Main Tool

Modifying the pitch and timing of notes

Select the Main Tool (denoted by an arrow) from either the toolbox or the context menu of the Note Editor or by pressing the [F1] key of your computer keyboard. (If you wish to assign a different shortcut to this tool, you may do so after choosing Melodyne > Preferences > Shortcuts > Editing Tools from the main menu.)

With the Main Tool, move the arrow to a point near the center of a blob and press and hold the mouse button as you drag it upwards or downwards (to alter its pitch) or left or right (to move it forwards or backwards in time). It is the initial movement (whether vertical or horizontal) that decides whether the pitch or timing of the note is altered. Before changing axis, you must first release the note. If you hold down the [Alt] key as you drag the note, the Pitch Grid or Time Grid, even if active, will temporarily be ignored, allowing you to position the note exactly where you want it.

While you are dragging a note up or down, you will hear the frozen sound of the note at the point where you clicked. If, whilst dragging, you move the mouse to the right or left, you can put other parts of the note under the acoustic microscope. If you do not wish to monitor pitch changes in this way, uncheck the option Monitor When Editing Blobs in the Options > Note Editor sub-menu, which can also be accessed via the cog icon in the top right-hand corner of the Note Editor.

If you double-click with the Main Tool on the middle part of a note (or one of a selection of notes), you quantize the note(s) in question to the nearest pitch allowed by the current Pitch Grid.

The blob not only jumps to a different note altogether (e.g. from E to F, if E is not allowed by the active Pitch Grid), but also loses any fine offset it may have had from its previous pitch. In other words, it snaps precisely to the target pitch, the offset being then 0 cents.
This gives you a quick and easy way of correcting the intonation.

However, if correcting the intonation is not what interest you here and your aim is simply to make the notes fit new chords, hold down the [Alt] key as you double-click. Then the note will jump, as you intend, to the nearest note in the chord, but retain its previous offset, creating interference effects that are sometimes desirable.

Modifying note lengths

Open the Note Editor Options menu and check Show Blob Info. Zoom in on a few individual blobs, so that you can study them more closely. Now, as you move the mouse pointer over a blob, thin lines appear indicating the zones in which the Main Tool performs particular functions. For illustrative purposes, the lines here have been drawn more boldly than in the program itself. The central area you already know about. This has to be distinguished from the front, back and upper regions of the blob. As you move the mouse pointer from one of these regions to another, it changes its appearance to emulate whichever of the more specialized tools is most appropriate to that zone – adopting its functions at the same time.

Drag the front part of a note to the right or left. Hold down the [Alt] key as you do so if you wish to override an active time grid. Now only the beginning of the note moves; the end remains anchored, so the note is either being stretched or compressed.

In the same way, you can move only the rightmost part of the blob (corresponding to the end of the note).

Notice that as you move the beginning or end of a note in this way, the preceding or following note, if adjacent, is also either stretched or compressed by the same amount to avoid either the two notes overlapping or white space (silence) appearing between them. This type of relationship exists whenever a pitch transition between consecutive notes has been detected. By moving the adjacent note as well, Melodyne ensures that discontinuities are avoided and the musicality of the phrasing is preserved.

If this behavior is not what you want, you can change the ‘soft’ separation between the notes into a ‘hard’ one using the Separation Type Tool. Instead of the separation line, a bracket will then appear between the two notes to indicate that no further connection exists between them. You will find the Separation Type Tool beneath the Note Separation Tool in the toolbar.

Editing note separations

If you move the mouse pointer to the upper part of a note (above the horizontal line), the Main Tool adopts the appearance, and emulates the functions, of the Note Separation Tool. If you double-click now, you can create a note separation – i.e. slice the note in two.

Don’t be surprised if the two notes that result move apart in pitch: this is because a new tonal center is calculated for each of the newly created notes, and that may differ from the tonal center they shared when they were one note. In such cases, each therefore moves to a new vertical position based on its newly calculated pitch center.

You can move an existing note separation horizontally with the Note Separation Tool. Before you begin, choose Options > Note Editor Options and check Show Note Separations.

You can double-click a note separation to remove it.

If you select several notes and move a note separation, the note separations of the other selected notes will also be moved. If you double-click one of the note separations to remove it, those of the other selected notes will also be removed.

If you have selected several notes that overlap, you can simultaneously insert a note separation at the same point in all of them, as well as move or remove one.