The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
  1. #1

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    Have been working on this for a couple of weeks. No notation for guitar, just playing. And I thought when I learn the whole song, how am I going to play it in the end? So I did the backing track too, in Reaper, measure for measure:

    ggbesamemucho68.mp3

    Upright bass and guitar notes should be pretty precise (value, not timing, can't play like Grant), but piano... not so. Sometimes I spent an hour on three measures and still didn't get it right.

    I gave up on his guitar tone quickly and tried something else instead. Don't have the right equipment for this at all.

    Recreating Rudy van Gelders mix turned out to be difficult as well. Still far away and I don't know why.

    No harmonic analysis so far. Probably I'll pick a few parts I like most and do the notation? I would need some tipps on how to start here.

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    The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
     
  3. #2

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    Smokin.........

  4. #3

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    ^^^ Thanks.

    Here are some things I found out since starting this project:

    • DAW Software: I had no prior experience with audio software. Overwhelming subject at first. You'll need a DAW and sampled instruments. I tried a few and got Reaper because it doesn't cost much, has a fully featured trial, is highly customizable and doesn't need a USB dongle like Cubase.
    • (Digital) Instruments: Reaper doesn't come with many instruments. There are countless studios offering sampled instruments, some free. Many need Native Instruments Kontakt to run. Some, like the Adam Monroe Upright Bass, will say they need Kontakt but the VST will work without it anyway. Some use the free Sforzando player (for ex. the Production Voices pianos). The Sforzando player will then plug into the DAW. I want to buy Straight Ahead Drums in the future and maybe the Fluffy Audio upright bass, so I needed Kontakt. Native Instruments has a well working license transfer system which makes it easy to buy used. You'll download the software anyway. The used prices for Kontakt and Komplete were almost the same so I bought Komplete 9 which contains Kontakt, but also many pianos, Guitar Rig Pro, Effects etc. Then upgraded to 12 during the Thanksgiving sale (still running). Got it for half the price in the end. Kontakt comes with a Jazz drum set and an upright bass, both used here.
    • Most important tip: establish correct timing first. On Besame Mucho the time base is floating between 108bpm and 116bpm. In Reaper you make the Master Track visible where you can adjust the time base. Vertical lines are the beats (I intentionally increased the bpm for a segment here for better visibility):



      Often the beats can be seen in the waveform but double check using the built-in metronome. This is hard to fix later (at least in Reaper) and if you don't do it, for ex. drum loops will never fit. If you think about getting a different DAW, make sure it can do this. While they're all more or less the same, I read somewhere that this is not something they all have (didn't verify this).
    • I used Amazing Slow Downer for the faster guitar parts. Slows down while keeping the pitch. Sliders in ASD: when using them you can move your finger away from it up/down for finer adjustment. ASD also can save the loop and pitch settings. While it works with Spotify it's much better to just buy the MP3 instead. ASD forgets the Spotify settings but will start with the last used MP3.
    • Bass tones can be difficult to hear. You can increase the pitch of the original track by an octave and it will be much easier.
    • The original track tuning was a bit too low for some reason. This can be corrected with pitch too. Amazing slow downer also does this, no reason to retune the guitar.
    • You'll need a midi keyboard to find the right tones. Depending on your piano skills you can record them directly into the DAW. Because I went measure by measure, it was faster to enter the notes by mouse into the piano roll. You still need the MIDI keyboard though...
    • A master group track ("master fx" below) allows post effects for everything but the original track (which is "06 - Bésame..."):



    Most of this may be obvious but maybe it helps someone. I hope it doesn't look like a product pitch. There are so many product options with audio software, I just listed what worked for me.
    Last edited by FRS635; 11-28-2019 at 03:30 PM.

  5. #4

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    If you ever do a transcription ... Post it..Not sure many here make there own backing tracks..great job on that song...i like band in a boxes ability to add vst instruments...regards
    Last edited by voxsss; 11-30-2019 at 09:10 AM.

  6. #5

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    Thanks. No Mac here and I didn't see iRealPro doing the bossa-nova to walking-bass to bossa-nova thing. Maybe it's possible I don't know.

    Still undecided on notation. Tone height is not the problem but timing/rhythm/note lengths. And the chords... Anybody volunteering to proof-read?

  7. #6

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    You can do all the stuff you mention about Amazing Slow Downer in Reaper. And probably better. But if you really want to transcribe, there's a program called "Transcribe!" that is certainly the best software tool for that job.

  8. #7

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    Yes, the phone is only necessary for logistics. It's just easier than moving the Notebook and charger to the couch.

    WRT to Transcribe, I tried it for finding the piano chord tones. Didn't succeed though. The tones it seemed to find didn't fit any better than those I heard, both not good. Might work better when the source isn't as scrambled as in this song. Or I didn't understand Transcribe well enough, also possible.

  9. #8

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    ++ about Transcribe!

    1) An important aspect: sound quality of slowed down music is much better with Transcribe! than with Amazing Slow Downer. I tried !

    2) what is the audio format you used for the music to transcribe. That may matters a lot too for ease of note recognition in a mix. Better use .wav if possible vs. medium or low quality mp3.

    3) Don't forget about the piano roll view in Transcribe! it uses different note recognition techniques than the keyboard / spectrum view. Combining both may help.

    Grant Green's "Besame Mucho" transcription / copy-besame-mucho-transcribe-view-jpg