Master/Slave Track Question

I have been delighted, as I get further into automation and routing, to see the depth of Reaper's design. Really fantastic work that has obviously been the result of much thought. My question is this -- is there a way to give priority to sound files on a Master track so that this supersedes the sound files on a Slave track? In many situations, using "Pro" Tools, particularly in de-essing, I move the problem areas of a track -- in the de-essing example, this would be the "esses" -- over to a new track, thus I can control the volume of the esses with its own fader, which is fantastic. This is also occasionally useful in various situations with drum tracks as well. Since much of Reaper's design work seems to build upon the way things work in PT, I was wondering if there was some way to do this in Reaper and i simply can't find it. Thanks a lot for your help! Cheers. :)

I'm not quite sure what you mean but... You could split the section you want to treat separately (hit the S key where the play cursor is) and you can apply FX on the split clip only. Or you could move it to a new track and do it there. Hope it helps.

Thanks for the tips! Yes, my question had to do with giving one track's audio clips priority over another's, so that when a sound plays on the Master track, the Slave track is silent. This is really helpful in creating a much more natural sounding de-esser, for instance, but also when replacing hits etc., as you simply adjust the fader on the "esses" until it's perfectly right. I can see maybe the Reaper paradigm might be to cut the physical tracks and place those on a new track. Just thought since so much of Reaper's Deep Fu is similar to PT's, that it might emulate it in this fashion also. Thanks for all the help! Cheers. :)

Ahh, you know, the thing that is really bringing me over to Reaper is the routing, and one example is exactly that kind of routing you can do with gates and compressors. Fantastic stuff. Your solution is a good one, and thanks, it would do the trick, but I think it's just a bit too fussy for when I'm trying to do things quickly. The thing about the PT solution is that it's just so damn fast. No big deal that Reaper doesn't have it, just thought I'd ask. Besides, making the physical cut to the audio track accomplishes the same thing, and reasonably quickly too, so I'll probably get used to doing that. It just seems a bit more limiting. Cheers. :)

Oh sorry I didn't make it clear. You select a region, exactly as you do in Reaper - in my example it would be where a sloppy singer gave me a really sibilant SSSS - then you copy it, click on the neighboring track you've made, and paste the SSSS to it. It now exists on both tracks. Do that with all the SSSS's. Set the second track to Master and the original track to Slave and every time it plays a file, that sound supercedes whatever is playing on the Slave track. You can see how this would have uses. In my example, one would now have all the offending SSSS's on their own track (yes, it's much more laborious than a de-esser plugin, but it's also MUCH more natural-sounding, IMHO), and you can now lower the volume till they fit the track perfectly. Did I finally manage to explain it that time? :) Cheers. :)

BenK-msx has build a template for priority tracks in Reaper, seems similar to the Master-Slave concept.

So freaky! I don't understand yet, but hey! It works! Thank you to BenK!! And nofish as well of course, and thanks to everyone who contributed. Very cool. You can just drop the template onto the arrangement window and boom, it's set up! Reaper slays me. Thanks and cheers! :)

- It might just be me, but I don't see how a noise gate will accomplish anything here. If a signal from the other track comes in, the gate will OPEN, allowing both through. To mute one you'd want to set up a compressor in the same way, sidechained to the other track, with as low a threshold as you can get, highest ratio, and the fastest-possible attack and release. You'd want it to "duck" the track so hard that it just mutes it. - Why do you want to copy the esses over instead of just cutting and pasting? - If it was me, I'd just split the ess area and adjust the volume on the item itself, put FX on it if needed, or automate the track volume. Worked well enough for a random string squeal on my bass track the other day.

Hey Lokasenna, It's really just all about speed. I don't care which particulars are involved. IMHO, a well-designed app enables me to do my job with a minimum of fuss, and that takes designers who actually know the job and can imagine the most elegant -- which is to say, efficient -- way to get it done. Cutting and pasting the actual audio file will work, but it's a brute force kind of way to go about it, and less flexible -- what if I wish to drop a different sound entirely over a single hit of a repeating loop, for instance? The Master/Slave track is just a more elegant solution. Fortunately, nofish and BenK provided a great solution to my particular issue. Thanks again, guys. Cheers all. :)

@ Empty Planet Don't know if you've already read the whole thread I've linked. BenK's template raised from a feature request of mine building this function natively into Reaper. BenK's solution is way cool but I'm still missing a few things, like for example a visual indication which parts are played back (in Cubase the audible parts automatically get another color). So feel free to comment + support my FR, if you're interested.