Cubase is by far a better DAW than Logic Pro X, but Logic has a great tool, which basically allows you to select a range of notes in the key editor, press Shift+T, and that gives the selection handles at the beginning and end. Clicking and dragging either handle allows you to stretch or compress the selected notes.
When I switched to Cubase earlier this year I didn’t see something like that, and I asked, but I was told that the only way to do that in Cubase was to cut the part where the notes were, and use the pointer in time stretch mode. It seemed a mind-boggling omission that a DAW like Cubase had a workflow so weird for something like this.
In C13 it is still the same, except that now we have something that makes it one step closer to the ideal. In the key editor that opens in a new window (which is the best way to edit), in C13 we can see a section at the top that has the track displayed like it normally shows in the project window. So now you still have to do the same process as before, but you don’t need to leave the key editor in its own window.
Am I missing something?
I just select the note(s), grab the starts or the ends and drag. The notes lengthen/shorten according the the Q setting, if it’s on.
Isn’t “Time Stretch” for audio?
Yes, and for MIDI parts too, as long as they are in the project tracks area. If you press 1 twice, the pointer changes into the time stretching one.
However, if you have a key editor window open and you have a group of notes that you want to shorten or lengthen proportionally, in Logic is rather easy, you select the notes, press Shift+T and drag the handles to enlarge or shorten that group.
But, in Cubase, the only way to do that is to cut the part around the notes, then use the pointer when it’s in time stretching mode, and drag the handles in the part itself. The only difference now is that we can do it in the key editor window, unless that extra section with the track was available in C12 and I missed it. But I don’t think it was.
In the meantime, I made macros that can easily scale selected notes by 0.1, 0.5, 0.67, 0.75, 0.99, 1.01, 1.1, 1.25, 1.33, 1.5, 2using hotkeys.
Default hotkeys are Ctrl+Alt+1 … Ctrl+Alt+0, but of course you can easily set your own as well as your own coefficients.
Also, keep in mind that it uses Marker#9, but it is possible to change it to use locators instead.
To install it:
Put Note Scale Macros.xml inside
C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\Steinberg\Cubase 13_64\Presets\KeyCommands
Put Note Scale folder inside
C:\Users\username\Documents\Steinberg\Cubase\User Presets\Logical Edit\
Run Cubase/Nuendo, go to Edit->Key Commands and load the Note Scale Macros preset. New macros should appear in the Macros list, set your hotkeys there and test it.
To me it’s very convenient, I almost don’t need the compress/expand handles at all. NoteScaleMacros.zip (18,9 КБ)
Thanks for sharing this. I wonder if it’s supposed to work only in Windows, or if I put them in the wrong places. Based on the paths you mentioned here, I copied them to these in my Mac:
Thanks for the detailed step by step on how to do them. I just found them, but I thought they were going to show in the macros section, but these show in the logical editor in their own folder.
However, they do what I need, but the problem is that the notes end up somewhere else. It does expand or compress the selection, but it always uses the origin position as the beginning of the region it has to process. Let me show you what I’m talking about:
This is just some random notes before applying the script:
So the macros partially work, but it seems to me that there should be something there telling it that the origin to compress or expand from should be the center of the selection, not the beginning of the timeline.
This is provided, look at the first screenshot. You can’t just use the Logical preset, you need to re-create macros which consists of 12 steps.
Quite long and hacky macro, but the best I could find working through experimentation.
Oh, I see. You couldn’t share the macros directly they are saved in the keycommands.xml file, so the user has to rebuild them using your logical editor presets.
Well, thanks so much, these work great! I only setup the one to expand 1.01x, then duplicated it and replaced the preset with the 0.99x one, and mapped those two. It works great.
Oh, Now I see what you mean. That loaded them in the lower area, although I went back to my preset because I have several custom shortcuts, but now I’m able to see all the macros you did, not just the two I had put together.
And thanks again, because you just gave me the solution to one of the things that I really missed from Logic Pro X. Even easier, because I don’t have to press Shift+T, marquee select the notes, expand or contract, and when I’m done, press Shift+T again to get out of scale mode.
No problem. Does it really conflict with your keybinds though? It shouldn’t, afaik.
Maybe you need to save your own settings as a preset first, then load both.
I’m not sure, but by loading it, it seems to keep your macros even after I selected my preset for the key commands. So it works for me either way.
Now, is there a way to make it work without it suddenly changing the focus in the timeline? And it doesn’t change it too much, but if possible I would prefer that it doesn’t move at all. Not the end of the world though if it’s not possible.
Im not sure if this helps but remember you can use all the PLE macros on MIDI (the whole lot or specific selection) without needing to be in the key, drum or list editor etc.
In the arranger view just click the ‘edit in place’ button and it will expand to show all the notes, here you can select them as normal and use all the normal tools in cubase without leaving the arranger window. This is how i work all the time pretty much. I have a shortcut to open the edit in place and then expand that selection to be full screen (horizontal and vertical), and then another one to put out all back the same way as before.
Edit:
The big win for using the PLE is that (besides more actions) it gives you those ‘pre’ and ‘post’ commands you can run. I often use the PLE without anything in the filter and actions area itself , but i can run 8 separate macros in one go.
