How do I make a song longer?

May 18, 2009 9:44 AM

Looping within a song for a slideshow? I am using an instrumental piece for a slideshow that is not long enough to fill the show. How do I loop the song internally to stretch it to the length I need?

I am putting together a series of slide shows in PrShow Gold for my daughter's High School Music Department. The Seniors slideshow is about 8 minutes long - the instrumental piece (suggested by tylerfulltilt in this question) I think would loop nicely if I could figure out a way to cut a portion inside the song and then paste it within the piece to make it longer.

I downloaded Audacity - is that the way to go here? If so, does anyone know of a good tutorial that would help me learn how to do this?

Alternatively, will this song be way too long at 8 minutes? The slideshow is a series of baby and then Senior photos, so there's no real breaking point within the show to change songs.

Any ideas out there? Thank you!

posted by Flakypastry to Computers & Internet (3 answers total)

Best answer: Audacity will work just fine. Choose a large section of the song that will loop correctly (like 2 minutes of it rather than 20 seconds), then copy that section.

Split the audio at the end point of your loop, move the tail end of the song down the timeline a couple of minutes, then paste your loop in at the split point. Do it again, two or three more times, until you have about 8 minutes. Now slide the tail of the song back until it touches the end of your last pasted loop.

You can put tiny crossfades on the split points to eliminate a pop.

Export the tune as an mp3 or whatever and you should be good to go.

Audacity has a good online manual if you are unclear on the exact steps you need to take. Good luck!
posted by Aquaman at 10:34 AM on May 18, 2009

Great song choice--however, when looped for 8 minutes, the repetitive nature of the slideshow and soothing melodies may cause minds to drift. By cross-fading into another song, you can recapture viewers' attention.

You might try looping the song once and then fading into a slightly more uptempo track to combat fatigue--perhaps something structured like Bill Frisell's "That Was Then", the first song that popped to mind.
posted by prinado at 12:33 PM on May 18, 2009

Response by poster: I thought of tacking a track in a similar vein to the one that was chosen, but couldn't find anything with the same vibe - any suggestions of similar music to use with it?
posted by Flakypastry at 3:23 PM on May 18, 2009