How do you use pitch shifting and time stretching to manipulate the pitch and tempo of your audio samples?

In manipulating pitch and tempo of audio samples, I recommend using tools like the free Audacity, particularly the Paul-stretch feature. It's excellent for stretching music with minimal impact on sound quality. Experiment with different settings to find the right fit for your specific sound. For rhythmic time stretching, your DAW's built-in function might be more suitable. It allows for precise adjustments aligned with the track's tempo. Remember, the key is to experiment and find what works best for the sound you're aiming to achieve. Each tool has its strengths, and understanding when and how to use them is crucial in audio manipulation

When you use a sample in any DAW, most of the times a window will appear where you can easily pitch shift your sample, most of the DAW's don't need a plug-in, they have this function built within the sampler. You can change it by semitones (st) or smaller increments called cents(ct).

-In my experience, I’ve done this using Flex Time in Logic with samples from Splice or vocals I’ve recorded. If I’m stretching a vocal take or instrument melodies “polyphonic” is typically the best algorithm to use. When stretching drum loops, I find that “rhythmic” and “slicing” maintains the quality of the audio best, and when those don’t work, then polyphonic is good to fallback on.

In Ableton, every time you open a sample by default it will be warped, that means it's already stretched to the BPM of your project, if you want to stretch it more you can double click it and use the view from the bottom with double click to mark in the waveform of your sample how much you want to stretch it.

Pitch shifting is extremely common in modern audio production, and you don't have to be an audio engineer to know of this pitch shifting method: Autotuning Tuning a vocal, whether it be through AutoTune or Melodyne, is a form of pitch shifting that is extremely common in modern pop productions. Although vocal tuning doesn't usually go to the extremes of pitching a vocal multiple semitones, vocal tuning is a form of pitch shifting.

I always use pitch shifting and time stretching when I work with samples (almost every time), I use it to make my music production more creative or to make a different sound with a sample (like making a snare from a hat) or sometimes I use it to be everything in the key that I'm working in (E minor, F major) by pitching samples to the correct semitone (st).

El cambio de tono y el estiramiento del tiempo ofrecen la capacidad de adaptar una composición a diferentes contextos y géneros musicales, brindando versatilidad a las producciones. Permiten ajustar la duración de los eventos sonoros, sincronizar pistas con diferentes tempos y adecuar la música a cambios narrativos en producciones audiovisuales. Facilitan la adaptación de una pieza musical a distintos estilos y preferencias. Asimismo, son herramientas valiosas para la corrección de sincronización en grabaciones, permitiendo alineaciones precisas en postproducción.

Divide las muestras de audio en segmentos más cortos antes de aplicar estos efectos. Esto permite un procesamiento más preciso y minimiza posibles artefactos. La utilización de herramientas avanzadas de edición que ofrecen opciones específicas para el cambio de tono y estiramiento del tiempo también puede mejorar la calidad, ya que algunos algoritmos especializados están dise?ados para reducir distorsiones. Explora la opción de utilizar la automatización para ajustar gradualmente los parámetros, evitando cambios abruptos que puedan generar artefactos. Experimenta con técnicas de micrófono y grabación óptimas para obtener muestras iniciales de alta calidad, reduciendo la necesidad de correcciones excesivas durante el procesamiento posterior.

Depending on your DAW, there may be different warping/time stretching modes available to you that are worth exploring. For example, in Ableton Live, choosing Complex or Complex Pro instead of Beats for non-percussive content can make a huge difference in the quality, especially when stretching to extreme BPMs.

I use Variaudio in Cubase Pro for pitch-shifting and time-stretching, all the time, creatively, for making new melodies from sample loops, rather than using them "out of the box".