clearly!
As for the BEAT track, set your grid in the midi editor to 1/16, and place one upbeat on every whole number measure. place 3 downbeats in between every upbeat (assuming your song is 4/4).
And of course, if there is anything else that can help it is reading the tempo map section and the beat section of this page: http://docs.c3universe.com/rbndocs/index.php?title=Mix_and_MIDI_Setup
It gets much easier if you can see the peaks in the waveform visually. If your song looks something like this:
See how there’s a clear peak in the waveform at the beginning of each beat? (I put red arrows too). If your songs looks like this, you’re in luck. Disable “snap to grid”, put the cursor in the peak and click Q to create the tempo marker. Usually, in standard rock beats, the snare on the 3rd will also align, so if that happens, that’s a good sign.
Of course – do not solely rely on this, always listen to the song with a metronome and make sure the tempo map fits. This method doesn’t always work and can be misleading sometimes (like if there’s loud noises that aren’t in the beginning of measures). In case of conflict, always go with your ears (if the click doesn’t sound right, it isn’t right, regardless of the waveform). But this does make the process easier.
To start learning it has been helpful to me to find a song that also has a drum tab to use as a guide, that way I can get an idea of what to expect in each measure and what is most likely (assuming the tab is accurate) to be the thing that I need to map as the starting point of the next measure. Don’t take the tab as gospel though, as I have found that they are by no means entirely accurate both in terms of the rhythms set out in the tab and the individual toms or cymbals etc that are being hit. In fact being able to scrub through audio in Reaper will let you see how inaccurate tabs can be. But they can be useful as a framework – this is the type of drum pattern here – and this is where the drum fill with toms is here and so on.
I also tend to chart the drums as I go and check that the audio lines up with the chart (this can be visual – looking at peaks in the audio or by scrubbing through the measure and making sure that sounds line up accurately with the chart). I imagine that experienced authors do not do this though and are able to just go through and tempo map the whole song confidently without charting at all.
As far as actually tempo mapping goes – focus on the drums first and foremost and really hone in on whatever is the starting point for the next measure – the kick or snare or whatever it is.
I would also advise picking songs that you like – you will be listening to them a lot – and to begin with pick a short song that is not too complicated.
Hopefully this is helpful to you – one beginner to another – otherwise there are other much more experienced authors here who can also advise you.
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