How to duplicate a track with same settings?
Not sure about others, but when developing music (in any sequencer) I often use several tracks (with the exact same instrument and effects) to create one part. I do this mainly when I want to add counterpoint or harmony to the first track—I’ll split each voice in the harmony across multiple tracks (this makes it easier for me to edit later).
So my question is, how can I quickly clone (duplicate) a track in the sequencer view with the identical instrument and track settings?
Right now I’m having to add a new Obsidian or Slate track, then go to the new instance and choose the same patch—which is time-consuming.
Thanks!
Scott in Oregon, USA
Comments
Quick follow up: if there is no way to do this currently, it would be great to add an item to the “Add Track” menu that says “Clone selected track” or something similar.
yeah duplicating of track in todo list, i was already requested by more users
but probably not soon - this will be pretty complex task, because of how complex can be track structure in NS (track can contain while tree of child tracks with own fx chains, sends, etc etc..)
btw may i ask for what exactly you need this feature ? Any chance it is layering ? Because there are more effective ways how to do sound layering instead of plain track duplicating
I would be happy to give you some advices (i like this topic becuase i'm using layering a lot in my music 
Hi dendy—sure, I understand it might take time to add a feature like this (or just not be worth the time).
Can you describe in a bit more detail what you mean by layering? (I’m definitely interested!)
The reason I like to do this is because...
Let’s say I’m writing a complex part for piano. I will often record one part for the piano. But then, I’d like to add more notes to that part (still the piano), because I like very dense and complex harmonies. :-)
I’m aware that I could simply record over the original part (on the same track) and have the newly-recorded part merged with the original part. But then all the notes end up in one track...which makes it much more difficult to edit if I want to change (or remove) the harmonies later.
So having each “voice” of the harmony on its own, separate track makes it easier to edit later.
But if you can suggest another way to accomplish this (without merging multiple recordings into a single track) I’d love to learn it! :-)
Scott
layering - multiple various synths playing same melody.. Like on this screenshot, notes are just on track "Main track". Synth tracks 1,2,3,4 are folded as "child tracks", then in "Main track" mixer settings page is set MIDI send to all those 4 child tracks - which means notes from "Main track" are send to all those 4 tracks.
But what you want to achieve is lot easier, and you don't need suplicate track for this at all :-). If it's just all about recording more melodies and then work with them independently - "track lanes" are your friend
You can add multiple "lanes" to same track - lane are like "copies" of track in sequencer, they just do not have own synths - they send all midi data to same synth. Their purpose is exactly what you want achieve - to have different parts of melodies in sequencer timelime independently, to be able edit or move them on timeline.
1/ press and hold bottom left "+" button until menu appears, then tap "Add track lane". You can add as much track lanes as you want, in second screenshot i added 3 of them
As you can see, each lane do have own "record" button - by selecting this button, you set which lame will record notes when you hit record. All notes on all track lanes are still played by main instrument on this track - as i said, those lanes are not really another tracks with instrumens, they are just "ghost copies" of your track in sequemcer. They are just placeholders for notes (and automations)
Additionaly, you can move recorded clip back to main track - in NS2 single track can actually contain multiple clips and you can move/edit them independently - like on last screenshot where i moved recorded clip from track lane back to main track.
**AWESOME dendy—thank you!!! **I was totally unaware of track lanes and how they work—and you're right, this does exactly what I want!
I'm really excited to start using this feature!!! :-D
Scott
@SWriverstone Just curious if you looked for how to copy tracks in the manual? Did you not think about Add Track Lane because you didn't know that feature existed? I'm asking to try to get some idea of how to improve the manual. I looked and did not find any info on adding Track Lanes and how they can be used. So, unless it is in a section that I missed, I think we need to add that info to the manual. dendy's awesome instruction is great, but I think most people will look for this info in the manual before they would search old threads looking for some feature they might not anticipate are even in the app. Just curious what your thoughts were. Thanks!
Just took a look. Lanes are decribed in the Song Editor section of the manual.
Yes, but it is brief:
“If you wish, you can add extra lanes to a track. These are really just extra list rows on the track to help you stay organized. A good use for extra track lanes is to dedicate one to parts containing notes and others to parts which contain automation. It's then much easier to see what's going on and apply edits without unwanted side effects.”
If someone was specifically looking for that, it could suffice. Someone looking to copy entire tracks, based on workflow experience with other apps, might not see this. On a quick glance this description looks like a feature for automation. There could be some helpful things added like making “Track Lanes” a bold header so someone looking for that function’s description could find it easier. Also I think that adding a sentence about how one can have multiple parts on the same track would have been helpful to @SWriverstone. Of course that would spoil the fun of discovering these features on your own through shear happenstance, but I think that a manual is supposed to be full of theses sorts of spoilers. 😊