Oh, and just to add a little levity...varispeed was what made tape flanging possible back in the 60s. My band had sessions booked right after Hendrix when he was recording Electric Ladyland, so the times often spilled over and we used the same flanging setup Jimi did. You had to have a 60Hz sine wave oscillator going through a power amp that could deliver 117V to the capstan motor, and we used a big ol' tube Macintosh power amp for that.

However................

It was not difficult to burn out a capstan motor (which were beaucoup $$$) if you went too far out of range in terms of frequency, so you could only slow it down so much. We were good boys - only burned up one of them. Jimi was, shall we say, a little harder on them.

However, I still think that in Mike's scenario of using Sonar, a zPlane elastique plug-in on the master bus is the simplest solution. Tune master out to out-of-tune instrument, record, insert zPlane in recorded track, change pitch by equal and opposite amount. Done.

 
I too think this is the best solution for Mikes scenario rather than 'varispeed' per se.
 
I reckon if he'd have outlined what he was trying to achieve rather than trying to launch another opportunity to highlight some lack in Sonar he may have got that sensible solution earlier.

So it's all solved then?

Ok...then what does before they TUNED mean?  Does it mean before they didn't tune?  Doesn't tuning mean that at the end of the process they were IN TUNE?  Or does it just mean they were kinda close?  I'd love to come to a session and tell the other players...hey, listen I just can't get this here instrument in tune...so you fellers just deal with it...ok?

Now...one instrument that comes to mind that does fit your sketchy metaphor is a steel drum.  But it still fails because the slight out of tuneness is what gives it it's character and other players are still in standard tuning on most sessions that use them.

All the "FX" uses of varispeed are valid and useful reasons to add it to X1 or 2 but tuning...at least to moi...seems specious.  No biggie, just my thinkin, ol pal.

I see Anderton that if you are limiting any transposition to a semi tone for reasons of sounding normal then I agree. But it can also be interesting to transpose instruments out of their normal range and witness the tonal change and perhaps use that as part of your arrangement.

The fact that Studio One can do the transposition instantly is a boon. It allows you to try out keys and things very quickly. Saves time quickly putting all your music up or down for the purposes of an overdub as well and resetting back so fast. The quality difference it must be pointed out is not major as it still sounds great in Studio One even when transposed a fair way. 

Also you can play the resultant file in real time as part of a performance and manipulate the transposition. The way I have my digital mixer connected I can record all that as well. 

You don't even need Melodyne that much either. You can simply separate an out of tune note and make that a separate event and then tune that accordingly using the cents window instead. Saves time too. 

But the discussion as always gets one thinking about how to do these types of things in your own software. It got me checking out all the pitch and time stretching options in my DAW. I didn't know about that little speed up and slow down window though, quite cool. (keeps pitch correct but speeds up or slows down audio events by very small amounts if needed)

Not sure exactly where this thread is on Varispeed, but I recall reading Roland's site about R-mix just after its announcement and it seems to have varispeed functionality (not to be confused with VariPhrase).  However, I am not sure if the X2 version will.  I'll check it out.  In the meantime, here is Roland's webpage on the matter:

http://www.roland.com/products/en/R-MIX/

"- Isolate any desired instrument within a mix, and then solo and slow down that element for study"

yorolpal


Ok...then what does before they TUNED mean?  Does it mean before they didn't tune?  Doesn't tuning mean that at the end of the process they were IN TUNE?  Or does it just mean they were kinda close?  I'd love to come to a session and tell the other players...hey, listen I just can't get this here instrument in tune...so you fellers just deal with it...ok?

Now...one instrument that comes to mind that does fit your sketchy metaphor is a steel drum.  But it still fails because the slight out of tuneness is what gives it it's character and other players are still in standard tuning on most sessions that use them.

All the "FX" uses of varispeed are valid and useful reasons to add it to X1 or 2 but tuning...at least to moi...seems specious.  No biggie, just my thinkin, ol pal.

Yeah, I can see your point here. There are instruments whose 'tuning', if one can use that phrase, is such that it lends support to the other instruments. I'm also thinking of, say, Gamelan based instruments mixed in with our 'standard' ones....

It seems sort of like a cheap shot to dwell on my mention of a single instrument and player that I enjoy helping.

 
That was the vehicle that you actually used as a cheap shot to highlight Sonar's lack of varispeed that's probably why it got mentioned.
 
Have you even used 'varispeed' in the context of digital recording?  Have you noticed how it differs from controlling a mechanical rotary tape transport?
 
This is just another case of re-purposing your own badly thought out bit of reasoning to put forward something you think is lacking.  In true McQ style when folk point out that your reasoning is flawed then everyone except McQ has got it wrong. 
 
You can get recording software that works the way you want but you'll notice that they lack other things you might like.  Even in this day and age.  Why don't you look at what's around and decide on what works best for you.
 
For me and many others it comes down to a combination of applications and plug-ins because since the introduction of varispeed 40 years ago, where incidentally you still needed a collection of stuff to achieve what you wanted, i.e tape machines, desks, amps and other outboard gear there is still not one thing that serves all purposes.
 
Most of us here have got what you are saying and what you are trying to do, some of us are already as au-fait with digital pitch-shifting, time-stretching and real time varispeed in a DAW as we were with tape, you however seem to lack a basic grasp of what's out there and how to go about what you are doing yet you are still being critical not only of your tool of choice but of the people making recommendations to you as well.
 
Your major difficulty seems to lie at the keyboard end of your equipment.
 
 

mike_mccue


It seems like a lot of folks react to requests for Varispeed by offering suggestions or comments about work arounds and different ways to get similar results.

When I read most of these suggestions or comments I get the impression that many people, probably the people who have never used Varispeed, don't seem to understand why, how, or when Varispeed is a great benefit to a musician and their recording technician.
 

From many of the responses it seems some get it and are offering "workarounds" as you say, but many aren't really getting what you mean by Varispeed as they continue to talk about pitch shifting and fitting to tempo without altering pitch etc. 
 
For those who have never used Varispeed, Varispeed affects BOTH pitch and tempo simultaneously by essentially "doing nothing" to the actual sound except changing the speed of playback which therefore affects the pitch as a result. As such there is little or no stress on the CPU and no odd pitch-shifting artifacts, there is no "processing" involved. Setting aside decades of analog gear, Varispeed has existed in computer-based wave editors since long before audio DAWS even existed. Back when a computer could not play two audio tracks simultaneously or even calculate a "simple" reverb in realtime as it had to be rendered before auditioning, Varispeed functioned just fine.
 
A good example is Goldwave audio editor, introduced in 1993 which had Varispeed:
http://www.goldwave.ca/about.php
 
In fact, the best "tape slowing to a stop" (or speeding up) I ever heard was using a Varispeed function instead of a pitch-shifting algorhithm. For what it's worth, Goldwave still lists as feature 6 in the Features list as "Variable Speed Playback".
 
In practice this may be more difficult to adapt to a DAW though. Somehow the engine would have to adapt the Varispeed to the Tempo internally - the DAW cannot continue "thinking" it's playing at 160 BPM when it may now be at 156.23 BPM. Not saying it can't be done but it's not as simple as using Varispeed on a wave file in an editor that is not linked internally to a tempo and therefore possibly VSTi's with dozens of envelopes controlling parameters while they have to compensate with delay-compensation and blah, blah, blah.
 
So, I'm with you, I could see this being useful, and fun!, but I do question how difficult it might be to implement it in a DAW. I noticed someone claimed Reaper has Vraispeed, but having never used Reaper I have no idea if it uses true Varispeed or whether it affects tempo while maintaing pitch. As others have suggested you could always do a quick mix and throw it in a another program but I realize it's one more unnecessary step you'd prefer to avoid.
 
Coming from my own selfish perspective, as much as I get you, I'd rather see the issue with third party VST's like Waves , Reaktor - alot of plugins that require more than a standard stereo input pair - dealt with. And the the Staff view tweaked. And then the ability to change the Fader throw height as having a three-inch throw sucks and I don't feel like dragging a controller everywhere (Audition can have the Faders the height of your screen if you like). Etc. etc. Varispeed would probably be a little further down my list than yours, simply based on my own needs.
 
 

I think most here know that true Varispeed (old tape days) effects pitch and tempo simultaneously. I am confident that in Reaper but definitely in Studio One all options are possible. Both tempo and pitch change, or one fixed while the other stays the same. They all sound very good too and are instantly adjustable. The same end resultant effect is also possible obviously in Sonar.