Playing synths with your sounds

Yo, do any of you like to play with a synth in your beat?
I do, but rarely come up with something that fits the song.
How do you like find the notes that fit with the sample? This is a pain in the ass to me!

thanks

How do you like find the notes that fit with the sample? This is a pain in the ass to me!

use a tuner to make sure your sample is tuned correctly! i've got thousands of samples that are twenty plus cents off that i had tried to compose over with no success. tune your sample correctly and you'll have a much easier time.

How can I do that? I'm sorry I don't know anything about any music theory at all..

NightReveller wrote:How can I do that? I'm sorry I don't know anything about any music theory at all..

If you take effort to reply at least let it be useful..

NightReveller wrote:If you take effort to reply at least let it be useful..

it wasn't exactly a very useful question (no need to assume you need theory to play in tune)

play your synth along with your sample, see what notes work where (this can be hard if youve never done it)

if no notes work anywhere, try tuning your synth or your sample to a different pitch, repeat if necessary

Nym wrote:

How do you like find the notes that fit with the sample? This is a pain in the ass to me!

use a tuner to make sure your sample is tuned correctly! i've got thousands of samples that are twenty plus cents off that i had tried to compose over with no success. tune your sample correctly and you'll have a much easier time.

tuner fTW.

either that or just have it looped and keep playing until you find the keys. i got told by a smart guy once to move things in semitones, ie pitch up a whole 1 not partial pitches then tuning your synth will be easier or you get what happens in Nyms case and shit be 20 cents out and you dont know whats wrong.

i have a tuner sitting next to me bascially all the time, headphone out is ideal

Thanks, but how do I tune my samples with a tuner?

Often having a good musical-ear helps, but I guess that if you had absolute pitch you probably would have worked this shit out all by yourself.

Short of telling you to google "pitch" to understand the basics, follow me.

1. Play the sample at natural pitch. Possibly let it loop and strike one synth key all along, all of them one-by-one.

There is surely at least one or two keys which sound better than the rest. They will probably be first and fifth degree of your sample tune. From there you can work out tonality and scales/chords/arpeggios which would work.

WHAT IF YOUR SAMPLE IS OUT OF TUNE?!?

As Nym said, your samples could be "not in tune" so that no key would really match.

IT'S EASY: your sample will be between two adjacent keys. choose to edit either the synth, either the sample pitch to match(knowing that all your sample material/instrumental parts should be in tune at the end...)

How to know when it's ok? Well, doing that listening thing with your ears.

When tuning a string instrument one will let resonate the tuned string, and will repeatedly pluck the second one adjusting the tension until he can't no longer hear the two frequencies beating out: he will hear them resonating together.

Tip: listen to the sound of an interval of one octave... the frequencies sum up fully.
Check for that feeling, and hit some music theory.

Sorry for sounding goofy; this shit just got me really confused.
Will use advice, thanks !