I would really like to see a solid tool like Melodyne developed for Linux — ideally one that could also integrate into Ardour. It’s unfortunate when the absence of a single plugin, such as Melodyne, becomes a limiting factor that prevents certain parts of the production process from being done properly. While ARA support would certainly be welcome, it’s not an absolute requirement. Hopefully, someone will take on the challenge and create such a tool at some point. In fact, this isn’t Ardour’s fault at all — the world itself is simply imperfect.
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`
I like it 
This is why I prefer using Ardour over Reaper so far ( I also like Reaper but for other reasons and so I use it less): it’s “the workflow”, a proposition that reminds us that developers are users of music creation tools and not simply users of plugins.
When I see in the development of version 9 through the different alpha versions how difficult it is to update the piano roll, it would be a big mistake to have to concentrate on ONE trendy style of plugin, which is - for me - much more a production tool than a more general creation tool.
So, congratulations to the developers for this difficult work.
We can’t wait to see version 9.
Despite our impatience, please take your time to release a beautiful version.
and vice versa ?
(traduction automatique du français… sorry)
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As a side note, one can wonder: why bother with pitch correction ? If you sing good, then that seems unnecessary. On the other hand, if one sings bad, then maybe he/she should practice some more ? I never used melodyne but I heard that some people use it for introducing interesting effects to the voice track. But when it comes to pitch correction, I do find the concept a little odd: if I were to record a guitar solo and missed a few notes, I would rather re-record rather than have a plugin fix my bad playing (?) But that’s just my opinion as a musician who keeps practicing his instruments and voice to improve over time. Maybe one day, I will see a need for this plugin, who knows ? but if it’s to correct my bad singing, I’d rather practice to get better (of course, it’s my POV as an amateur who does not record and mix other musicians against a fee).
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This may have something to do with real people and their real performance in real life. If you are rich enough to turn down a project because the singer messes up, good for you. Others may not be as fortunate.
A poor man’s Melodyne has been available for quite some time with x42 Auto Tune. I hear there’s some new, better algo coming from Fons.
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For the individual pitching of transients, could use a pitch shifter like rubberband and have an automation lane on the cents parameter. More of a manual way to do it.
There is also a kind of Melodyne-wannabe project called MXTune, but according to GitHub Insights, development stalled in 2023.
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It also has to do with there isn’t always the option.
First and Foremost I would rather work with a vocalist to get the correct performance. As Paul said above, those albums are about capturing amazing performances first and foremost (In that case that also included the mixer as well, live mixers know this to well) and you have to start there. I would rather take the time to get the performance right first.
But in some cases that isn’t an option. For instance I have sessions recording of my father singing and playing guitar I recorded about 2 years ago now. In that time frame has had some massive medical issues and now may not be able to play the guitar even like he did two years ago, much less sing at the same time, and even two years ago is nothing compared to my memory of what he used to do (Rose-tinted glasses and all). I am lucky he is still with me, but the general thing there is, what are my options in this case, and I have decided I am going to work on trying to get that recording together into something that reflects my memory, rather than the performance, for my family’s enjoyment. So in that case some pitch correction will be needed (Though I am not at all worried about it being perfect, the imperfections are part of my memory as well). I may go back and attempt to capture another session sometime if I can, but it is doubtful I will be able to, this may be my only option.
Always capture the performance first and foremost, but the tools are available to help us along the way as well. Just don’t depend on the tools in lieu of a great performance and putting in the work to get there.
Seablade
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In the real world, where engineers work professionally with artists, pitch correction is mandatory and should, in my opinion, be an integrated part of the DAW.
I also mainly work with singers who “do it right” by singing several takes and punching in parts if needed and possible. However, sometimes, good pitch correction is required, and Melodyne has to be fired up. Pitch correction is not only for vocals; as an example, saxophones can be ridiculously out of tune.
One does not have to like it, be it a developer or an old school engineer, or a musician, but I will, without having any scientific proof for what I say, claim that the ability to do pitch correction at the fingertips is necessary for almost any professional engineer when needed. And doing it flawlessly in a DAW is always a good thing.
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I have a question to ask precisely on this subject, while diverting a little from the topic:
In the real world, is the DAW market still really aimed at professional producers or more at enlightened amateur creative artists?
Personally, I’m just a simple amateur—not at all enlightened—and my friends who use different DAWs are not professionals at all.
Furthermore, I’m not at all certain that the professional market is a heavy user of Ardour, but that its users are much more passionate, creative people, particularly the Linux community.
I’m not saying this to say that Ardour couldn’t be a professional tool and isn’t intended to become one…certainly not (i think the opposite)
But it’s just to try to reframe the debate about its priorities with the reality of its current and future users.
Do Ardour’s developers have any “statistical” idea of the proportion of its users?
(always automatically translated from French)
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We do not keep track of our users in any real way at all.
Speaking for myself, I’d prefer to be focused on people who use a DAW a lot and therefore value fast and efficient workflow over discoverability and ease of entry level tasks.
But we also have to recognize that to attract new users, a power-user-friendly focus doesn’t really help very much.
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I’m not sure I understand the answer (my English is really bad), but for me, Ardour is a truly powerful DAW… AND very easy to access (the hardest part is actually not Ardour, but installing Jack under Linux - I don’t like Pipewire).
So congratulations on that. For me, the compromise is good.
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Also wanted to mention that DAW’s are also used for podcast and audiobook recording, sound design and composing that doesn’t require melodyne, like mostly MIDI composing. There might be other features people using the DAW for those purposes find more necessary instead. It’s always a balancing act and they said they might implement it in the future. I subscribe to the idea that it would be nice (as I think even the devs stated), but I think the tone used is quite demanding rather than simply an argument of why you’d consider it to be a priority.
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I had some PipeWire issue I won’t discuss here, so I get the JACK part.
However, everyone is going to PipeWire despite it having some baggage.
But we also have to recognize that to attract new users, a power-user-friendly focus doesn’t really help very much.
I don’t think there’s a need to. Convenience had really killed productivity for a while, so I’d recommend a bit of inconvenience and basically letting people do inconvenient things again, just like we did some time back.
Hopefully you are aware, but you only need JACK to route audio between applications, so many users do not need jackd at all and can just use the Ardour native ALSA backend.
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Of course good to know I have been working professionally and making a living in the fake world for so long;)
Seablade
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I know, but I prefer Jack for a few reasons.
I wrote that it was a bit of a pain to install (especially since Pipewire is installed by default), but I’m used to it after using it for so long.
Thanks for the advice anyway.
Installing jack is not really a problem so long as you know how to configure your user and audio group. I have been using jack and ALSA for almost 20 years now and when pipewire was stuffed into the more recent debian releases, I did not even realize it was there since I am not using the pipewire-jack module. I only use the pipewire-pulse module to make my MATE desktop sound applet work, that basically ends here. Jack is completely independent of pipewire and I am using it in the same way I was using it 10 years ago.
As to my need for jack, I use zita-njbridge a lot because I share audio via an ethernet cable between 2 PCs (closed network, no hub in-between):
- one is a recording box receiving 24 channels of 24bit audio straight into Ardour
- the other is a Bitwig PC that does some funny sound synthesis and clip looping
The Bitwig PC also has a zita-n2j receiver with only 2 channels which the recording box sends audio to (for Ardour playback). The recording box has no soundcard and jack is started with the dummy driver. The Bitwig PC has a Scarlett 18i20 hooked to it so Bitwig can record loops on the fly without latency. The Scarlett internal routing makes it so the incoming audio goes straight to the zita-j2n jack client that forwards the audio to the recording box.
Without jack, I wouldn’t know how to do this. Forgot to mention: I run all this at 48kHz, 256 / 3 buffering (reasonably low latency) and have 0 xrun with the liquorix kernel (no fancy boot parameters, no irq tuning - I used to drown myself in these tech things many years ago but I am glad I don’t have to waste time on this any longer!)
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I have grown to really love the midi workflow in Ardour and agree that inline editing is awesome. The Z and shift-Z commands on selected midi regions work great as an editor without the need for another window. I understand the desire for extra windows and in some cases might be necessary, but definitely encourage people to try and embrace the inline workflow!
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Member of the ‘separate piano roll camp’ here. 
I’ve always wondered how you ‘inline guys’ deal with the following case:
- I have a track with some custom height.
- Now I want to edit, so I hit Z to extend the track height.
- But for some precision tweaks I also do a lot of zooming in/out using the mouse wheel.
- I’m done and want to return to 1.
How do you do that? I could hit Shift-Z to go back through the zoom history, but that’s tedious. You can also use Z, but that restores some predefined track height – not the one from step 1. Having a separate window solves this, because the original track height is not altered at all…
Technically, you could save the layout before pressing Z and then recall that saved layout.
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