. Tempo issues

How do I reclock the tempo to match a piece of audio?
ReClock tips and alternatives (tip)
How do I use Tap Tempo?
Using different tempi in one song, for e.g. live use with multiple songs merged into one song-file
Are there any alternate Tempo Lists?
How do I 'lock' a tempo change to a particular point in time?
How do I append tempo maps for two or more files into a single file?

.1 How do I reclock the tempo to match a piece of audio?

The Reclock function isn't described too well in the manual, so I'll try to explain:

If you have more than one audio track (especially with different start positions), set them to SMPTE lock (Arrange window, Functions menu > Objects > Lock SMPTE Position).
Record a 1/8, 1/4 or 1/1 note MIDI click following your source material (obviously some cowbell or whatever sound would do the best job).
Correct some of those clicks in Matrix or wherever to better match the audio if necessary.
Select the recorded track, and from the main menu, pick Options > Tempo > Reclock Song.
Choose "Use Guide Sequence" and optionally "reclock only within left and right source" (setup a cycle for that) which is what I recommend (you might want to setup a rough tempo before starting all those operations anyway).
Select the appropriate value in the "step increment" field (corresponding to the note values you recorded).
Press "Reclock".

That should be it. Depending on the tightness of both your source material and the notes you tapped in this works amazingly fast and well.

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.2 ReClock tips and alternatives (tip)

Tip 1: It temporarily time-locks the sequence then inserts tempo changes to line up Logic's bars & beats with the notes in your sequence. But you have to use it carefully or things will get messed up. Here are the steps:

Decide what note division you want to reclock to - you will need a "guide" note at each of these divisions and you will have to insert any that are missing. I.e. if the section to be reclocked has a note on every downbeat but not at every quarter note then reclocking to the downbeats will be easiest.
Cut the Sequence so that both the first and last notes in the Sequence are guide notes. Failing to do this will result in notes before or after the Sequence being messed up.
With the guide notes selected, return to the Arrange window, select the Sequence and choose "Reclock Song" from the Functions menu. Check all four of the check boxes and set the "Step increment" to match the guide note spacing (i.e. "/1" for downbeats, "/4" for quarter notes, etc.).
Reclock the song. The Sequence will sound exactly the same (it's been temporarily time-locked during the reclock process) but the guide notes will all be at the correct note divisions. The notes between the guide notes probably will not line up exactly.

After you've done this, the Sequences that follow the reclocked Sequence will probably be at the wrong tempo. Add a new tempo event at the position of the last guide note (if there's one already there, just change it) matching the tempo before the reclocked section.

Tip 2: A quick alternative which is often satisfactory is to "Adjust Tempo using Object Length & Locators" (Options > Tempo menu). First cut out the rubato section so that it is a separate sequence of which you know the intended length. Then SMPTE-lock this sequence (Arrange window's Functions > Object menu), set the locators to the intended length and select "Adjust Tempo using Object Length & Locators". Then SMPTE-unlock the sequence. You could cut the rubato section into smaller pieces and in fact if you cut it into one measure bits, the effect would be the same as reclocking with guide notes on the downbeats.

Tip 3: Reclock works best it you set up the task with a steady click - save - then reclock once - if you don't like the result - revert to saved - and try another reclock. Multiple reclocks seem to get very weird indeed. Also: if you are just adding MIDI to the live tracks - why not ignore logic’s click - set the song to an arbitrary tempo and play along with the live tracks - like a series of session overdubs.

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.3 How do I use Tap Tempo?

It is in the manual (look for Tempo Interpreter) but not very clear, I agree. It will work after doing this:

Open your Key Commands and locate the Tap Tempo command (do a Search)
Press Learn Key and give it (any unused) key command
Press Learn MIDI and assign a MIDI channel + key
Press Learn Key and Learn MIDI again to stop learning
Close your Key Commands
Next, start Logic (play or record) and press the Tap Tempo key command (or click-hold the Sync button in the Transport window and select Manual Sync from the menu). Now the floating window about human sync comes up.
Start pressing the MIDI key you assigned above, and you will see that something works: the squares in the bottom of the floating window will light up, meaning that incoming MIDI events are being recognized.

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.4 Using different tempi in one song, for e.g. live use with multiple songs merged into one song-file

Suppose you have multiple songs merged into one Logic-song -- you put e.g. each song in its own folder, so that you can quickly mute/unmute entire songs during live shows. Now every song needs its own tempo. Using a tempo fader, this is quite easy to achieve.

In the Environment window, pick New > Faders > Specials > Tempo Control. Ignore the dialog that pops up.
With the fader selected, change (in the parameter pane) its In definition to some unused controller, like CC100 ("In = Control, -1- = 100").
Check the Icon checkbox so the fader will appear in the Instrument list.
Now in each 'song' folder, insert a new track and assign the tempo fader to it as instrument.
Create a new sequence on that track, and insert a new controller-100 event with the proper value. Value = 0 is tempo=50, value=127 is tempo = 177.

This way you don't have to line your folder's up linearly. They can be "stacked" vertically in your track list. You can even have multiple tempo changes inside each folder/song. This concept appears to be brilliant. So you finally create a tempo track which is visible and editable in the arrangement.

Even though in the Tempo List you can choose between 9 tempo tracks (Tempo Alternatives, from the Tempo List's Options menu), this method is great to arrange the tempo changes and stuff from within the arrangement, with muting, dragging and alt-dragging and all that.

Note: a drawback of the tempo fader is that it allows only tempi in the 50-177 range in increments of 1. So 60.8 or 234 bpm are not possible.

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.5 Are there any alternate Tempo Lists?

There are 9 different choices. Open the Tempo List Editor (from the Options > Tempo menu). In the Editor's Options menu, you find an entry Tempo Alternatives where you can choose from 9 alternative tempo lists.

Defining a secondary slower tempo for Alt Tempo list #2, and toggling between this list and the "real" Tempo list is much easier than constantly typing in a new tempo (slow, real, slow, real, slow , real etc.......). This can be great for sequencing at a slower tempo and then bringing up to the correct tempo. It's a pity there aren't any key commands to choose from the alternatives though.

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.6 How do I 'lock' a tempo change to a particular point in time?

Question: I want to 'lock' a tempo change to SMPTE so that when I alter tempo before or after certain section, that 'section' stays where it is in real/SMPTE time.

Answer:

In the Environment window, create a Tempo Fader (menu: New > Fader > Specials > Tempo Control). Ignore the dialog that pops up.
Check the Icon checkbox in the fader's parameter pane (left side of the window), so that it'll appear in the Instrument list.
Set the In definition of the fader to "Control" and the In -1- value to 7 (i.e. the fader will respond to CC7 (volume) messages).
In the Arrange window create a new track, and assign the tempo fader to it.
Create a new sequence on that track.
Open the Event List for this sequence.
Create a controller-7 message by Command-clicking [rightclicking] the green controller button (right below the '88' button). Set the value of the CC7 event towards the top or bottom end of the 0-127 scale so that you'll notice the change
In the Event List choose View > Position and Length in SMPTE Units (there's a key command as well).
Position the event at any SMPTE time you want.
Close the Event List and now lock the SMPTE position of the object (Arrange window: Functions > Object > Lock SMPTE Position) Default keycommand: page down for SMPTE lock, and page up for SMPTE unlock.
Done! You can now alter the tempo before the tempo change, and the point at which the tempo changes will stay at the same SMPTE point

Note: using the tempo fader, you can only set integer tempi between 50 and 177.

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.7 How do I append tempo maps for two or more files into a single file?

Open the first file. This one creates a correct tempo list. Save that file to a new file name.
Import the second file into a new project (don't close the first file). Make sure the SPL is placed where you want the track info to appear.
Open the tempo list for the second file. (Click the Sync button in the transport window and click Open tempo list).
Select all (Command-A [Ctrl-A])
Copy the tempo list (Command-C [Ctrl-C]) and then close the second file.
Go to the saved master file. Open the tempo list (as described above).
From the options menu select Tempo alternatives and select one that has no data in it yet.
Paste to that tempo list (Command-V [Ctrl-V]).
Click on the first beat of the first measure and enter the measure number that you want to start this portion of the song. This changes all the tempo data for this section by that offset amount.
Select all from this tempo alternative. Copy it.
Select the main tempo alternative. Paste the tempo data there.
Save the file.

Repeat steps 2-12 for any other files you want to append.

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