How to transpose a loop in Reason

I receive a lot of questions and requests for transposing my loops so I thought I might as well give a tutorial on how it’s done. It’s really quite simple to do in Reason, so let’s get started. This tutorial assumes you have Reason and have opened some project.

1. Select pitched midi notes

You want to select all the pitched midi notes, you do not need or want to select non-pitched midi notes like drum kits or percussion instruments. For those changing the midi note actually changes the instrument. So usually what I’ll do is organize my project so that non-pitched instruments are all at the bottom or top to make selecting all the others quite easy.

After drawing a box around all your midi notes it should look something like this:

2. Set the semi-tones in Tool Window

In the Tool Window click the “Tools” menu item. Then set the semi-tone adjustment you want to make. A semi-tone is a half step. So if you want to raise the key a full step you’d set the semi-tones to 2, if you want to lower the key 2 full steps you’d set the semi-tones to -4. A semi-tone level of 0 would be no adjustment, it’s where you are currently.

3. Click apply

Now all that’s left is clicking Apply and you’re all set.

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2 Responses to “How to transpose a loop in Reason”

  1. AUDIO MATRIX November 9, 2009 at 12:08 pm #

    thank you!!!!! I needed that for real!!!!!!

  2. Samster February 11, 2010 at 5:40 pm #

    fewww… That saved me like, three hours, this is just great! thanks.. But why do they always have to hide the functions when you need them, right? =P

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