Splicing

Audacity Help Forum Windows
1

I use 2.0.1 on Windows 7. My problem is splicing or perhaps not knowing how to properly add to a track already recorded. i.e. I recorded guitar background for a guitar/vocal recording then wanted to add a new ending. I tried to record it at the end of the first track, but Audacity automatically jumped to another track, so I copied that and pasted it at the end of the first track. That worked except that it produced a tiny dead space (stop) just before the new insertion. Can I get rid of that dead spot somehow?

BTW, on my first attempt, I recorded only the first verse of guitar and then copied it and added it to the first track. The result was the same problem. I deleted the resulting silent spaces to achieve appropriate timing, but each addition was separated from the prior verse by that dead spot. I searched the FAQs, but found nothing related. Any help with this problem will be much appreciated.

2

Use Append Record (Shift-R) to continue recording on an existing track. Koz

3

Thanks. That’s a help. The question about the dead space remains though as when I append, there will be some silent lead-in that will need to be deleted which will leave the same dead spot I’m experiencing now. Is there a way to avoid or remove that?

4

You will need to edit the recording after the recording is complete.
Select the part that you want to delete and press the Del key.
More about editing here: http://manual.audacityteam.org/o/man/tutorial_editing_an_existing_file.html

5

Sorry if I’m being a blockhead, but what you’ve said here is what I do that creates the stop I’m trying to get rid of. As it is caused by deleting, am I stuck with it or is there another step I can take that will remove it?

6

I don’t understand why you are getting these “dead spots” or I don’t understand what you mean by “dead spots”.
Please describe step by step what you are doing.

7

It’s happened in two different instances. The first was when, after recording guitar for the first verse of a four verse song, I copied that first verse and pasted it three times to the end of the preceding verse. That gave me a four verse backgroung instrumental with an intro. However, when played back there were obvious breaks in the flow of the music at the beginning of each verse which I call dead spots. There is no click or anything it’s just obvious that the music stopped and then restarted.

The second was when, having recorded another background by playing straight through all the verses, I wanted to add a new ending. What I did was record the ending on another track then copy and paste it into position. It produced the same dead spot between the last verse and the ending.

I didn’t use the append command suggested in one of the responses above. Could that be the problem?

8

It sounds like you selected a little bit too much when you made the copy.
Note that you could have use the “Repeat” effect (about 3/4 of the way down the Effect menu).
To make the “loop” seamless you need to select exactly the right duration. The easiest way to do that is to select from the exact start of of the first beat of a bar, to the the exact start of the first beat of another bar.
Zoom in so that you can make the selection precisely enough (http://manual.audacityteam.org/o/man/zooming.html)

9

OK. Thanks, Steve. I’m using the gauges at the bottom of the screen to measure my areas, but maybe I’m messing that up somehow. I’ll keep whittling and will yell again if I can’t get it worked out