Selecting all tracks to bring down the level

#1

I seem to have missed a trick here.

If I select all tracks in a typical DAW then move the fader of one, it moves them all. How is that acheived in Ardour?

#2

Well first make sure you understand groups and their usage, it doesn’t sound like that is what you want, but just want to make sure.

I believe what you are looking for, off memory, is SHIFT+COMMAND+CLICK and Drag. I might have the modifiers wrong, but it is something like that I think, you can easily test it and find it.

   Seablade
#3

No subgroups is not what I’m after, unless there is some other kind of group that I need to create in Ardour.

The following combinations do not work:

Shift+windows+click
Shift+alt+click
Shift+fn+click
Shift+ctrl+click

Surely, this cannot be so difficult.

What does multi-select actually do?
#4

In the mixer window, select the first track you want to adjust, shift+click to select the last track you want to adjust, then use the up or down arrows to move all the selected faders.

1 Like
#5

There is a difference between a subgroup (Typically what a bus is called when the output of multiple tracks are sent to it without independent volume control, before sending on to the master) and a group in Ardour.

Subgroup: The Ardour Manual
Group: The Ardour Manual

I remoted into my desktop and tested, SHIFT+COMMAND works for Mute and Solo for me, but not for faders, where I am fairly certain it did in the past, so not sure what is going on there.

     Seablade
#6

Yeh I figured Ardour had some kind of extra groupings for controls and the like.

It’s definitely broken for mouse scroll but up/down buttons do work.

Raised a bug in the issue tracker.

#7

This is intentionally not done. Also drag only affects the fader of the current strip (and that of grouped tracks/busses).

To bring down the level of all tracks just lower the master-bus fader. That is equivalent to lowering the level of all tracks feeding it.

If you really need to change the fader-position, use a VCA:

  1. Switch to the Mixer Window
  2. Select all tracks (Ctrl + T)
  3. Add a VCA (Ctrl+Shift + N)
  4. Right-click on the VCA > Assign Selected tracks
  5. Pull down the VCA’s Fader
  6. Right-click on the VCA > Remove
#8

Nope. the modifiers there are used for fine-grain, very-fine grain adjustments and group override.

The “all” modifier only works for actions and toggle operations, but not for adjustments.

#9

“This is intentionally not done” then, with respect, it’s intentionally a design flaw. This very simple feature is standard issue for any mixing technology, both digital and analog, across every single mixer or DAW that I have ever used and I’ve been doing this a looooooong time.

“To bring down the level of all tracks just lower the master-bus fader. That is equivalent to lowering the level of all tracks feeding it.”

No sir, it is not at all equivalent. The master bus is my mixdown level and what I send to my mastering engineer. Bringing down this level does not allow me to control groups of faders running into a bus or the output levels across those individual tracks. A VCA is for grouping and controlling a mix of tracks in volume only once they have been mixed appropriately. I would still require this feature despite the presence of a VCA, as they are for slightly different use cases.

I’ve raised a bug but I’ll change to feature request.

#10

Also, where is this noted in the docs?

Happy to spend some time going through and updating if it’s not there, already submitted a PR for some small issue. It looks like the docs could use some love and attention.

#11

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