In Cubase/Nuendo 13, a crucial utility that was formerly part of the old beat calculator was removed: the ability to select part of an audio event, input the number of beats, and let the software calculate the BPM internally using this simple formula: (Number of beats * 60) / Duration of the selection = BPM
This feature existed for at least six iterations of Cubendo. It allowed me to quickly and precisely calculate the BPM of various electronic music tracks and embed it directly into the audio event properties. This made aligning different audio tracks to a common tempo seamless when creating mashups. Recently, I’ve been doing a lot of these for several large-scale events.
Several alternatives have been suggested in the forums, but none fully address the need:
Tap Tempo: This method is imprecise and initially caused tempo track issues (now fixed). Beyond that, it seems to calculate the average tempo per bar rather than the overall average BPM.
Tempo Detection: While useful in some cases, it creates multiple warp markers instead of providing an average BPM, disrupting the tempo track. Additionally, it requires moving each event to the start of the project for detection, which is inconvenient.
My Question
Is there currently a simple, precise way in recent Cubase/Nuendo releases to:
Detect or calculate the average BPM of a selected audio event,
Avoid altering the tempo track or overall project tempo, and
Achieve this without relying on external tools like an actual calculator?
If there’s a feature I’ve missed or a better workaround, I’d greatly appreciate hearing about it. That said, I believe this utility deserves to be restored in future updates, given its importance to workflows like mine.
Thanks in advance for your insights and suggestions!
I would go like this:
Set the cycle length to the number of beats of the event.
Say import a 2-bar drum loop–> set cycle length to two bars.
Then:
Audio Menu–> Advanced–> Set Tempo from Event
Despite this method requesting to choose to alter the tempo-track, it calculates the exact tempo of the event and you could then immediately ,after reading the tempo, undo the operation.
Hope this helps!
kind regards
Wolfger
@wolfger
Forgot to say thank you!!!
I even found the a command for inserting the project tempo into the audio event Set Definition From Tempo with the Write Definition to Audio option.
Now I have find the command which undoes the project tempo change but keeps the event tempo - then I can make a macro
But honestly, it’s like using quantum computing for doing elementary school math.
In the context of automatic tempo detection, is that ever-wavering tempo that Cubase produces from an audio file ever useful? I’m thinking of what it tends to pick up if I record a guitar piece without a click track and then want to build on top of it, especially as I will naturally have some swing in my strumming and variation due to emphasised strums. I’ve never worked out a process for retrofitting a structure around freestyle playing.
I can see that there can be special cases where you might explicitly want to vary tempo, but I’m not musical enough to understand whether there is a use for what Cubase typically generates.