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How to create a loop (repeat User song) ?

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randmont
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How to create a loop (repeat User song) ?

Unread post by randmont »

When I followed the manual (p. 78 "A-B repeat") it does repeat but inserts a 3 or 4 sec. intro/ending (cowbell etc.) between each repeat. All i want is for my (one verse and chorus) song to keep repeating so I can practice singing along to all umpteen verses.
I tried removing this annoying cowbell by muting but it permanently muted my song and left the cowbell so I had to re-record it.
I just bought this keyboard and thought looping would be dead simple.
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SeaGtGruff United States of America
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Re: How to create a loop (repeat User song) ?

Unread post by SeaGtGruff »

The "cowbell" as you call it is the metronome. To mute the metronome you must press the FUNCTION button, press the CATEGORY buttons until you get to the "MtrVol" (Metronome Volume) function, and set the Metronome Volume to 0.

Unfortunately, this doesn't eliminate the pause before the selected measures are repeated. It appears there's a very slight pause (approximately one beat) after the selected measures play, followed by two full measures of the metronome, then the selected measures are repeated.

There is a way to prevent the two measures of metronome ticks from being inserted-- select the measures you want to repeat by pressing the "A-B Repeat" button at the beginning and ending of those measures, then just as the selected measures are finished playing, press the "<< Rewind" button. That last part is a little tricky, because if you press Rewind too soon the selected measures start to repeat before they've finished playing, and if you press it too late you'll get that slight pause mentioned in the preceding paragraph, therefore you have to try to time it just right if you want the looped section to play "on beat."

Note that when selecting the measures you want to loop, it selects full measures. So the best way to loop a section of a song as smoothly as possible for a bit and then continue with the rest of the song would be as follows:

0. (Preliminary step.) Press the FUNCTION button, use the CATEGORY buttons to navigate to the "MtrVol" function, and set the Metronome Volume to 0. If you don't do this, you'll get a metronome tick when you press the "<< Rewind" button in step 3 below.

1. Sometime during the measure you want the loop to start with, press the "A-B Repeat" button. If you try to time it with the start of the measure but hit it too soon, you'll actually select the previous measure, so it's better to hit the button a little too late rather than too soon-- e.g., hit the button on the second beat of the measure.

2. Sometime during the measure you want the loop to end with, press the "A-B Repeat" button a second time. This time, instead of trying to wait until the end of the measure, just go ahead and press the "A-B Repeat" button a little early-- e.g., on the last beat of the measure, or maybe even in the middle of the measure. Note that some songs don't use 4/4 time, so you'll need to pay attention to whatever time signature the song uses-- e.g., if it uses 2/4 time then you'll want to hit the button on the second beat.

3. After you've pressed "A-B Repeat" to mark the last measure of the loop, try to press the "<< Rewind" button just as the last measure is ending. As long as you didn't wait too late, the selected loop will immediately start to replay from its first measure, so if you pressed the button a little prematurely you might lose part of a beat. But if you wait a little too late you'll get the beat of silence while the keyboard pauses before it tries to play the two measures of metronome ticks. It's probably better to lose part of a beat than to get a full beat of silence, but with practice you should be able to hit the "<< Rewind" button at just the right moment so the loop is repeated "on beat."

4. When you want to stop looping and continue with the rest of the song, press the "A-B Repeat" button a third time sometime during the last playback-- i.e., don't try to wait for the end of the loop, just go ahead and press the button as soon as the loop has started to repeat for the last time. The song will proceed normally from there.

Two additional comments:

1. The metronome ticks aren't part of the recorded song, so you didn't need to record the song over again from scratch.

2. This looping feature isn't intended for creating loops in a user-recorded song, but rather for temporarily looping part of a song for some reason (e.g., in your case, to practice singing along). If you want to create a loop in your user-recorded song, the best procedure would be to record your song with a DAW rather than using the keyboard's song-recording feature, so you'll have all of the capabilities and features of the DAW available to use. An alternative would be to record your song on the keyboard, but when you get to the section you want to loop just play it one time rather than repeating it. Then convert your recording to a MIDI file, load it into a DAW, and use the DAW's functions to copy and repeat the section(s) you want to loop.
Michael Rideout
Current keyboards: Yamaha YPT-400, PSR-E433, PSR-E443, PSR-EW400, MX49 BK
Current controllers: M-Audio Axiom 61-II
Previous keyboards: Farfisa Matador 611; Casio CTK-710
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Tinutt Israel
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Re: How to create a loop (repeat User song) ?

Unread post by Tinutt »

So my rewind button only resets the song to one measure before the rewind buttond, what should i do?
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SeaGtGruff United States of America
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Re: How to create a loop (repeat User song) ?

Unread post by SeaGtGruff »

What model do you have?

Are you using the "A-B Repeat" button to mark the beginning and end of the section you want to loop?
Michael Rideout
Current keyboards: Yamaha YPT-400, PSR-E433, PSR-E443, PSR-EW400, MX49 BK
Current controllers: M-Audio Axiom 61-II
Previous keyboards: Farfisa Matador 611; Casio CTK-710
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tomsixtwo Germany
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Re: How to create a loop (repeat User song) ?

Unread post by tomsixtwo »

randmont wrote: Mon May 19, 2014 10:03 pm When I followed the manual (p. 78 "A-B repeat") it does repeat but inserts a 3 or 4 sec. intro/ending (cowbell etc.) between each repeat. All i want is for my (one verse and chorus) song to keep repeating so I can practice singing along to all umpteen verses.
I tried removing this annoying cowbell by muting but it permanently muted my song and left the cowbell so I had to re-record it.
I just bought this keyboard and thought looping would be dead simple.
I've had a PSR-S670 for a week and I ran into exactly the same problem.

I can't understand why something this simple is not possible with an arranger keyboard in this price class. Repeat A/B is a function for practicing, I have understood that so far. But this does not exclude that it should be possible to switch off the pre-count. If you google, you'll find out that this "feature" has frustrated many Yamaha customers over the years :cry:
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vyakunin
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Re: How to create a loop (repeat User song) ?

Unread post by vyakunin »

agreed, pretty basic function not nailed before adding tons of features very few people would ever need, not to mention discover :-(
nakeyer Russia
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Re: How to create a loop (repeat User song) ?

Unread post by nakeyer »

Hi!
It's a funny thing on my old Yamaha QY100. The same situation with the pause during repeating A-B of the recorded song... But it has so-called 'Chord Template' - pre-programmed progressions of chords. There are 100 of them. The beginning of this list is here:
Screenshot_1.jpg

all of them are very different and at last - it is possible to find the progression of chords you need for your current song. All what you need - is to choose the Style you need. :)
These progressions can be played in loop mode WITHOUT ANY PAUSE!
So I can sing or play guitar and the chord progression will playback in loop mode without any pause! Sure it's possible to transpose these progressions to the tune you need.
Maybe it is possible to find the same on your synth!...
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