Breaking up a long jam session into separate songs

I am planning to record my band during a 2 hour jam session.  This will be meant to be a rough demo recording.  All instruments (1 acoustic guitar, 1 electric guitar, 2 vocal, bass and roland vdrums/midi/SD2) all going into separate tracks with input signals clean.  To make this go quickly, I want to just create a single project, get levels set and hit record (1 take) for the duration of jam.  Now, my question:

What is the best workflow to take this single project (post recording) and break it up into N individual song projects, so I can work on each song separately - applying changes: eq, effects, etc and master each song as separate audio file.

My theory is the workflow may involve taking the LONG recording and mark the beginning and ending of each song, then (somehow) cut out each song (with all tracks) and paste each into another project.  I think it may have to do with manipulating clips. But, I am not sure how the best (most efficient) way of doing this specifically.  Anyone have any specific suggestions or  instructions on how?

Thanks in advance!  Dan

Sonar X2/Toontracks SD2, EZMix2, VS-100/Quad Capture/Zoom G3/Zoom B3/Roland TD-30

To create new song files out of the long recording, I would go through the original recording project,use the "save as" function to create file names of each song you want to work on. From there, I would go back into each song file, use the "split" and "delete" function to get rid the part of the file not related to the song.

Make sure you have enough disk space :-)

I do this quite often Dan,

I like to have plenty of time to setup and get the best sound I can on each track before I do anything.
I have used panels to kind of isolate mic'd amps, drums, etc...  to try to minimize bleed (However bleed can be a good thing IMO).

As far as Sonar settings, I would have it set to where you can expect the least amount of problems with buffer sizes being you wont be needing any type of low latency for monitoring purposes.

Start with a blank template (No FX or plug-ins)

Once your happy with what your hearing that will be captured/tracked, save your project. I usually create a folder for The Band, then Title will usually be something like "MASTER, Band Name and Date, might be good to squeeze in Sample/Bit Rate in title as well.

Once the recording session is over-DO A "SAVE" and also a "SAVE AS-Working Copy" with the other title Info as well.

Then you can open the working copy and start with the assault of editing, mixing, .....

The first thing I like to do is get a general template made up of having all the FX, EQing, etc... in place for the most common type of songs that will hopefully apply to most of the session and get as good of mix as I can from that point.

Once you have that done, I like to add a "Marker" at the beginning of each song with the title.
This will make it easy when it comes to jumping to the beginning of each song to isolate/slip edit it down to the song itself.


Once all this is done, now you can do the SAVING.
I will take the set/song list in order and do a "Save As" for each song.
This will create identical projects with the exception of the Project Title.
--Open the first Song/Project,
--Lasso all track
--Zoom all the way out
--Grab the end of the clip and slip edit out until just the song remains.
--SAVE 
Repeat for all song projects


You can delete the markers once that is done


Now you can go in a fine tweak each one, you have a Master Saved, a Working Master Saved, and Individual song Projects saved.


The Last thing I do after this is Burn a copy of the Master to DVD and put it away (THIS HAS SAVED ME!!!) even with 3 HDDs and all the other back ups.


It sounds like a bunch but it really isnt once you get your system down.   

+1 to setting markers
when you do this you can select all then right click any clip and choose split then in the dialog box select split at markers.  easy peasy.  lasso each song and copy, create a new project and paste.

I have recorded many of our band practices into 12 tracks of Sonar using a 2004 laptop. The best method for me was to create a template as mentioned. It only takes a few minutes. Start with the 16 track Sonar template. Then name tracks and set inputs to the correct channel of your interface. There's lots of stuff you can pre meditate. One thing I do is save them ready to record all tracks.  

I do the "save as" to a separate folder for each song and just name them with a number or if I know which songs we'll play the names. These song folders are within the session folder. I'll be transferring it later as one big file to my desktop DAW> 

At the night of the rehearsal I open ALL of the CWP files and minimize to the the bottom. You can have an unlimited amount of files open apparently. I've had at least 16 open at once. 

It will only take a few seconds to open that file and start the recording. And easy to hit "save" when done. If a second take is needed of a song I just add it to the end of the first take. Or if there's time, save take 1, record over take 1, and do a "save as" and name it " take 2. " Worst you can do is erase take 1 which was probably a bad version anyways. 

The beauty of this system is most of your songs will be separated CWP files.. If the band is on a roll and doesn't stop between songs no big deal. Just keep rolling. You might not get a chance to drink your beer, that's all. 

I would defiantly not want to chance on a 2 hour multi track recording bombing out on you at some point. Break it it to smaller bits at least. But having a bunch of templates ready to roll is the ticket. 

It works pretty good for me but it did take a few sessions before we got the sounds dialed in. The Uncle Ruckel recordings on my sound cloud site in my signature are the result of this method. 

cool. i take it the session is over and it went well.  if you could share some feedback on what worked for you and what didn't so the rest of us who do this kinda recording can learn a bit from your experiences! :D