Ableton Live: Things You Need to Know

Chapter 1 : Arrangement View

• 2:27

  Introduction

  This video introduces the Ableton Live course and discusses what will be covered in the following videos.

• 4:28

  Playback Modes & Key Commands

  Learn the key commands and short cuts to take control over the playback of your Ableton Live sessions. These features will not only speed up your workflow, but will allow you to quickly audition different parts of your songs.

• 3:37

  Looping Key Commands

  This video covers the different shortcuts for looping sections inside of the software.

• 5:15

  Navigation Workflow

  This video covers key commands and shortcuts that focus on navigation and track resizing. Quickly resizing different parts of your arrangement view allows for faster editing and automation when working with MIDI and audio clips in the sequencer.

• 4:04

  Quickly Editing Clips

  Ableton makes the process of quickly slicing audio and MIDI clips super easy with the help of a few shortcuts. Learn all about how to quickly edit clips from slicing to time stretching.

• 5:39

  Consolidate & Bounce in the Sequencer

  There are several ways that you can quickly consolidate audio and MIDI clips in the arrangement view. This video covers how to combine MIDI and audio clips, as well as two different ways of resampling MIDI tracks to audio for further manipulation.

• 3:34

  Insert Time In Sequencer

  Once you have the layout of a track, adding in a new breakdown or verse can be a bit cumbersome. Luckily Ableton includes a few shortcuts that make adding new sections in the middle of songs quick and easy.

• 6:45

  Quicker Automation Workflow

  Learn how to quickly automate inside of Ableton. This video shows you how to take more detailed control over your automation values and curves.

• 2:28

  Turn Off Auto Fades by Default

  By default Ableton creates short fades on the beginning and end of audio clips. This behavior can be helpful in some production situations but can be problematic for things like drum hits. This video show how to best configure this feature based upon your workflow.

• 1:44

  Assign Default Track Colors

  Learn how to quickly assign a track's given color to all of the MIDI or audio clips on that track. This lets you keep things organized in more complicated sessions.

• 3:05

  Lock Automation

  The ability to lock automation in the sequencer makes it so that automation follows its position in the sequencer, rather than being attached to a clip. This feature can be helpful when working on a full song project and you want to leave complex automation in place but want to move a MIDI clip.

Chapter 2 : MIDI Sequencer

• 5:22

  Quickly Editing MIDI Pt. 1

  Learn the shortcuts and key commands used to quickly edit MIDI sequences. This makes the composition and writing process a lot faster when working in Ableton.

• 5:29

  Quickly Editing MIDI Pt. 2

  In the second part of this video, Thomas covers multiple ways of recording MIDI sequences other than using the recording feature. Thomas also covers how to compare and edit multi MIDI clips at the same time.

• 4:30

  Changing Velocity

  Other than editing velocity directly from the MIDI clip, there are a few ways of quickly editing the velocity of a note, or a sequence of notes. This video shows these shortcuts and how to use velocity to quickly create more interesting patterns.

• 5:18

  Custom Quantize Settings

  Quantizing MIDI sequences is something that you will do all the time during the production process. While there is the main quantize mode that Ableton uses by default, there is an extremely helpful hidden menu that gives you advanced control over your quantize settings. This allows for deeper control over your musical sequences.

• 4:24

  Capture Mode

  The Capture Mode in Ableton is a real lifesaver during the writing process. It is a feature that is always recording your MIDI keyboard in the background of the software. These recording can be accessed and edited by pressing the capture button, allowing you to focus on generating ideas rather than having to remember what you are playing.

• 2:59

  Editing off the Grid

  Writing to a grid can be great for certain types of musical parts, but for others taking things off the MIDI grid and giving the part a more natural swing can bring life to your production. Learn how to quickly turn off the grid and how to move notes around to achieve different musical effect.

• 3:26

  Audio to MIDI Devices

  Learn how to quickly add audio samples or clips to sampler devices in Ableton. This video also shows how to quickly slice a drum break to a drum rack for more detailed control over your drum loops.

• 3:33

  Fold Notes

  The Fold Note feature makes it easier to work on musical sequences that you are editing. It can also be used to lock a MIDI clip to a scale.

Chapter 3 : Effects & Mixer

• 4:12

  Saving Ideas in the Browser

  This video shows how to best utilize the saving features of Ableton?s browser. Learn how to save and organize individual MIDI clips, synth patches, and whole song ideas directly in the browser so that they can be recalled at any time.

• 4:39

  Track Defaults & Default Projects

  Learn how to setup default projects and effects in Ableton. This gives you the ability to automate your process and just focus on writing the music.

• 3:02

  Edit Info Text

  Ableton gives you the ability to add text notes to different effects or tracks in your session. This can be helpful when working on your project so that you don?t forget settings or recording ideas.

• 3:23

  Labeled Routing Configuration

  When working in larger studios with lots of audio inputs and outputs, Ableton gives you the ability to individualy label your audio channels. This can be helpful when using things like external hardware effects or synthesizers.

• 2:11

  Multi Track Solo

  This video is a real quick tip, but It shows how to easily solo multiple tracks in Ableton and how to best utilize the different ways the mixer can solo multiple tracks.

• 2:18

  Properly Route Reference Tracks

  When mastering it is common to use reference tracks to check your mixes against other released recordings. Ableton has some advanced routing features that are helpful when using reference tracks to ensure that the reference material isn?t processed by the master effects.

• 5:17

  Saving Backups

  This video covers the different ways you can backup your Ableton projects. It also shows how to quickly create multiple versions of a song and how to best organize them.

• 5:24

  Sidechain with Ghost Kick

  When sequencing drums via MIDI it is common to use a ghost kick to trigger a sign chain compressor. The downside of this method is that you have to sequence multiple lanes of MIDI for your kick drum patterns to sidechain with a ghost kick. This video shows how to set up a ghost kick so that it is automatically linked with your main kick sample in the MIDI sequencer. That way you just have to sequence a single MIDI note to trigger both the kick and the ghost kick.

• 10:31

  Plug-In Organization

  This video covers the different ways to manually sort your VST plugins. Learn how to create custom folders on your computer to better organize your plug-in library.