8. Editing and timestretching clips

1 Let’s have some fun with clips. In our previous tutorial, we added a loop called Wersi_130 5.aif. Let’s find it in the Clip Launcher and double-click it to open the editor in the lower pane. We also solo the track on which we dropped the clip to better hear what we’re doing.

2 The clip’s waveform is displayed in the editor. It’s a simple loop, with an ancient rhythm machine playing only down and backbeats. Click and drag over the first half of the last snare, then use the Ctrl/Cmd-D command to duplicate that snare hit.

3 That adds some interest, but we can do more than that. Select the very first downbeat and duplicate it three times in rapid succession for a 16th-note kick at the start. Some of our beats aren’t perfectly aligned to the grid – let’s click Stretch to fix those.

4 Note the ‘handles’ at the bottom of each event in our clip. Use those to drag events to the desired location. This stretches the audio, rather than simply moving it unchanged. Double-clicking adds more of these beat markers. Holding Shift unsyncs your actions from the grid.