How to pitch quire recording slowly over time?

[phas3d]

If it is choir its not an easy task as it is a polyphonic source. The only tool that I'm aware of that can accomplish this is Melodyne because of their DNA technology. Curious how it could do in a case like this. Good luck.

[psycho_monkey]

Originally Posted by phas3d

If it is quire its not an easy task as it is a polyphonic source. The only tool that I'm aware of that can accomplish this is Melodyne because of their DNA technology. Curious how it could do in a case like this. Good luck.

The polyphonic issue isn't an aspect - assuming it's only a stereo mic, you just need a realtime plugin that can do automated pitch shifting - eg the "pitch" plugin in Pro Tools HD - and process the pitch using automation over time.

However...it's likely to sound really bad, musically. It might sound better to just pitch the offending section to match.

I don't know that anything will pass muster for an "audiophile" recording though.

[phas3d]

Doesn't need to be realtime. You can pretty much do it with Melodyne, Auto tune in graphic mode, or even Izotope Radius (great algorithm). Now the final result will depend on the content and extent of pitch shift required.

[captainj]

All digital pitching plugins that I have heard produce obvious artifacts. If I had to do this, I would mix down to a great 1/2" analog recorder 30 ips & use varispeed to capture back to digital. A semitone or less over 32 bars is very gradual - a great deck will respond accurately to small increment changes, but you might want to map out where the most significant changes occur. You could even record a few passes of the pitch change section to mix and match. Make sure the tape deck is in good working order and converters are top notch, get good levels to tape, etc...
As an added bonus, often "quire" recordings benefit from the sound of analog tape, at least somehow things seem to sound a bit more quire-ish afterwards

[Tui]

What are you guys on about - a "choir"?

quire
noun
four sheets of paper or parchment folded to form eight leaves, as in medieval manuscripts.
• any collection of leaves one within another in a manuscript or book.
• 25 (formerly 24) sheets of paper; one twentieth of a ream.

ORIGIN Middle English : from Old French quaier, from Latin quaterni ‘set of four.’

Or this?

quire
n
an obsolete spelling of choir

[stevelalonde]

Go on this site
The DSP Dimension

There's a free au plug somewhere. Automate the shift on the master bus or an aux of your choir.

If it's within a minor third, you should get away with it. I had great result with this guy.
Since it's a whole section, Melodyne is not your friend.

[burnhard]

Thank you all for your time and infos...
Melodyne ...not sure if it can do the trick...
Autotune...hmmm...sounds very plastic
Dspdimension....sounds promising
will try on it on Monday.......
And yes I am German it's a choir not a quire....

[phas3d]

Radius has some good results on many things. Not sure if it will do for what you need. There's a lot of harmonic content there. Never an easy task...

[ivansc]

Explains it! I have a dyslexic child who may well have spelled Choir like that and I can readily see how you would make that mistake.
Problem is that the rest of your english is good and idiomatic. Mein deutsch ist schrecklisch...

[stevelalonde]

Radius is great but can't be used in realtime and you can't automate the shift.

For a semitone or two, that should be quite easy. At worst, you put it on the whole recording for homogeneity followed by an exciter to bring back some of the lost highs.

In this case that should not be such a problem and the DiracFXau should sound a lot better than some built in pitch shift option in your daw (if you're using a AudioUnit capable daw)

[stevelalonde]

And if you're using some reverb post-shift, that could yield even better result with a bit of fine work and experimentation.

[phas3d]

Originally Posted by stevelalonde

Radius is great but can't be used in realtime and you can't automate the shift.

From What I read it was a whole take. So wondering why the need to automate...

[stevelalonde]

Originally Posted by burnhard

Now they asked me if it was possible to slowly pitch it up over a certain period of time....

[psycho_monkey]

Originally Posted by phas3d

From What I read it was a whole take. So wondering why the need to automate...

As I understand it, they start off flat, the OP has been asked to slowly return it to pitch, and then it's possible to cut to another take if needed, because the "off" recording has now reached pitch.

Why on earth you'd take this unmusical approach, and not just attempt to transpose the part up a semitone using the most transparent algorithm you can, I don't know.

[phas3d]

Exactly. My bad for not understanding it right in the first place. After all English is my third language. I do try though

[JustMastering]

It might be better to cut and paste that same section of the song from a prior take (assuming it's in pitch). That will give the most natural sounding result. Best of luck!

Cheers

Maybe not relevant, considering the recent replies, but...

If you do choose to do the pitch shifting, you might reduce some artifacts by upsampling the material before shifting and then downsampling to the normal rate afterwards. This might have the technical result of spreading out the shift artifacts in either the time or frequency domains (or both, I'm not really certain).

Also, something I'm more certain about...

Many sophisticated shifting algorithms will let you choose between optimum shifting for one voice (monophonic), or many voices (polyphonic). It seems like you'd probably have better results with the polyphonic setting if it's available in your software. And, pitch shifting algorithms may also have a separate or related "formant" setting. As I understand it, preserving the formants makes the shift sound more spectrally natural, but takes more CPU power and perhaps time.

So, with everything I'm saying, you may need to set up the algorithm to run by itself, and then go away from the computer and take a break while it works since it may take a long time.

Good luck with your various technique choices.