Play samples from any position in any pitch

As the longstanding campaign by DJ Terrabyte have reminded me, the ability to play any position of a sample in any pitch is pretty useful when you want get creative with long recordings.

I’ve found the following trick (which is possible from Renoise 3.1 and onwards) is a nice workaround, which comes close to achieving the original goal while providing some benefits of it’s own.

So, enough talk. How does it work?

The first thing you should do is to select an empty instrument and load a long sample of some kind.
Next, head into the phrase editor, add a new phrase and make it look like the following

tip_any_pitch_sample_column.png?raw=1

Enable the sample column (CMD/CTRL+SHIFT+K) and type “01” in the sample column
The number 01 will make the note reference the second sample in the instrument - or, in our case, the first slice. Which doesn’t actually exist yet.

Next, we want to add a slice marker. This is really just a question of switching to the waveform editor and selecting the slice tool.

tip_any_pitch_slice_marker.png?raw=1

Once the slice is added, you can now play the sample in any pitch, while moving the slice marker around.

tip_any_pitch_playback.gif?raw=1

That’s all there is to it. Triggering the slice via a phrase with sample columns makes the whole thing possible.

Granted, this is just one phrase and one slice. But you can add a lot more - I think the maximum number of phrases is 126 - and have instant access to them all by switching phrase (or via program change messages). To further streamline this process you can use my phrasemate tool (link in signature) to batch import/export phrase presets.

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Man what a great find, this is amazing!

Thanks a lot, I needed this for so long.

I think Terrabyte will be a happy man too haha

And while you shift the marker - the playing position is shifted, too, a bit choppy though but for real.

Very good for sample exploration! Finally not bound to standard speed anymore!

the playing position is shifted, too, a bit choppy though but for real.

Yeah, it’s harsh sounding :walkman:

This technique is so powerful and beautifully simple at the same time. Thanks danoise for this brilliant discovery!

Whoah Danoise! you really put a smile on my face! :smiley:

This technique is very powerfull indeed. You can put a start and stop position in there with 2 slices. Huray!!!

While this is not the easiest method of obtaining the state I describe, It sures reaches the sample-exploration levels I imagined.

How can I thank you for discovering this!?

(no, my ‘campaign’ is not over yet - harrr harrr, devs! did Danoise and I inspire you now?)

Man what a great find, this is amazing!

Thanks a lot, I needed this for so long.

I think Terrabyte will be a happy man too haha

and YES i AM pretty happy here :smiley:

… now… for the devs to make it native :wink:
But then again, this enables me to search long samples, select tiny fragments of the wave and play them quickly at various pitches, and yay I discover new ‘instruments’ :smiley:

This is like having the Start/End locators I’ve been looking for. What a neat idea.

Phrases is a bit of a powerhouse; a lot of which I need to explore. It needs a different name!

Don’t suppose the slice markers can be modulated can they?

now in 2017, with Taktik beeing the only active developer… I respect every day that I can use Renoise - stopped the sobbing about this sample-play-thing-thread…

Renoise is finished :wink: uhm… wait… !!! THE FEATURE IS IMPLEMENTED TODAY !!!
THANK YOU DEVS!!!

This is pretty cool, thanks for sharing dude!

You can accomplish a pretty similar thing by using sample offsets, but it was pretty cumbersome to work with and you’re limited to the resolution that sample offset commands gave you, so this is pretty awesome :slight_smile:

I had some long field recordings I wanted to fuck with for ambient music and now I can do some weird chromatic shit with them!

Great idea! Thanks a lot :slight_smile:

This is great but is it possible to automate the slice marker position?

This is great but is it possible to automate the slice marker position?

Unfortunately no.

a small addon to this awesome guide is that if you add a second slice marker - it will mark the end of the sample.
this way you can explore short pieces of wav and get very short cool burst of sample.

I don’t mean to be a party pooper haha - I realize there is currently no active development, perhaps never will be. I can understand that. But as the issue still bugs me personally every single day (I have to use two versions of Renoise - 2.8 and 3.1) I can’t help but bump this thread on the topic:

Just to bring it up a bit, in case some development does happen. But I’m sorry to stir the pot on this again. :wink: I’m not saying the developers have to stop everything they’re doing to start fixing an issue for me… Just a wet dream that’s all.

Slice marker workaround is great (and even -better- for so many things!) but doesn’t address the low-treshold-workflow-is-everything -issue which I personally have. The functionality is -perfect- in 2.8 but I’d rather use the new version for most other things, so. Yep. Frustrating. It’s all explained in the other thread.

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