Hello i have been using the demo and would like to know how to get 1/32 notes in renoise. Coming from Cubase i do not understand how the quantization works in this daw. I can get 1/16 notes by using the “Q” button and setting it to 1,but cannot find how to get 1/8, 1/32 notes etc…what do i do?
You have two main options:
- Use multiple note columns in conjunction with note delay commands, to effectively squeeze a more rapid or more dense group of notes into a tight space.
- Expand your song’s LPB (Lines Per Beat) value to “physically” give yourself more pattern line resolution to work with.
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Here’s a quick example to demonstrate both techniques:
7962 dblue-2018-02-10-renoise-lpb-note-timings.xrns
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At the default setting of 4 LPB it breaks down like so…
- four pattern lines are equal in duration to one 1/4th note
- two pattern lines are equal in duration to one 1/8th note
- one pattern line is equal in duration to one 1/16th note
- a half of one pattern line is equal in duration to one 1/32nd note
- a quarter of one pattern line is equal in duration one 1/64th note
- and so on…
Halves, quarters, and other fractional subdivisions of a pattern line are obviously not directly possible, so this is where the note delay column trick comes into play.
danoise’ response has you covered, for sure.
Seeing as you’re new to Renoise, I would personally recommend his 2nd method above – simply changing LPB (line per beat) to 8. I think that’s a much easier approach both in general and certainly for a new user. the delay trick is cool, though, but takes more elaborate sequencer programming and I wouldn’t hesitate to call it an “advanced” level trick, but maybe that’s just me.
also worth noting that the Retrigger effect command is a quick way to get fast hat rolls (1/32, 1/64th and beyond) triggered on a single line, and works the same regardless of your LPB setting.
danoise’ response has you covered
Hey, I refuse to take credit for dblue’s answer 
But I have another good tip for newbies
Expand your song’s LPB (Lines Per Beat) value to “physically” give yourself more pattern line resolution to work with.
This works fine when creating new patterns - but perhaps you already have a project (renoise song) and you still want more pattern lines?
Easy, go into the Advanced Edit panel and then choose “Whole Song : Cut/Copy/Paste > Expand”
Of course, with twice the number of lines, you’ll have to change the LPB too (as per dblue’s answer).
For a new comer who is checking out the demo, my friendly tip would be to see the number of lines per beat or LPB value and the resulting lines drawn in the pattern editor as fully zoomed in subdivisions of a single quarter note beat in a 4/4 time signature. First get your head around this. If hex is confusing then change that to decimal display from the preferences menu. Now it’s a simple arithmetic step but it’s vital that your pattern loops well at least for ensuring the complete music bar for the requisite number of measures. For 4 beats in one measure on your pattern and for a default value of LPB =4, you simply multiply the (LPB * number of beats) so 16 in decimal or 0x10 in hex will give exactly one bar. However you normally go for a 4 bar loop so just add 3 more bars which would have 4 beats each so effectively you now need to multiply (4 beats * 4 bars *LPB) which is 64 decimal lines or 0x40. So that gives you 4 bars total in one pattern for a default LBP of 4 in 4/4 TS.
Same thing for any TS, 5/4 just means that you have 5 beats with each beat having a quarter note value. Quarter note means LPB can be whatever value you want(within a range) and Renoise will ensure that LPB retains that ‘resolution’ value for each beat.
That automatically bmeans that more lines means more resolution per beat and that is a personal and musical decision. I use 6-14 depending on the style of music or amount of capture resolution I am aiming for. For tuplets which are possible in any TS which makes a new kind of notation required really, but for sake of description say (5)4/4 which means there are 4 beats in 1 bar and each beat represents an equal quarter note. The number on brackets represents how each quarter note beat is further subdivided into equal compartments. This happens a lot in Neo Soul and jazz and even many classical pieces too. So what you do in Renoise for this sort of stuff can be a varied solution. Using delays for each note column is a bit rote for me personally and I let my playing dictate the amount of delay required rather than trying to humanized the entire thing by entering delay values per note row. This is also how bulk of hip hop drums are swung they just play it and then tighten the swing using a small amount of ‘Timing Correct’ percentage value on the MPC, or just vanilla step recorded and then swing for a more even computer type swing. You can also do the following in Renoise:
Since those 5 equal tuplets values represent each quarter note, you can simply substitute the numerator with 5 and multiply that value with the number of quarter beats require to get the requisite number of lines PER BAR, so for (5)4/4 we have 5/4 or 20 decimal lines per bar with LPB of 4. Now this is not 5/4 time btw even if looks like it. Your goals are different and the purpose of this example is to understand the difference. So what you do is just translate the requirement of the number of tuplets subdivisions per beat to the number of lines, so now set LPB to 5 and and keeping the number of beats to 4 you still get 20 lines per bar, which is more than the default with LPB of 4. However the equal parts per quarter note is now 5 which is a tuplet. The next step is to increase resolution even more say for each tuplet subdivision you add more lines, say 2 lines per tuplet subdivision, so now you have LPB of 10 and the total number of bar lines of 40. Do the same for (7)4/4 and other tuplets.
Now if you use delay values the swing is far far more accurate than if you did with just even number LPBs. Also the inbuilt swing quantize sounds tighter now even at smaller percentages. It’s also less work for you becos now Renoise handles the odd subdivisions internally and you can focus exclusively on the swing. Each line is about 12 ticks so that is alot of resolution you are getting from a sequencer, MPC still has a crude resolution of 96ppqn and 12 ticks internally (if I remember correctly…). To get a well looping 4/4 loop however you just need to multiply the lines set by Renoise per bar to 4 times or 8 times to get to a length of 4 bars or 8 bars respectively. You do the math now…
Renoise require you apply yourself a little and makes it very engaging and musical so good luck if you like it and it makes sense to you. This sort of benefit where the timeline of a single measure is zoomed in fully is like doing quantum mechanics with music at atomic level all the time and there is no other DAW that gives you this kind of default resolution for note data and not to mention the amount of horizontal and vertical zoom just to see where in the timeline your note is at! This approach to beat construction means they yours drums are placed exactly where you want it and it shows you exactly where they are too. Now try finding a zoom button in Renoise. 
yeah, most folks up the bpm or lpb automatically.
as a side note or extra renoise specific addendum to classic tracker usage: the phrases let u write, access and use a diff lpb from the main sequencer. is personally my fav way. also, you can reuse that fill u stored in there in alot of ways.
You could also do a separate 32nd-note instrument as a phrase :
https://forum.renoise.com/t/all-tuplets-as-phrases-method/48440
I really appreciate the help from everyone but I’m still having trouble. Could someone possible do a YouTube tutorial for this? I’m trying to do some Tom rolls like in this video here at 1:29 https://youtu.be/IbBcxFw_63M
Tom rolls
There’s really nothing too special going on here.
Instead of the note delay column or LPB stuff I mentioned in my previous post, this guy is just using the other note delay command Qxx to delay a note by xx ticks instead.
You can see it being applied in the track named “Drums (MIDI)”.
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Edit: As m.arthur pointed out earlier, you can also use the Rxy retrig command to get some cool results:
Here’s another very quick and basic example to demonstrate both techniques:
another tip for drums its to actually use the LPB - 8 in the phrases to get 1/32 resolution…and keep the regular 4 LPB in the project …so its more easy …on the eyes …only few instruements are going to be played with that much resolution
Rx command!
Trackers were doing trap hihat rolls before it was cool…
“Instead of the note delay column or LPB stuff I mentioned in my previous post, this guy is just using the other note delay command Qxx to delay a note by xx ticks instead.”
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Sorry but im supernewb here with this. Can you tell me where to find the “Qxx” command? And also is there a list for shortcuts to use for commands? Im having a hard time since im used to Piano Roll based sequencers.
It’s best if you learn how the lpb works .
LPB = lines per beat .
Take for example a simple 4/4 measure = this means a bar is made out of 4 beats ( upper number ) and the value of a beat is a quarter note ( lower number ) .
Now lets translate that to renoise lpb .
We could use lpb 4 , then a beat (quarter note ) equals 4 lines , 2 lines =8th note , and 1 line = 16 note .
NOt enough for a 32nd note .
Let’s increase lpb to lpb 8 , 8 lines =quarter note , 4 lines =8 note , 2 lines =16th note , and 1 line 32 note
Presto .
What about triplets ?, ( a triplet is played as 3 notes over the timespan of 2 notes of the same value )
Lpb set to 12 …it’s dividable by 3 , so 4 lines for your triplet notes .
Summary lpb = the note value of your quarter note , a beat
Couple of years ago I posted an example of the pink floyd ’ money’ bassline ( 7/8) all with different lpb …but can’t seem to find it