I've been using the free program Audacity (http://audacity.sourceforge.net/) to edit MP3's for a few months now. I never ventured into the "Effects" menu because I pretty much just cut and paste. Today I learned that this program can slow a song down (or speed it up) without changing the pitch. It'll sound the same - just slower! Now I can take the song I want to learn, slow it down, and be able to play along without having to buy a Tascam CD Trainer or something like that! Give it a shot!

Here's an example:

Bass Solo Normal (http://www.soundclick.com/bands/songInfo.cfm?bandID=584265&songID=4759862)

Bass Solo Slow (http://www.soundclick.com/bands/songInfo.cfm?bandID=584265&songID=4759866)

Audacity is a great program, especially considering the price! (Which is free.) It really does have a lot of awesome features.

Audacity is a great program, especially considering the price! (Which is free.) It really does have a lot of awesome features.

Check out the samples I added to my post!

Could a moderator please move this into General Instruction? I didn't know where to put it and then I saw someone in General Instruction asking about slowing songs down. Thanks!

i dowloaded it, but how do you put music on to it?

i dowloaded it, but how do you put music on to it?
You can either go File > Open, or ctrl + o and then select either an mp3 or wav file. The song will load in and you'll see the sound file. If you want to slow the song down you need to click on the panel on the left of the song that contains the "mute" and "solo" buttons. The song will be highlighted in a greyish-blue and then you can go Effect > Change Tempo. That will allow you to change the tempo by degrees. I'm slowing things down by around 15%.

that program seems pretty cool, but whats wrong with buying the tascam bass trainer? I find it has a lot of coole features, and you can take it on the road with you.

that program seems pretty cool, but whats wrong with buying the tascam bass trainer? I find it has a lot of coole features, and you can take it on the road with you.

Nothing.

But if you already own a laptop, why not download a free program and take the laptop with you?

Plus, you can do a lot of cool things with audacity if you record directly to your PC.

Transcribe! is a little easier and gives a few more options (isolating specific instruments etc) and has a free trial. I think it is worth buying though.

that program seems pretty cool, but whats wrong with buying the tascam bass trainer? I find it has a lot of coole features, and you can take it on the road with you.
Nothing! I'm sure the Tascam thingy is great, but now that I know this program will slow songs down for me I'll never neeed to buy one. I actually was using Audacity for editing and joining mp3's. It was an accident that I stumbled upon it's slowing-down abilities. I can load a song, slow it down, and then export it back as an mp3. Once the mp3 is on my Ipod I can practice with it anywhere I like.