How To Beat Match Using AudioSnap

I do a lot of backing tracks for my cover band, everything we do uses them. My normal workflow usually involves importing the original recording into Sonar (BTW thanks for fixing mp3 imports), finding the tempo and key, then either transcribing the song or importing and fixing up a MIDI (they usually have bits wrong). Most new songs today are gridded so it's easy to beat match everything and have your MIDI in sync with the original, but I recently ran into a song (Goodbye To You by Scandal) that's all over the map (pun intended). After screwing up all weekend and deleting my work a dozen times, I think I found a workflow that works so I thought I'd share it.
 
I wanted to end up with a work environment that I could use to ensure my MIDI played in sync with the original recording and then later grid before bouncing so it doesn't drive the drummer nuts trying to follow a click that slows down and speeds up continually. Basically I wanted to set the project tempo from the clip or in this case the whole song.
 
Here's what finally worked:
1. Import the song audio. I usually start at measure 5 so I have room before the song for the count in clicks.
2. Set the channel input gain and fader both to -3db (-6db total). This isn't necessary but it helps keep the outputs from overloading when you want to listen to the song with your mix.
3. Set the project tempo as close as possible to the song tempo, there are some good videos on YouTube on how to do this. You can also use a BPM counter tool. For this song the one I used told me the tempo was 79.7 but the song is twice as fast so I set the tempo to 159.4.
4. Align the song start by turning off snap and sliding the audio clip until the beginning starts where it's supposed to, zooming in as much as necessary. In this case I wanted the first beat of the song to start at 5:1 so I zoomed down to the sample level to get it exact. Note that if you change the project tempo after aligning the song, you will have to do it again because the timeline moves relative to the clip.
5. Extend the beginning of the clip a measure before the first beat. This is important because you'll probably need the space if Sonar doesn't match the audio transients perfectly. Turn the snap back on and drag the beginning of the clip until it snaps on the measure boundary.
6. Bounce the track to a clip (Bounce to clips). You need to do this so you can later drag the beat markers to establish the correct starting tempo.
7. In the clips menu for the track, go to the AudioSnap tab and enable AudioSnap. After a second or so it should display the average tempo of the song, in this case Sonar thought it was 80 too so use the dropdown to set the right tempo if it's not right.
8. On the track, select Audio Transients. You should see the audio transient markers show up on the track.
9. Press 'a' to show the AudioSnap palette or select it from the view menu.
10. On the AudioSnap palette, click on the edit tempo map button, you should see beat markers lined up with the audio transients.
11. Fix up the first measure and the beginning of the song. You might notice that the first transient lines up with the noise before the beginning of the song and the beat marker lines up with that transient instead of the first beat, this is the first thing that will need to be fixed. IMPORTANT: when dragging transients, always grab them by the diamond. If you grab the line, the clip will change which is not what you want. Drag the first transient and move it all the way over to the beginning of the clip (4:1:0) to establish the start point. Then use the draw tool to add a transient for each beat up to the first beat of the song (5:1:0), and make sure they align with the project beat markers.
12. Start fixing up the beat markers. Start by dragging the first beat markers (1:1, 1:2, etc) to the transients added at the beginning of the clip. as you drag them you should see the other ones starting to line up on transient markers. You may need to move several of them before they  start lining up on quarter note boundaries. In my example the clip beat marker 1:1 lined up at project (4:1), the song starts at clip (2:1) and project (5:1). You'll get it when you see it :)
13. Fix up the beat markers for the song. Listen to the song and align the beat markers so that beat n:1 lands on the one. In some cases you may need to play some sections a few times to find 1 and make sure the correct transient has the beat marker. You will probably need to make a few passes. One thing to look for is when a beat marker doesn't line up with a transient, that's a good sign there was a tempo change and AudioSnap didn't catch it. Keep doing this until you can hear 1 and see the now time pass the beat marker n:1 for the whole song. Sometimes it'll put n:1 on a tom hit on n-1:4:480 so you might want to watch for that too.
14. Fine tune the beat markers. Optionally you can make sure n:2, n:3, and n:4 are lined up. I found that once n:1 is right, the rest of the beats in the measure are close enough.
15. Turn off the edit tempo map button.
16. Set the project tempo to the clip temp. First click the little arrow button to select the resolution, use either measure or beat. I used the measure option, as long as 1 lines up it's close enough for my purposes. Once you have the option you want click on the Set Project to Clip button, once.
17. Dismiss the AudioSnap palette and disable AudioSnap on the track to avoid screwing anything up later.
18. Play the song back with the metronome and watch the project position markers, everything should line up and you should hear the metronome click on the beats. You should now be able to view the project tempos (View->Tempos) all the while insulting the drummers meter. :)
 
If you've done everything correctly, the only thing that will have changed is the project tempo map, the clip should still play at the tempo it was recorded at. If you have a MIDI file to import, you will want to set up the project tempo map first before importing the MIDI file. If you import the MIDI first, you might end up screwing up the note positions when setting the project tempo.
 
It took me a while to figure this workflow out, hopefully this might save you some time if you're ever faced with the same problem.
Cheers!
 
 

Thanks for this. I too have screwed up songs, deleted, started over many times on something similar but have not yet come to a good solution. I am going to try this to see how it works. 
 
I have a bit different scenario but it's similar. I have a fireface UFX, which allows direct recording to USB drive. I have recently recorded some live show with it. I them import the multitrack audio into sonar but need to line it up and adjust it so I can add more tracks to it. 
 
I think I can do what you've done, by selecting all the tracks and using one of them, maybe the snare drum track, line it up like you've done, and use it to adjust all the tracks. Or I may have to do each track like you've done and individually get them lined up.
 
Thanks, GB 

I think BPM  does a good average, but if the song wanders, it can't be exact.  Also you have to sometimes adjust for tripple meters...