In order to follow along with this chapter, you will need the following:

• A computer with at least 8 GB of RAM and at least an Intel Core i5 processor
• A pair of headphones
• A copy of Live 11 Suite
• Chapter 1 Ableton Live project

Don’t own Live 11 Suite? You can download a fully functioning trial version from the Ableton website: https://www.ableton.com/en/trial/.

Live originally started out as a loop arranger (or loop sequencer) before it became a fully realized DAW, and became popular upon its release in 2001.

Its unique approach to music-making can be a little intimidating to those coming from a traditional DAW background, especially when you first open the software. Sometimes, you might need to change your thinking and approach to producing music in this kind of environment; however, the workflow that you are about to embrace will definitely benefit your creativity in the long run.

Live is widely used among producers and performers due to its previously mentioned unique workflow. But what makes Live so unique? Well, I guess you already met Session View when you first opened up the program. This view will enable you to compose and perform your music in a non-linear environment (without a timeline) so you can just focus on your ideas and playing, in contrast to a grid-based timeline’s linear approach.

The time will come when you will need to lay down your ideas in a traditional linear way to form your final arrangement, but that’s why there is the other view – Arrangement View.

Furthermore, there is now MIDI Polyphonic Expression (MPE) support in Live 11, and we will also discover the amazing world of Racks (which will enable you to create complex and layered instruments, as well as providing you with track-based parallel effect processing, macro controls, and more), which can benefit both production and performance workflows.

Live also offers a bunch of tools to humanize your music (by adding further movement to sequences and fluctuation to values), generate ideas quicker, and even help you out with some areas that might not be your strongest suit, such as music theory.

You can carry out the entire production process in Live, from laying down your first initial ideas to forming your arrangement and doing your final mixdown.

Of course, you will not have to stop there. Once you are finished with your tracks, you can use Live to take them to the stage or design a set specifically for a live performance.

Let’s have a look at how to set up Live’s preferences in the best possible way to suit your workflow. To follow along in this chapter, you can use the Chapter 1 Ableton Live project. You can also access the same project from within Ableton Live itself:

1. Navigate to Help | Help View
2. Click on What's New in Live 11 on the right side of the screen in the Help View.
3. Click on Live Set within the first paragraph of text in the Help View.

Live will automatically open up the demo project.

In the preferences, you can set up how Live operates on its own or with external devices that you connect to the computer.

The first thing that we will have to set up is the audio preferences:

1. Navigate to Live | Preferences... (Options | Preferences... on Windows) or use the key command, Cmd + , (Ctrl + , for Windows).
2. Click on the Audio tab.

Figure 1.1 – Audio preferences

3. For Audio Output Device, you should choose the device that you want to use to play sound through. This could be external headphones, your audio interface, or your computer’s built-in output.
4. You can define the Sample Rate that you’d like to use (generally, for music, 44.1 kHz is fine. If you are working on audio for a motion picture or other multimedia, then choose 48 kHz, but this would be in your project brief anyway). We will revisit the sample rate in Chapter 2, Recording Audio in Ableton Live 11.
5. Buffer Size is related to latency. The lower the buffer size, the more pressure you are putting on the CPU, so the sooner you will experience audio dropouts. However, the higher the buffer size, the more latency you are introducing. For now, we can set the buffer size to 256 Samples. We will come back to this again in Chapter 2, Recording Audio in Ableton Live 11.

You should now be set to hear sounds in Live.

Let’s just briefly look at what you can set in the other tabs within Preferences; however, don’t worry too much about remembering what these do as we will keep on coming back to Preferences throughout this book:

• Look Feel: You can set up different and customize functions such as playback head behavior, display zoom, track and clip color assignments, and change the theme of the software interface.
• Link Tempo MIDI: You can set up Ableton Link and Tempo Follower here. You can also find the MIDI preferences here.
• File Folder: Here, you will find file management functions related to things such as analysis files, the temporary audio recordings folder, and cache.
• Library: You can set browser behavior and library content locations here, both for Packs and User Library.

What are Packs?

Packs are curated content libraries, which can be one-shot samples, device presets, or loops. You can find many of them to purchase on the Ableton website. Alternatively, the ones that are part of Live Suite will show up in your browser to be downloaded directly from there.

• Plug-Ins: This is the place where you can manage your third-party plugins’ behavior and location.

If your third-party plugins are not showing up, you should check whether their folder is set properly here and then rescan them.

• Record Warp Launch: Under this tab, you can set up functions such as the recorded file type, the bit depth, count-in, Exclusive Arm and Solo (this function will define whether you are able to arm or solo multiple tracks at the same time. If you set them to Exclusive, you can still solo and arm multiple tracks while holding down the Cmd (Ctrl for Windows) key), how session automation is being recorded, warping behavior, fades, launch modes, and global quantize.
• Licenses Maintenance: Here, you can authorize Live, set automatic software updates, and send usage data.

Now that the preferences have been covered, we can take a look at the different elements of the interface so you will be able to navigate Live quickly.

Let’s begin to take a tour of Live!

Figure 1.2 – Session View accessible by the Tab key

We are going to go through all the crucial parts of the interface, and in the next section, we will conclude with how Session View and Arrangement View operate in this parallel workflow.

But first, let’s look at the parts of the interface that you can display regardless of whether you are working in Session View or Arrangement View.

The browser

In the browser, we can access all our samples, loops, synthesizers, samplers, audio and MIDI effects, as well as third-party plugins, grooves, Packs, templates, Max for Live devices, User Library content, project content, and custom collections of these.

Figure 1.3 – The browser

This is where you are going to start your music-making. The unfold button (triangle) shown in Figure 1.3(1) shows and hides the browser.

Categories

There are two columns in the browser: the browser sidebar on the left and the content panel. When we click on something under Categories, it will expand the content of that category and show subfolders in the content panel.

For example, if you click on the Instruments category, Live will show you all the available instrument devices you can use. Furthermore, each of these devices will have a small triangle next to them, which will further expand the instrument types and presets (Figure 1.4).

Figure 1.4 – Bass presets of the Wavetable instrument

Let’s briefly cover the different categories:

• Sounds: Instrument presets, categorized by sound type rather than instrument type
• Drums: Drum presets/drum racks
• Instruments: Instrument devices and presets, categorized by instrument type
• Audio Effects: Audio effect devices and presets
• MIDI Effects: MIDI effect devices and presets
• Max for Live: Max for Live devices and presets
• Plug-Ins: Third-party AU/VST/VST3 instruments and effects
• Clips: Clips installed in Live
• Samples: Audio files
• Grooves: Live’s grooves
• Templates: Different project templates

Places

Now that we’ve looked at the categories, let’s go through what we can find under Places:

• Packs: Library content and installed content of Live which we looked at under Preferences already.
• User Library: Your own content. Your personal, saved presets of devices and effects, for example, will be found here.
• Current Project: You can access here all the files that are part of the currently active project that you are working on and open them.
• Add Folder…: Here, you can add custom folders to Live’s browser. For example, if you have a personal samples folder on your computer, you can simply add it so that those external files will be part of your browser and you can take advantage of the Preview function (Figure 1.3(3)).

Preview will enable you to hear the selected media in the browser before loading it into your session. You can activate it with the small headphone button on the left of the waveform display (Figure 1.3(3)). You can preview the media in real time or synced with the current tempo of the project. The preview can also be routed to a separate output, so if you are looking for a sample, loop, or instrument preset in the browser when playing live, it will not interrupt the music playing through your main output.

Collections

Collections allows us to organize any media within the browser into custom-made folders, so if you are working on a project that requires you to use the same device, preset, or sample over and over again, it’s a good idea to tag those items into a collection folder.

You can simply navigate to the item, Ctrl + click (right-click for Windows), and choose the appropriate collection folder from the drop-down menu (Figure 1.5).

Figure 1.5 – Choosing a collection folder

You can also rename a collection folder by Ctrl + click (right-click for Windows) on it or selecting the folder and hitting Cmd + R/Ctrl + R (Figure 1.6):

Figure 1.6 – Renaming a collection folder

In order to speed up the browsing process, we can also use the Search field in the browser (Figure 1.3(2)).

We can type in bass, for example, and it will show us everything in the browser with this keyword within the selected category.

If we would like to browse in all the categories at the same time, then we can select All results, or press Cmd+F (Ctrl + F for Windows) (Figure 1.7).

Figure 1.7 – Searching for bass in the browser

Now that we have gone through the browser, let’s have a look at the other areas of the interface…

Figure 1.8 – The interface

Groove Pool

The Groove Pool (Figure 1.8(1)) allows you to add a more humanized feel (additional movement and fluctuation of values) to your clips by using grooves. Live comes with a rather large number of grooves, which you can either drop into the Groove Pool from the browser and then later add to your clips, or drop the Grooves straight onto a clip. They will appear in the Groove Pool, where you can adjust the parameters. More on this in Chapter 5, MIDI Editing and MIDI Effects.

Help View

Now, this is a quite crucial area if you are only beginning your journey in Live.

The Help View (Figure 1.8(2)) explains the functionality of each parameter in Live. You simply need to hover your mouse over the parameter and the Help View will display the appropriate information regarding the chosen parameter.

I strongly suggest displaying the Help View, as even for a seasoned Live user, it can be useful when the time comes to provide a little reminder of some functionalities.

You can hide and show the Help View by simply clicking on the small triangle button underneath the Help View box.

Clip View/Device View

This area (Figure 1.8(3)) will display either the device chain on the chosen track or the Clip View, which will be either the sample editor or the MIDI editor, depending on the chosen track’s type.

You can simply double-click on the track head to display the Device View or double-click on the audio or MIDI clip to display the Clip View. Additionally, you could use the Clip View selector or Device View selector, as shown in Figure 1.9.

Figure 1.9 – Clip View Selector and Device View Selector

Control Bar

In the Control Bar, you can find the transport controls (Figure 1.8(4)). This area holds crucial functions, such as start playback, stop, and record, in both Session View and Arrangement View. Additionally, you can set the tempo here and switch on and off the metronome, among other functions.

Let’s quickly have a look at these:

Figure 1.10 – Control Bar and transport controls

• The Follow button will make the screen scroll along with the position of the playback head to always display the current play position of the song (Figure 1.10(1)).
• Arrangement Position will display the current position of the playback head in the arrangement (Figure 1.10(2)).
• The Play button (Figure 1.10(3)).
• The Stop button (Figure 1.10(4)).
• The Arrangement Record button, when pressed, records clips in Arrangement View. There's more on this in Chapter 2, Recording Audio in Ableton Live 11, Chapter 4, Exploring MIDI Sequencing Techniques, and Chapter 10, Utilizing Arrangement and Organization Techniques in our Ableton Live project (Figure 1.10(5)).
• When the MIDI Arrangement Overdub button is enabled, recording MIDI over an already existing MIDI clip will add the new notes to the clip, not overwrite them. There's more on this in Chapter 4, Exploring MIDI Sequencing Techniques (Figure 1.10(6)).
• When the Automation Arm button is enabled, manual parameter changes will be recorded to the clips in Session View and Arrangement View. There's more on this in Chapter 11, Implementing Automation and Modulation (Figure 1.10(7)).
• The Re-enable Automation button will re-enable manually overridden inactive automation. There's more on this in Chapter 11, Implementing Automation and Modulation (Figure 1.10(8)).
• The Capture button pre-records MIDI and “captures” the notes you just played, even if you didn’t hit the record button. There's more on this in Chapter 4, Exploring MIDI Sequencing Techniques (Figure 1.10(9)).
• The Session Record button enables you to record (and overdub MIDI) audio and MIDI clips in Session View (Figure 1.10(10)).
• Loop Start/Punch in Point in Arrangement View displays the start of the Arrangement loop or Punch recording. More on this in Chapter 2, Recording Audio in Ableton Live 11 (Figure 1.10(11)).
• Punch-In Switch in Arrangement View will prevent Live recording anything prior to the punch in point. There's more on this in Chapter 2, Recording Audio in Ableton Live 11 (Figure 1.10(12)).
• Loop Switch in Arrangement View activates the Arrangement loop. There's more on this in Chapter 2, Recording Audio in Ableton Live 11 (Figure 1.10(13)).
• Punch-Out Switch in Arrangement View will prevent Live recording anything after the punch out point. There's more on this in Chapter 2, Recording Audio in Ableton Live 11 (Figure 1.10(14))
• Loop/Punch-In Region Length in Arrangement View displays the length of the Arrangement loop or punch-region. More on this in Chapter 2, Recording Audio in Ableton Live 11 (Figure 1.10(15)).

Figure 1.11 – Control Bar

• Draw Mode Switch is useful for drawing in MIDI notes as well as envelopes for automation and modulation. This can be also turned on and off by pressing the B button (Figure 1.11(1)).
• Computer MIDI Keyboard enables you to use your computer keys to input MIDI notes (Figure 1.11(2)).
• Key Map Mode Switch enables you to map Live’s parameters to your computer keys (Figure 1.11(3)).
• Key/MIDI In and Out Indicators will flash when Live is sending or receiving MIDI messages belonging to remote control assignments made in Key and MIDI Map Modes. There's more on this in Chapter 14, Exploring MIDI Mapping, External Instruments, and MIDI CCs (Figure 1.11(4)).
• MIDI Map Mode Switch, when turned on, enables you to carry out MIDI mapping. There's more on this in Chapter 14, Exploring MIDI Mapping, External Instruments, and MIDI CCs (Figure 1.11(5)).
• CPU Load Meter can be seen in Figure 1.11(6). Clicking on the small arrow will give you additional options, such as switching the CPU load meter between Average and Current and configuring your audio preferences (Figure 1.12).

Figure 1.12 – CPU Load Meter

• Overload Indicator: This lights up when the CPU is overloaded because Live was not able to load audio fast enough. When this happens you will experience audio dropouts. It might be because your computer is not powerful enough to handle all the audio processing you are trying to do, or you need to increase your buffer size because it is currently set too low (Figure 1.11(7)).
• MIDI Track In Indicator/MIDI Track Out Indicator: These will flash when Live’s tracks are receiving or sending out MIDI messages (Figure 1.11(8)).

Figure 1.13 – Control Bar

• The Link On/Off switch triggers Ableton Link on and off. There's more on this in Chapter 15, Playing Live (Figure 1.13(1)).
• Tap Tempo is where you can set the tempo, by tapping this button. Live’s playback will follow the tempo of your tapping (Figure 1.13(2)).
• Tempo is where you can manually type in the tempo for your project (Figure 1.13(3)).
• Phase Nudge Down/Up can be useful when you are trying to synchronize Live to a source that isn’t locked to one tempo, to temporarily increase or decrease the tempo of Live (Figure 1.13(4)).
• Time signature Numerators will allow you to type in the time signature of your song (Figure 1.13(5)).
• Global Groove Amount defines the global intensity of all grooves in the Groove Pool (Figure 1.13(6)).
• Figure 1.13(7) shows Metronome and Metronome Settings. Here, you can enable and disable the metronome. By clicking on the small arrow, you can also enable count-in and apply further settings to the metronome, such as sound and rhythm.
• Figure 1.13(8) shows Quantization Menu. This is the magical function that keeps everything in time in your session. Global Quantize controls the global launching behavior of Live. We will be looking at this in more detail a bit later in this chapter.

So, now that we have had our first proper tour of Live, we can continue to have a look at Session View and Arrangement View. This is super important in order to take full advantage of the creative workflow that Live has to offer.