Speed up wav AND have pitch increase

Hello Cubasers,

I have old 4-track cassette tapes that I’m trying to import into cubase to digitize and remaster. Unfortunately, my old Yamaha MT120 no longer plays at a consistent speed, so I have been importing the tapes by recording the tracks directly off the tapes using a regular cassette player. Of course, this means I play “Side A” and get tracks 1 & 2 forwards, and then “Side B” and get tracks 3 & 4 in reverse. I have been solving this by processing the wav files of track 3 & 4 using “Audio-> Processes → Reverse”, then manually syncing the resulting wav with the original wav of tracks 1 & 2. This works totally fine. However, here is my issue…

As long as I am importing tapes I recorded at normal speed (4.8) it works ok. However, I need to speed up the wav files from the tapes I originally recorded at double (9.5) speed. Is there a way to use Cubase to double the speed of a wav file AND have the pitch increase proportionally? I know Cubase can time-stretch and keep the pitch the same, but I want the pitch to actually change along with the speed change. I’m not sure if I’m being very clear, but I know there are some other “old guys” out there like me who know the trials and tribulations of using an old tape-based 4-track (ahem, no “undo” function!), and will understand what it is that I’m trying to explain.

And to all you younglings – you have NO idea how nice it is to have Ctrl-Z whenever you need it. So many tears and broken personal items after punching in with the wrong track armed…

Welcome to the forum

Yes, switch the pitch shift algorithm to Elastique Tape.

Hi Steve, Thanks for the response! Unfortunately, right now I only have Elements – which doesn’t seem to have that ability. The terrible irony of all this is that the recordings I wanted to sound best at the time I recorded at double speed to maximize their quality on tape. Turns out they are now the recordings that I can’t actually use! But I suppose if they are REALLY worth having, I can rerecord them now. And honestly, 20 years later I am a much better player anyway!

I’ve tried time stretching and transposing, but the quality of the result is nowhere near what I was hoping to achieve. I’ll probably just take the best of the original ideas and reuse them in other ways, and probably archive the recordings for later – I’m sure I will eventually upgrade my version of Cubase as I start requiring greater functionality.

Thanks again!

1 Like

Ya. When musical mode is off, I wish the transpose control did exactly what you asked.