Audacity Forum

Rather than reversing a song, for example, which would reverse the entire waveform, what if we reversed this waveform head on? What I mean by that is if we were to zoom in and select the first two dots in the waveform and reverse them, then select the next two dots (dots 2 and 3) and reverse them--and continue this entire process through the entire waveform. Would this result in a song that plays forward in a reverse way?

Edit: So how would you reverse something in a forward way? A small example would be that if I were to have a spoken word recorded such as the word "Audacity," I could select the portion of audio that has the letter 'a' pronounced and reverse that letter (actually, it would be the letters 'au' since the 'u' is silent), then go to the next letter (letter 'd') and reverse that letter, and so on. Now as for a full example, it would be something like what I said before (which would be zooming in and reversing everything that makes up those individual letters, in this case, the individual dots in the waveform). But since the result of that would be a buzzing sound, what possible way would there be to successfully reverse audio in a forward way?

It doesn't seem like it, but the spacing and direction of the dots in the waveform isn't random. That's what carries the quality and richness of a voice or musical instrument. Reverse them and the sound will get very harsh and buzzy -- like a bad USB data error.

It won't go backwards.

Koz

So how would you reverse something in a forward way? A small example would be that if I were to have a spoken word recorded such as the word "Audacity," I could select the portion of audio that has the letter 'a' pronounced and reverse that letter (actually, it would be the letters 'au' since the 'u' is silent), then go to the next letter (letter 'd') and reverse that letter, and so on. Now as for a full example, it would be something like what I said before (which would be zooming in and reversing everything that makes up those individual letters, in this case, the individual dots in the waveform). But since the result of that would be a buzzing sound, what possible way would there be to successfully reverse audio in a forward way?

Split the words up into pieces (Ctrl+i)
Select one piece at a time and use "Reverse" from the Effects menu.

It will sound bad - there will be a click between each piece.

To avoid the clicks, make two duplicate copies of the track (Ctrl+D) and split the first track up at every third syllable.
Do the same with each of the other tracks, but off-setting the splits by one syllable.
Apply a fade-in to the first syllable and last syllable of each segment.
Select one segment at a time and apply "Reverse" (use Ctrl+R to repeat last effect).

There's no automatic way to do this as audio editing programs (including Audacity) can not identify syllables.