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What software can change guitar backing track one-half step lower? Many guitar songs are in E and A flat key and backing tracks are in pure E and A respectively, you know. It sounds obviously differently, especially when there is a vocal on record.

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    Are you willing to have a slightly slowed-down version of the backing track, or must the lower version be the same tempo as the original? Some methods of pitch shifting change tempo.
    – Dekkadeci
    Apr 28, 2017 at 11:53
  • If you are using Cubase or Nuendo to record your guitar, there is a plugin called pitch shifter for you to do that.
    – papakias
    May 4, 2017 at 11:16

5 Answers 5

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Audacity is free, and can do this.

Import the audio file. Highlight it. click Effects > Pitch shift. Select the amount (in semitones)

Done.

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  • (Obviously a real full fledged DAW is better for detailed production work, but for a task this simple there is absolutely no reason not to just use audacity)
    – Some_Guy
    May 4, 2017 at 12:50
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There are many products out there that can do this, ranging from the really simple "slow-downer" type applications that you can get free for every platform, up to professional products such as Melodyne.

As we aren't a software recommendation site, I'll leave it at that - a google search for pitch-shift will give you an almost endless list.

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Transcribe! is such software. Works on Win/Mac/Linux. About $30 and has 1 month free trial. In addition to be able to change the pitch by half-step it can also change it by a percentage (which is useful for some old recordings that are not at A/440). From the "slow-downers" - VLC player, which is also cross-platform and free, can do that (you have to configure it to actually change the pitch when changing speed).

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Logic Studio is expensive but you can change keys on a recording EASILY. Doesnt matter if it's a guitar track, vocal track, or whatever.

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If you want go half step lower you can do it with the help of windows mixer. Firstly you need to right click the speaker icon in your task bar. Then click on 'open volume mixer'. Click on device speaker then. Go to 'Enhancements' tab, Select 'Pitch Shift' Select -1 in the setting drop down menu.

If the track has vocals, it may sound a little funny, but it does the job.

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  • Good tip, but it depends on sound card. Some computers have this and others don't. If you've got the realtek config panel open and you can't see it, it's probably because your soundcard doesn't have it.
    – Some_Guy
    May 4, 2017 at 12:53
  • Yeah right, but many computers may be having this feature nowadays. May 6, 2017 at 7:58

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