Transpose Lyrics for One Track Only – Is It Possible?

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1

Hello!

Is there a way to transpose lyrics and chords for only one specific track in my project? Here’s my use case:

I have my guitar tuned down by one semitone (from standard EBGDAE to D#A#F#C#G#D#). I’m working with three different lyric tracks:
a) Lyrics only
b) Lyrics with chords for myself
c) Lyrics with chords for other musicians

The reason I have separate versions is that, when I see an A-major chord, I instinctively play it based on familiar finger positions—however, due to my tuning, what I’m actually playing is G#-major. So for my own reference (track b), I want to see the chords as they are in standard tuning, while other musicians (using track c) should see the actual transposed chords.

Ideally, I’d like to make edits in track b and then copy them over to track c with an automatic transposition applied. Is there a way to do this, or does it require manually rewriting all the chords for the other musicians?

Thanks in advance for any insights!

2

Assuming you’ve written this in a ChordPro format, a relatively quick way to transpose without using AbleSet is to transpose using ChordSmith.

This does rely on you having the original lyrics/chords in a text file, else you’ll have to copy the MIDI clip text one line at a time first. And of course it needs to be pasted back in after, but that’s not as bad.

3

Thank you! I just found out how to do this on per-track basis. All I have to do is to put for example [+1] in the name of track in Ableton, and suddenly all of the chords are transposed and properly showing in AbleSet :partying_face:

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