Ableton Live Tutorial: Recording MIDI

22 Feb 2012 No Comments

by madeleinein Ableton Live Tutorials Tags: , , , , , , , ,

MIDI itself contains only data like note number, velocity and length, but no sound. To turn MIDI into sound you need a MIDI instrument.

 

  1. Drag and drop a MIDI instrument, e.g. a Simpler Preset, from the Live Device Browser into a MIDI track. You will see see that it now has a Track Volume Slider just like audio tracks. This indicates that audio is now routed out of the track, not MIDI data anymore.

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  2. Make sure the MIDI track is armed. By default arming is set to exclusive in Live’s Preferences > Record/Warp/Launch. Unless you’ve changed that, adding a MIDI instrument will automatically arm the track.

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  3. If you have a MIDI controller like a keyboard or drum pads and it’s set up correctly, you can now play and should be able to hear the sound. If you can’t hear anything, check the audio setup. See the tutorial for Mac or Windows if you don’t know how.

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  4. If you don’t have a MIDI controller, you can use the computer keyboard to play. Check out my tutorial if you don’t know how.

     

  5. Before recording you should set the Tempo and Time Signature. You can either enter the BPM directly or Tap out the tempo by hitting the Tap Tempo button for each beat.

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  6. To record in sync with the tempo, turn on the Metronome.

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  7. You can also set a count-in to have some time to get ready before the recording starts. For this open the Preferences > Record/Warp/Launch and choose 1, 2 or 4 Bars for the Count-In.

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  8. You can either record into Session or Arrangement View. The former is good for jamming and trying out ideas in loops, the latter for continuous recordings.

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    • To record into Arrangement View, you need to click on the Global Record button, then hit Play.
    • If you want to record into Session View, you only need to click on the Record button in a Clip Slot to start recording.

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    • It’s also possible to create a MIDI clip with a fixed length to record into. For this double-click on a Clip Slot which creates a MIDI Clip of 1 bar length. You can change the length of the Clip by adding the desired length in the Loop Length field.
    • To record into an existing MIDI Clip or to add notes on top, the Overdub (OVR) needs to be on.

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  9. The Clip View at the bottom of Live includes the MIDI Note Editor that now contains the notes you’ve recorded. To see the Clip View of a MIDI clip, it needs to be selected. If it’s not, double-click the Clip to make it visible.

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If you have questions or suggestions, you’re welcome to leave a comment.

 

 

Ableton Live Tutorial: Recording Audio

08 Feb 2012 No Comments

by madeleinein Ableton Live Tutorials Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

If you want to record real instruments or vocals, you should get a decent audio interface as a built-in sound card won’t give you good quality and may give you higher latencies which means you’ll hear an annoying delay while recording.

 

  1. First make sure your audio interface is set up correctly. If you don’t know how, I wrote tutorials about this for Windows and Mac.

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  2. Connect your guitar or microphone cable to an input of your audio interface.

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  3. In an Audio Track choose ‘Ext. In’ under ‘Audio From’ as well as the Input that you’ve connected the cable to on your interface, e.g. 1. Most input sources are mono so if you can only choose 1/2 you need to go to the Preferences > Audio > Input Config and activate the Mono Inputs first. Otherwise you’ll end up with the recorded signal playing back only on one side.

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  4. Arm the Audio Track. Plug your headphones into the headphones output of your audio interface.

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  5. Now test the input levels by playing/singing. You want to get a properly loud signal without having the meters go into the red. Red means it’s too loud and you’ll get nasty digital distortion. If your audio interface has a knob next to the input, you can adjust the input level there. If not, you should have a mixing software in which this can be set. If in doubt, refer to interface’s manual.

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  6. Once you’ve established a good level for your recording you should set the Tempo and Time Signature. You can either enter the BPM directly or tap out the tempo by hitting the Tap Tempo button for each beat.

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  7. To record in sync with the tempo, turn on the Metronome.

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  8. You can also set a count-in to have some time to get ready before the recording starts. For this open the Preferences > Record/Warp/Launch and choose 1, 2 or 4 Bars for the Count-In.

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  9. You can either record into Session or Arrangement View. The former is good for jamming and trying out ideas in loops, the latter for continuous recordings.

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  10. If you want to record into Session View, you only need to click on the Record button in a Clip Slot to start recording.

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  11. To record into Arrangement View, you need to click the Global Record button, then hit Play by either clicking the button for it or using the Spacebar.

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  12. The Clip View at the bottom of Live includes the Sample Editor that now contains the waveform you’ve recorded. To see the Clip View of a clip, it needs to be selected. If it’s not, double-click the clip to make it visible.

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Any questions, suggestions or other comments? I’m happy to read them. :)