Originally Posted By: Guitarhacker
I liked the first one where the tempo remained constant. Switching time signatures was a bit strange, but not as weird as I thought it would be. I could see why you did it.... but I can also hear this in straight 4/4 as well. That would be my choice.... stay at 100 and in 4/4.


The main reason the change to a 3/4 time signature sounded strange is that I didn't switch from a 4/4 drum track to a 3/4 drum track. I tried to keep the bridge in 4/4 but wasn't able to because the rhythm of the lyrics in the bridge call for a 3/4 time signature.

Quote:
The tempo change I think was not a good idea... speeding up and them dropping back suddenly. I have used tempo change to slow the ending to a hold/stop... and that works well because it is used a lot in popular music.

When you do the tempo change the way you did, you can actually hear the steps and that makes it sound awkward. So what I do is a bit more work but it makes it sound totally natural and smooth. Where you plan to increase the tempo.... figure which measures are going to be affected. Then, lets say, using your song as an example... 4 measures for the transition. Insert an extra 4 measures. Go into the first measure and reduce the beat count from 4 back to 2 and then change the tempo by about 5 to 6 BPM in the direction you are transitioning. Then go to the next measure and repeat the process. To the listener's ear, your 8 measures of 2 beats each sounds like 4 measures of 4 beats and the transition in the tempo is by smaller increments and as a result sounds totally natural.


The tempo change transition in the demo (#3) I shared in my OP was definitely not very smooth because it consisted of four distinct steps of five bpm applied to four consecutive 4-beat measures. But in the next demo (#4) that I shared in a subsequent comment (which you may not have listened to), I used a different transition scheme that starts with a 2 bpm increase on the first of five measures that switches to a 3 bpm increase on the second measure and then switches to a 4 bpm increase on the third measure before ramping up to a 5 bpm and a 6 bpm increase on the last two measures respectively. Because the bpm increase on the first three measures is so small (from 2 to 3 to 4 bpm) the tempo increase isn't even noticeable until the third or fourth measure. By the time the ramp up to 6 bpm occurs in the fifth measure, the time signature also changes to 3/4. However, because I continued with the same 4/4 drum track in this demo (#4), the drums don't sync with properly with the rhythm of the bridge. So, I created a new demo (#5) in which I switch to a 3/4 drum track, which takes over to complete the transition to 120 bpm on the first measure of the bridge. I'll share the link to this demo below for you to listen to.

Quote:
For what it's worth... I ten to do my transitions from regular tempo to the slow down hold across only 2 measures which are 4 measures of 2 beats each so there's 4 small tempo transitions and waaa laaa.... it works like a charm.


After I listened to the song you shared at the end of your comment (which has a tempo decrease at the end of the song), I decided to try a similar effect using BiaB's hold and fade feature in order to create a one-measure transition instead of a two-measure transition (as you had suggested) because the tempo decrease in my song occurs before the last two choruses instead of at the end of the song (like yours does). Here's a link to the latest demo (#5) I created that contains the 3/4 drum track for the bridge and the hold/fade effect for the tempo decrease at the end of the bridge:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRYu4jVCu5o


Quote:
Once you get all that worked out to your satisfaction, this is a good tune and would certainly benefit from a real singer.


Thanks! I do have a real singer who will be singing this song for me after my producer records it in his studio sometime this summer.

Tom Levan (pronounced La-VAN)
BiaB 2024 Win UltraPAK Build 1109, Xtra Style PAKs 1-11, RB 2024, Windows 10 Pro 64-bit, Intel Q9650 3 GHz, 16 GB RAM, 500 GB SSD & 2 TB HDD, Tracktion 6 & 7 (freebies), Cakewalk, Audacity, MuseScore 2.1 & 3.4, Synthesizer V