Steinberg Sequel 3 Manual

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The Multi Zone
Chain Play
In Chain Play mode, you can create a preset order for the 
arrangement parts to play in.
Just select each pad in the order that you want it played. 
You can also press the corresponding key on your com-
puter keyboard to add the pad to “The Current Chain”. As 
you select them “The Current Chain” will begin filling up. 
“The Current Chain” resides along the top of the Arranger 
page and is only active in “Chain Play” mode.
Scroll left/right
You can scroll left and right through the current chain using 
the buttons on the left hand side.
Insert Cursor
The insert cursor allows you to decide where to insert an 
arrangement part into the “Current Chain”. Click and drag 
to move the cursor left or right to the desired position and 
then click on a pad to enter it into the current chain at the 
cursor location.
History menu
The History menu will save various chain configurations 
you have made for future use. Click to reveal a pop-up 
menu. You can then select a number, enter a chain. Then 
select another number. The previous chain will be saved.
Reset
Select “Reset” to clear the current chain.
See the chapter “Tutorial 4: Live Pads and Chain Play 
mode” on page 34 for more details on the Arranger page 
and arrangement parts.
The Program Settings page
The Program Settings page is where you define all of the 
main settings in Sequel.
Scroll left and right
History menuReset 
						

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The Multi Zone
Sequel Projects
Project Location
Click in this field to select the directory to store projects in 
on the hard drive. A dialog pops up allowing you to browse 
the hard drives and find a suitable location or select create 
to make a new folder.
User Content Location
Click in this field to set where you would like user created 
content to be stored. A dialog pops up allowing you to 
browse the hard drives and find a suitable location or se-
lect create to make a new folder.
Once set, this is where any content that you create will be 
stored. If you own media files that you wish to use in Se-
quel, copy the files to this location, and it will be displayed 
on the Media Bay page.
Start-up Action
This pop-up menu allows you to decide whether Sequel 
will create a new project when you load up or load the last 
project you were working on.
Audio Settings
Audio Connection
Clicking here brings up a pop-up menu where you can se-
lect which ASIO driver you would like to use for audio 
playback. 
Click the “Setup…” button to bring up the control panel 
for you audio interface. 
Click “Reset” to reset the ASIO driver settings.
Output Selector
Clicking here brings up a pop-up menu where you can se-
lect the output on the interface that you would like to use 
as the output for the project.
Record Format
Here you can select the bit rate you would like to use for 
recording. There are two options:
16 Bit is the format used for CDs.
24 Bit provides noticeably better quality than 16 Bit, 
however, it also requires more storage space on your hard 
disk.
User Interface
Panel Color
Use the slider to apply different colors to the main Sequel 
program window.
Show Tips
Show tips, when activated, will display tips when you 
hover over a button or object.
Options
Auto Quantize
If this option is activated, anything recorded to a track will 
automatically be quantized.
Metronome Settings
You can activate or deactivate the Metronome buttons so 
that the click will only play back during Record, Play, or 
Play and Record. 
						

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Advanced features 
						

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Advanced features
Introduction
In this chapter, we are going to go over some of the ad-
vanced features found in Sequel. Make sure you have gone 
through all of the previous chapters before proceeding.
ÖThe following sections make references to tutorial 
projects, located in the default Sequel project folder.
Adding silence
Adding silence allows you to strip out or mute sections of 
an audio event to erase unwanted clicks or glitches. This is 
great for removing headphone bleed from vocal tracks or 
any other extraneous noise when there should be silence. 
ÖThe process is non-destructive. It only mutes the se-
lected section of audio.
Here we have a simple project with drums, bass, guitar 
and an organ track.
The guitar track was recorded in by placing a mic in front 
of the amp. Therefore, there is a lot of noise present when 
the guitarist wasn’t playing anything. Let’s clean it up.
1.Select the “Guitar” event.
2.In the Multi Zone, select the Editor page.
3.Notice that when you hover the cursor over the audio 
editor it changes to a selection tool.4.Find an area where the guitarist wasn’t playing. There 
is an area right at the beginning and in between the first 
and second bar. Click and drag to highlight a section of 
the event. You may want to zoom in.
Notice that the selection area becomes gray. 
Let’s make sure that the selection doesn’t contain any au-
dio that we want to keep.
5.Place your cursor at the left and right edge of the se-
lection. The cursor changes allowing us to adjust the size 
of the selection by clicking and dragging.
Adjust the selection so that it is as tight as possible to the audio that you 
want to keep.
6.When you are done, press [Delete] or [Backspace] on 
your computer keyboard to remove the selection and cre-
ate silence.
!Load the project “Adding Silence 1” found in the 
“Sequel Tutorial 5” folder. 
						

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Advanced features
Add silence to any other areas in the Guitar event that you 
think might need it.
Audio quantization and warp
Audio quantization and warp allow you to lock events to 
the project tempo. This is great for correcting audio that 
has bad timing.
The quantize function in Sequel is automatic and is great 
for quickly locking drum tracks to tempo.
Here we have a “Drums” event that has a few timing issues.
1.Start playback using the space bar to hear how the 
drum beat strays off time.
2.Turn on the metronome to hear the mistakes more 
clearly.
3.Double-click on the “Drums” event to view it in the 
Audio Editor.4.Change the Stretch Mode to “Tempo Sync” and 
change the optimization to “Mix”.
First of all, make sure that the right number of bars is set 
and that the grid lines are positioned at the visible beats.
In our example, these settings should be OK, so leave everything as it is.
5.Make sure that the Quantize value is set to “1/4”.
You can see the audio file locking to the nearest quarter note.
6.Click on the “Warp Beats” button.
This will automatically snap the audio to the selected Quantize value.
7.Play back the project and you will find that it is now in 
perfect time.
!Load the project “Adding Silence 2” found in the 
“Sequel Tutorial 5” folder to hear the project now 
that silence has been added.
!Load the project “Audio Quantize” found in the “Se-
quel Tutorial 5” folder.
Turn the Metronome on to hear the poor timing.!Load the project “Audio Quantize 2” found in the 
“Sequel Tutorial 5” folder to hear our changes.
Quantize set to 1/4 
						

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Advanced features
Manual Adjust Beats
Sometimes, an event might need a bit of manual adjust-
ment as well. That’s where “Manual Adjust Beats” comes 
in handy. “Manual Adjust Beats” allows you to effortlessly 
stretch and warp audio as you please.
ÖNote that this function is only applicable to your own 
loop files. The factory content files cannot be adjusted 
manually this way.
ÖMake sure to read the entire section “Audio quantiza-
tion and warp” above before moving on.
1.Double-click on the “Drums” event to view it in the 
Audio Editor.
2.Activate the “Manual Adjust Beats” button.
3.If necessary, click on “Reset Beats” to remove the re-
sults of a previous auto-quantization that might be there.4.If you want to perform a new auto-quantization with a 
new quantize value, change the quantize value, deactivate 
the Warp Beats button and then activate it again.
An auto quantization will not be performed, if the grid lines were changed 
before (manually or automatically). This is indicated by the red color.
In this mode, we can adjust the timing of the audio file by 
actually dragging grid points to match up properly with the 
audio file.
5.The amount of adjustable grid points is determined by 
the “Quantize” value. Make sure that it is set to 1/4.
Grid lines are showen in different colors. Selected grid lines are shown in 
blue, while grid lines that can be edited are shown in yellow (or orange if 
they are located at quarter note positions). Edited grid lines are red.
!Load the project “Manual Adjust Beats 1” found in 
the “Sequel Tutorial 5”.
!Before editing, make sure that the Multi Zone is 
zoomed in so that all grid lines are shown. Depend-
ing on the zoom factor, grid lines can be shown in a 
different (lighter) color, or you may find additional 
help lines that cannot be edited. If you change one 
beat, the nearest grid lines will be marked edited (i. e. 
appear in red).
Quantize 
						

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Advanced features
6.Our goal now is to drag the grid to line up with the 
drum beats. Click on a grid point and drag it to the nearest 
drum beat.
 
7.Repeat this procedure for any beats that appear off 
time. Keep listening back to make sure that you are getting 
the desired result.
Congratulations! You have just successfully warped an au-
dio file to fit the bars and beats of your project. It doesn’t 
matter how off your audio is, because you can always warp 
it on time.
Smart Transpose
When you set the Project Root Key in the Pilot Zone, it 
becomes the reference that any audio file or MIDI loop will 
follow when it is added to a project. What this means is 
that when you add a file to your project that has a defined 
key, it will be changed to match the root key of the project.
What Smart Transpose does is make sure that the loop is 
transposed to the nearest interval or pitch. This way, no 
loop will be transposed by more than six semitones. This 
ensures that loops never sound too unnatural because the 
pitch was raised too high or too low. 
Lets see this in action.1.Go to the Media Bay page in the Multi Zone.
2.In the search field, type in “Bb guitar”. Press [Enter]/
[Return] on your computer keyboard. Sequel will filter the 
results for us.
3.Drag the “03 105 Bb Guitar” loop to bar 1.
4.Notice that the project’s “Tempo” and the “Project 
Root Key” changed to match the loop. The Project Root 
Key is now “A#” which is the same thing (enharmonic 
equivalent) as “Bb”.
5.Go back to the “Media Bay Page”. This time enter “D 
horns” in the search field.
6.Drag the “02 112 D horns” loop to bar 1 underneath 
the guitar.
!Load the project “Manual Adjust Beats 2” in the “Se-
quel Tutorial 5” folder to hear the final results.
!Load the project “Smart Transpose” found in the 
“Sequel Tutorial 5” folder.
Enter “Bb guitar” in the search field Search Results
Project Root Key 
						

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Advanced features
7.Click on the “03 105 Bb Guitar” event and go to the 
Editor page. Notice that the Root Key is “A#” and Trans-
pose is set to “0”.
8.Now click on the “02 112 D horns” event. Notice that 
the Root Key is “D” and Transpose is set to “-4”. Smart 
Transpose has automatically transposed the “02 112 D 
horns” loop to the closest interval.
9.Play what we have so far and hear that the guitar and 
horns are in the same key without any extraneous transpo-
sition.Let’s add a drum loop to the project. Drum loops aren’t 
affected by the “Project Root Key” or Smart Transpose. 
They can only be transposed using the “Transpose” fea-
ture in the Audio Editor.
1.Go back to the Media Bay page and enter “Bb drums” 
in the search field. Drag “03 105 Bb drums 03” into the 
project at bar 1 underneath the “02 112 D horns” event.
2.Select the “03 105 Bb drums 03” event and press the 
[P] key on your computer keyboard to create a cycle re-
gion that is the exact length of the event.
3.Activate the Cycle button and press “Play” to listen to 
the project. Notice that the “03 105 Bb drums 03” event 
was not transposed – that’s Smart Transpose!
ÖAnother great thing about Smart Transpose is that 
when you use the Transpose track for global transpose 
(see “Show Transpose Track” on page 43) or change the 
“Project Root Key”, the loops won’t all transpose in paral-
lel, which usually results in a more natural sounding trans-
position.
4.Keep the project looping and try changing the Project 
Root Key around to test this out.
ÖRemember, if you want to transpose a loop manually, 
you can do so using the Transpose feature in the Audio 
Editor, which is not “smart” but absolute.
Transpose = 0
Root Key = A#
Transpose = -4
Root Key = D 
						

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Advanced features
Locking transpose
You can also lock the key of the loop using the “Transpose 
Lock” feature.
Drum, percussion and FX loops are transpose locked by 
default.
One button record
Normally, when you want to record something you need to 
record enable a track and click the Record button in the 
Pilot Zone. Recording will start after a two-bar count-in, 
and will end when you deactivate the Record button or 
stop playback.
Sequel provides a second recording mode that allows you 
to record only in the area defined by the cycle markers. This 
is very handy, e. g. if you have just one little inaccuracy in an 
otherwise perfect recording: you can simply re-record that 
little section, and don’t have to record everything all over 
again.
1.Set up a track to record on, and make sure that it is 
record enabled.
2.Set up a cycle that exactly encompasses the area in 
which you wish to record.
3.Press [Ctrl]/[Command]+[R].
The project cursor jumps to a position exactly two bars before the left lo-
cator, and playback starts.
4.After the normal two bar count-in, recording will start 
automatically as soon as the project cursor reaches the 
left locator, and will stop when the cursor reaches the 
right locator.
Playback will continue until you stop it.
You have three options to start this recording mode:
 By pressing [Ctrl]/[Command]+[R]
 By pressing [Ctrl]/[Command]+[*] (“multiply” on the numeric 
keypad)
 By [Ctrl]/[Command]-clicking the Record button.
Transpose lock
Transpose 
						

							11
Setting up your system