At the bottom of the screen grab you can see the arrow that you can move a cross from left to right to switch from track to track like a dj mixing desk. I used this on the last part of my piece of performance from a two-step garage looped sample to my bassline track.

-Midi key board

-Studio microphone

-Mixer and speaker

-Head phones

-Guitar

-Ableton effects, compression and processor.

Computer software and periphery:

-computer

-Monitor

-Keyboard

-USB cables

- Ableton 07 software

Sounds:

-Sampler from CDs and videos

-live recorded guitar

-live recorded vocal

When I planned this project I was expecting a lot to do with personnel creativity in conjunction with good ideas from other artists like wise CDs, videos and record my own guitar to bring more live on my live performance.

Unfortunately time did not allow me to make a combination of the ideas I had in mind for the first time. And also I was struggling to make some rumba, salsa, and reggae beat with Ableton.

So all my area of expertise did not 100% come to what I expected.

Finally I have used Ableton to edit some base drum, bongo drum played on midi keyboard.

All other instruments and vocals were samplers I have collected from different CDs, exported to be edited in Ableton.

I have used all the ideas I have leaned to challenge all these obstacles, and by the end the finale outcome was incredibly marvellous.

Below is the Session View from the performance on the 17th of June.

It proved possible to reduce the number of scenes by re- using the same 8 bar (1) Bridges and 4 bar (2) Bridges and Riff 3 (7), although it would have been even better to standardise on single bridge and riff scenes right from the start. Moving to the requisite scenes during a performance would have been more in keeping with Ableton’s way of doing things. The Extension (3) and Riddle (4) sections of four scenes each were reduced to single long scenes and this allowed time during the performance to apply Delay and EQ Three effects live. The three OK V1 (5) and two OK C1 (6) scenes were reduced to single scenes.

It was extremely useful to go through this process and take on board the lessons learned for next time.

Using Sony sound forge I have been listening to different tune and crop the piece I like to work with in my project.

This piece will be then exported to my Ableton project to be edited.

By doing this I have to change the start and the end of every exported piece of music to my project to make theme play on time with any other scenes already in.

Today was the final project for the music tech level 3. To prove I did the course to get the qualification  I needed to perform my piece of music infront of a live audience. At first i was very nervous as i have never performed infront of an audience. The first thing we had to do is arrive at BSS(Beaumont street studio) for 12:00pm  to decide on the teams slots for the day; I was the fourth slot for the day.

After deciding on the slots for the day, I decided to go through my performance and tidy up the mistakes I perviously made and also made sure my arrangement was in the right places and then rehearsed through my project a couple of times.

At 12:30pm it was time to take the equipment to the Lawrence Batley Theatre where the ableton live showcase was happening.  We all helped to load the equipment into one of Beaumont street staff’s car, then unloaded it at the theatre. We then set the equipment in the basement where we were going to perform.

Final preparation for showcase

At 6:00pm it was time for each of us to have a quick run throught of our piece to make sure the right keys were assigned to the the right keys. I was one of the last people to have a run through to makesure my timing was right.  We decide I should use Rob’s keyboard as it was the best one there and working , so i had to assign all my keys into his keyboard by going through the midi control, but the keyboard looked a bit  tricky to use as it had a lot of buttons and cross faders in certain places, that made me nervous again but with a quick guildence through from tutor Graham, it calmed my nerves down a touch.

showcase

After the run through of all the sets, it was time to let the audience in and that when the nerves broke back in but before we all performed we had a class quick talk throught, were it boosted abit of my confidence to just go and do my best.

Overall example of project

Overall example of project, is that i want to create a two-step garage and grime track that would mix into a bassline track, to give the audience an underground music feeling.

I did my best, but missed out certain effects to my project,  but the audience never really noticed  as they loved my scarface introduction to my two-step garage  mixed into a bassline beat to give that live dj mixing set feel. I realy liked the turn out and everybody did their best and also thanks to the tutor Graham Booth  for teaching me abbleton live and I really enjoyed the course by learning and listening  to the different types of music we was all into.

On Tuesday 17^th June, I and the rest of the students prepared ourselves for the performance of our level 3. The session stared at noon and we set about working out a running order. It was decided that the group of 8 would be divided to allow four performances before and after a much needed break.

It was decided that my piece would be performed last as it had if nothing more a strong and fast original beat. Though I have performed in packed clubs and bars as a DJ nerves still kicked in as I was still unhappy with my piece of work and the technical difficulties I have encountered for the last five weeks had once last chance to shake my confidence (and succeeded) I encountered difficulties with the M-audio Radium keyboard for the final time and in the very last moment I had to set my performance control onto Rob’s Akai controller. This was quite a privilege because it is a mean machine and now I know exactly how much I want one. When it came to the actual performance I was still setting up my control and all the practice before hand was for nothing as this was a whole new ball game. An enjoyable one I jumped in hands and feet and just went with it. I did make a mistake or two and they were not really noticed. Saying whoops gave the select crowd a bit of a giggle and I think everyone had a good time my invited guests certainly enjoyed the variety of music that was displayed.

Overall my performance could have been better. I must be a poor workman because I am going to blame the tools provided, as mentioned I have had a character building experience with the transportation of livepacks and even more fun with the performance controls but I am glad of the whole experience it has certainly been a fun learning experience and though I have played with Ableton previously I am much more confident with the programme and find myself losing sleep because of its addictive nature.

For the final project I have created entirely new material in Ableton. Some of this newly created material is using some ideas I had been working with in preparation for this project using Propellerhead’s popular Reason software. I decided not to use rewire Technology to synchronise the two programs but recorded Reasons’ output as audio.

In the top box which has been highlighted the audio routing has been changed. Standard setting come from ext stereo channels 1& 2, to capture the Reason audio I selected the audio source to come from Reason. The box underneath (un-highlighted), states that audio comes from Reason channels 3 & 4. In the Monitor section the highlighted section relates to monitoring. With the in option selected I am monitoring the Audio from Reason. This means Reasons sounds can be heard in Ableton and also recorded.

To the bottom right of Ableton there are viewing options one of these been the master section.

When I click on the ‘M’ button, the section next to the red arrow opens this allowed me to see the volume levels of the channels used in my project. This option also displays the volume meter for each individual channel and allows me to monitor the level as they come in and avoid audio clipping. Clipping is when the top and bottom of a waveform are chopped and produce distortion.

The above image shows all channels displaying their individual volume meters.

In the image above the arrow shows an extendable part of the screen. Holding the mouse here will change the mouse arrow icon to an up/down arrow and I was able to drag the volume meters up to display a more detailed meter with volume levels as below.

Once I was able to see a good indication of input levels I armed the Ableton audio track to record, as shown below.

There are subtle differences between these two audio tracks. In channel 3 I am pointing out the monitoring section. I selected monitor in to hear the incoming audio from reason which enabled me to record the audio from reason. I had worked on some ideas for this project in reason so this was how I captured them. In channel 4 I have highlighted the record button. Selecting or arming this channel for recording enabled me to record a vocal straight into Ableton. I had originally planned to make a song but even I could not bear my signing voice through the editing process. I made a decision to record just a verse form the lyrics I had written and play around with them to get them to repeat a la house music. This as done by using an envelope to create a skippy loop of my recorded vocal which I thought was much easier on the ear than my singing voice. With careful monitoring I was able to set the levels of the reason audio, my vocal and the other channels trying not exceed 0db at which point clipping would occur as mentioned earlier.

Clicking on reverse option will change the clip direction.

The first picture shows the clip before clicking on reverse option.

The second one shows the clip playing know in reverse mode.

I have used this mode to bring more variation on my project during performance.

1. This is the scene that I have selected to apply envelope variation on.

2. Clicking on this “E” will open the envelop window which in this time I am going to use to transpose the volume of this clip

3. There are a number of choices depending on what you want to change, but at this time I have selected transpose.

4. By double clicking on this red line I can drug this line up and down to make variation on my clip.

EQ Three was added in the same way to reduce the bass on the Verse 1 Vocal clip and remove a “growl” in that particular recording. This also made sure any similar sound was removed from all the clips. The compressor and EQ Three were also inserted in the Harmony track.

These vocal clips in the project were subsequently replaced by audio clips created in Sonar as part of the Area of Expertise study. The clips shown here were processed by the V-Vocal processor in Sonar to remove any pitch anomolies in the original recordings and “bounced” to new audio tracks. These were dragged from Sonar into Ableton and processed with the compressor and EQ Three.

Using a range of Ableton Instruments

Live is bundled with built-in Instruments if you purchase Live suite. However Analog, Impulse and drumracks are included with Live 7. Ableton also offers Suite with other Plug-Ins such as operator Sampler et al:-Ableton products

I made of use of these plugins in my project :-

The instruments on offer provide hum free sound

Basically each instrument is set up by dragging and dropping the desired instrument from the effects folder to the session view then the desired instrument is selected by left clicking the name of the said instrument at the top of the session view. Then instrument may be played from the keyboard!

See Screen grab of 2 different instruments

operator

Drum racks

Impulse

No link on webbsite for last 2 and the Screengra

bs are from my project!

]]> http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/19/using-a-range-of-ableton-instruments-2/feed/ 0 Knighty http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/19/arrangement-of-scenes/ http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/19/arrangement-of-scenes/#comments Thu, 19 Jun 2008 08:37:40 +0000 robertlknight http://digisound.wordpress.com/?p=448 ]]> A scene is an arrangement of clips in Ableton Live. Scenes are visualised horizontally and an arragement of scenes make up a Live ‘Set’.

The screenshot clearly shows the Master to see further screenshot click the bar above.

There was 47 scenes in my performance. Scenes in modern dance music normally last for 8 bars (House Music) and 4 bars (Hip Hop).

An example of a transition between of parts is shown below

Click the bar for further graphics!

The way you move between scenes is by clicking the master

Warping

Warping is the term applied to changing the speed without altering the pitch of an audio sample. A process outside of Ableton known as time-stretching.

I used warping for the main loop of my performance. The main loop needed slowing down by about 15 BPMs to 115 BPM

Therefore the sample needed warping as shown!

The aim of Warping is to make a sample fit a given time, for this we use warp markers at regular and sequential points in the sample as shown below

Once Live has markers it can work how to add or subtract information for the loop and a sound can be warped and sound accurate. This is the sample that I warped. Once Live has markers it can work how to add or subtract information for the loop and a sound can be warped and sound accurate. It is a Nelly Furtado loop of around 130 BPM which I slowed down to 115 BPM.

]]> http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/18/warping/feed/ 0 Knighty http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/18/final-review-notes/ http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/18/final-review-notes/#comments Wed, 18 Jun 2008 12:20:26 +0000 bryanhackett http://digisound.wordpress.com/?p=400 ]]> My performance went smoothly and seemed to be well received, as were all the performances on the night. One scene was triggered early towards the end and I did not manage the second tempo change on the slider all that well. This made it difficult for the guitarist to adjust his playing in the section before final fade out. Several people commented we obviously enjoyed ourselves, as both of us were singing our respective vocals along with the recorded verses.

The build up through the day was uneven, with controller keyboards not working properly and the volumes in the short practice session making it virtually impossible to rehearse the performance with the guitarist. In the end we changed the intended guitar sound to suit the venue setup and late modifications to the project.

For me the project and performance strengths lay in the decision to write a song specially for the project, as the course was taking place, and to introduce a “live” playing element. This meant the composition process adapted to Ableton’s approach, as I hoped it would, and consequently introduced a greater musical variation overall. However, this meant I could make only limited use of effects “live” during the perormance.

At the end of the course I can see how different it would have been if the project had been developed totally in Ableton from the start e.g. the riffs, bridges, links etc. would have been common, instead of being slightly different, with an obvious overall sequencer feel about the piece. The number of scenes would have reduced and there would have been greater movement between scenes. However, it would not have been possible to do this within the course duration.

My concentration on how I would use Ableton to write songs and integrate with the other applications used meant I have not fully exploited the processor and effects aspects of the software. Having used orchestral instruments almost exclusively, I found the use of synthesizer instruments difficult, especially when I had to change all the instruments I intended to use, to those available in Ableton.

It was difficult to keep to the blog timetable, because I did not complete a blog until it was incorporated into the project. Working on the project at home was also fraught, as there were problems packing live sets and opening them on another machine, even after machines were upgraded to the same version of Ableton. The hardest part of the project for me was making the last bar of each verse play in the following scene.

Through the course I realise how useful Ableton will be to my song writing, and crucially how well it works with other applications I use already. The portability with Sonar was fantastic, dragging complete sections from the sequencer into Ableton. All vocals were recorded and processed there, as the project had lead and harmony parts plus an orchestral section. Because it is so intuitive, Ableton has introduced me to aspects of other software that previously I had found too difficult e.g. V-Vocal processing and Audiosnap in Sonar. I’ve already started to input music using a keyboard and midi guitar, instead of a staff editor – far more creative and time efficient.

Thanks to the tutor and participants on the course I have become a true Ableton believer, with still a lot to learn.

Clicking on midi option will open this window that allows me to set all buttons that are to be remotely controlled by midi key board.

After this window has opened, clicking on selected key and buttons (play key and 1,2,3,4,buttons will be activated to navigate between scenes during live performance.

This is a step by step adjustment and can be modified or readjusted as practicable as possible.

On this project I am using a midi keyboard to control all the scenes, this will involve going up and down into scenes, using effect on selected channel, playing scenes and bringing up or down some scenes that I have selected to use the delay on.

1.The following marker on my midi keyboard is the selected button to navigate up and down between scenes during my live performance.

2.To play selected scenes i have made a selection of the first key from the left on my midi keyboard to play scenes.

3.To apply a delay on Selected channels and scenes i have marked the button that will be controlling my effect return channel as number 1 on the midi keyboard.

Delay channel or button will be turned on during my performance, only if i need a delay on the following scenes represented by,

Button number 2 to control the scene accapela 1,

Button 3 to control scene accapela 2,and

Button 4 to control scene accapela 3

4.These are the scenes.

My area of expertise is on Kore 2 Native Instruments’ “Super Instrument”

Kore player is free to download from the native Instruments website ( which gives you access to NIs’ diverse audio pallete).

http://www.native-instruments.com/index.php?id=koreplayer

Kore integrates all native instruments plug-ins by copying of the said Instruments folders into Kores’ folder and thus sounds from Individual Plug-Ins appear next to a logo in the sound browser next to the said sound. It is a host for plug-ins as well as a plug-in and looks as below:-

The benefits of using it are it’s sound and usability you can narrow down the sound you want by using the sound browser kind of like a zoom on an image!

I have used the Kore extensivley in my project as one can see from the image above.

To insert an instance of Kore

1) Firstly select the plug-in section from the file browser as above.

2) Drag and drop the instance of Kore to the session view and you should see Kore as below.

Unfortunaly when using Kore with its hardware controller it is rather CPU hungry therefore when using Kore player try not to use this.

First I am very grateful for the support I received from my tutor Graham from the beginning of this course up to this live performance.

Yes there are many areas where I have to work very hard to improve my skill, especially in editing, warping, and playing some variation on loops.

If I look back into my initial ideas of the kind of music i was to produce, my project went a bit shorter because of some challenge I find when I tried editing my music on samba, or rumba music rhythm or bit.

The other option was to use samples from CDs which I did actually use more to make most of my music.

Having said that and reflecting my memory into yesterday performance, also what really want to achieve, I think more practice or play on Ableton I steel can achieve my goal at the highest level.

There are a lot of positive areas to be proud of with this course individually; first of all making a peace of music involve hard working, commitment and skills. I believe I have achieved all of this.

Secondly the compliments I received from the crowd and my colleague during my performance and after have boosted my motivation to do more in the future than I did yesterday.

]]> http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/18/final-review-2/feed/ 0 augustinbally http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/18/final-performance/ http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/18/final-performance/#comments Wed, 18 Jun 2008 10:19:48 +0000 wibblemeister http://digisound.wordpress.com/?p=401 ]]> Last night, at the Lawrence Batley Theater in Huddersfield, the Music Tech level 3 students (that includes me) performed our Ableton pieces in front of a motley crew of friends and family. The day started at noon, and the time leading up to the performance at 7pm was filled with getting the equipment to the theater and set up. There was a chance to run through our pieces a couple of times just to make sure all the equipment was working, and any problems with the pieces were ironed out.

The running order was worked out before we got there and comprised of two sets with a break in between. I was originally destined to play in the final slot, but as my piece wasn’t as up beat as Leons (who was playing second to last) I thought it probably best mine was the penultimate performance.

The whole performance went well with no real hiccups or problems, and considering that only 6 weeks previously most of the people up there hadn’t used Ableton before, or at least didn’t have any idea of what they were going to perform, I thought it was all done with great confidence and professionalism.

My piece, I felt, was always the most simple, especially when compared to at least the look of Leon’s or Brians. But I think that as this was no “masterpiece” (worked on for months aiming for perfection), an over complicated or elaborate piece could easily cause confusion in the heat of performance. Although, as I found out, the look of the piece doesn’t always show how easy or difficult it is. Leon’s piece had sections to jump backwards and forwards between and so could get muddling, but Brian’s was arranged as a piece to be played in a straight forward order so not confusing. So the apparent size of the piece doesn’t matter, and in fact as long as you are confident about knowing where everything is your piece could be huge.

I think overall I was pleased with my piece and the way it went. I actually fluffed the end (I had planned to cut out track in a particular order, and took out the wrong ones to start), so I merely improvised the drop outs to a different finish, and nobody knew I’d fluffed it (until I told them at least). The reason I fluffed it was just a mistaken key hit, but as I have already learnt – in any performance the mistake doesn’t matter if confidently worked though. I have played a fairly long grade 6 classical guitar piece in front of more people before now, so I wasn’t phased by any of the performance.

I had invited 5 people to come and see the gig. At least one of them commented that all the pieces were good, and that he enjoyed them all. All of them commented that even if they didn’t necessarily appreciate the style that the it was all good and enjoyed themselves.

Reflecting back on the course, I have definitely achieved what I wanted to. I enrolled on the Music Tech courses to learn the software involved (I’m not bothered about the qualifications or anything like that), and having completed the Ableton course I’m confident I can use the software in the future if required.

I am pleased with the progress i have made on my project, at first my project was quite simple but in the end I was able to prove my skills with ableton had much improved. I had a fair amount of controls on the MIDI controller keyboard along with triggering clips and scenes. I had feedback from a few of the audience and they seemed pretty impressed with my performance. I even had some contact with a local record label.

My project progressed well I started off with no knowledge of ableton and now feel it would be a commonly used piece of software. I have learnt about ableton’s similarities and differences with reason, the software i know more about and gone into some depth with a comparison of Reason and Ableton’s drum machines ReDrum and Impulse respectively. I think in future I would use Ableton a lot for live performances but I would love to combine the two within production and I have gained the base to continue with my music.

Overall though I think my weakness was that even though i did really well i know i made mistakes and they could easily have been avoided with a bit more time to practice.

Things to improve

1. Not running off when Graham wanted to talk to me, although i did come back to talk.
2. More practice and testing certain elements before live performance

Back to my review, more I would have done more preperation! however Graham said that a live performance is never the same twice! Many people on the day said it needs to be as simple as possible. I was terrified of triggering a blank scene so I went for a simple approach merely triggering scenes until the tech-house part of my performance where I used my keyboards rottory pots to control two instances’ of filter cut-off on the Arpeggio and a synth lead from the Kore player. I think the Kore player is brilliant bit of freeware and when used in conjunction with Live makes for an expressive opportunity. Most problematic to me was timing I looked at the pies but there was no numbers of Elapsed bars that I use, Back to my review, had I had the time I would have done more preperation! however Graham said that a live performance will never be the same as rehersal!

Other than that it was OK, had some nerves but that goes with live performances which Ableton helps the electronic musician achieve. I think what kept the audience attentive was the wide range of musical styles and the duration of the perfomances.

I have bought a copy of Live and currently use it on my Imac so to anwer the Question will I use it again the anwer is yes and maybe I will rewire it into Logic! As for morphing into the dance element of my performance I felt what with the tempo changes it worked.

With regards new skills I have learnt a new DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) and WordPress with image and URL (Universal Resouce Locator) editting and placment respectively.

For me personally my favourite set was Augustines’, however they were all good. Dom put my keyboard to good use using the sliders as a crossfade for his beats. I also like his bassline of which he told me was created by his 13 year old nephew. Leon also used my keyboard.

Over the first 5 weeks of the course I wrote a song, using Guitar Pro and Sonar, that I thought would be suitable for development in Ableton . Based on a four chord riff with bass and drums, I assigned instruments in Sonar as a rough prototype, but had very little idea how it would progress beyond the first verse of 16 bars.

So, after Tuesdays and Wednesdays at BSS, Thursdays were dedicated to completing the composition ready for loading from the sequencer into the Ableton Session View. I have been compiling an album of songs I’ve written, including some composed separately by my friend David Westmoreland, and he agreed to help me get the song finished in time for the performance. Although we’ve been working closely together over the last 12 months, this is the first time we’ve collaborated on a song, and it was a tremendous experience. Each week I would have the next phase roughed out and we would progress from there. David is particularly strong on percussion and linking the various themes together and of course working together was more creative than composing on my own.

Although Ableton is not designed for the type of music that interests me, Session View is a great way to develop a song in conjunction with the other applications. As a guitarist, it is simpler for me to lay down chord structures in Guitar Pro with a suitable drum loop. It is probably easier to enter a melody line using the tablature editor or a staff editor too. However, in future I’ll probably just create the scenes to export to Ableton, or via Sonar, instead of the whole song. Sonar is an extremely competent sequencer and more, but I can see how useful the Ableton approach is going to be to try out different arrangements.

From the possible topics listed in my outline on the 6th of June I decided to concentrate on a couple that figured in the final stages of the project, prior to performance on 17th of June. Within the general area of how Ableton works in conjunction with Guitar Pro and Sonar, I selected two related capabilities in Sonar that I needed for my project, that were not available in Ableton:

• Creation of an Edirol Orchestral audio clip from its midi track
• The V-Vocal Voice processor to correct vocal tracks for pitch etc.

My normal composing and recording procedure is:

• Compose the music and preliminary lyrics using the guitar.
• Manually enter the song into Guitar Pro and finalise the lyrics.
• Assign General Midi instruments and export tracks as a midi file.
• Import the midi file into a Sonar template and assign instruments.
• Record the vocals and any other audio tracks in Sonar.
• Master and mixdown to CD.

With a few minor complications this procedure is straight-forward.
Advantages of Guitar Pro are its simple tablature/staff editor and entry of chords to create the structure for a song. To continue to have these facilities available I would need to keep using Guitar Pro, as neither Sonar nor Ableton have suitable alternatives. It’s easy to import and create midi drum tracks in Guitar Pro, which transfer readily into Sonar for use with its Session Drummer. If channel 10 is common to both applications there is no need to map drums, as you need to with Ableton. Because Guitar Pro enables lyrics to be matched to the music, there aren’t any surprises when these come to be recorded elsewhere.

Sonar has the advantage that it has everything you would want from a sequencer, without being as intuitive as Ableton. The staff editor is OK for minor changes, but difficult to use when modifications to tracks are needed, e.g. insertion of a bridging section. It is generally better to revise in Guitar Pro and re-import to a Sonar track template. This keeps both syncronised, with the Guitar Pro version remaining the master and amendments made in one direction only. There is also a mis-match of midi editors, as Guitar Pro only has the tablature/staff editor.

Sequence versus Ableton’s Session View

Initially it was difficult to overcome the sequencer mind set, but as the project song was being written piecemeal in Guitar Pro, the concept of “scenes” became more attractive. At first I cut the individual Guitar Pro sections and exported them as midis. These were dragged into Ableton as scenes. However, it seemed simpler to import all tracks into Sonar before dragging into Ableton, where bars needed for each scene could be edited into clips. The ease with which the Sonar tracks are split and dragged into Ableton, made it possible to insert new scenes and amend the song’s sequenced arrangement. In a very practical way this revealed the benefit of using the Session View to compose and develop a song. Only Ableton has this excellent drag and drop ability. Sonar and Guitar Pro rely on import and export routines.
The original concept of the song had orchestral instruments, but there were no suitable equivalents in Ableton’s library. Although the Edirol Orchestral VSTi soft synth did install as an Ableton plug in, it proved impossible to assign it to any of the tracks. There seemed to be general confusion on the forums about getting it to work in Ableton, and most examples were of the DXi version used with Sonar. Determined to have at least one clip as an orchestral instrument, I decided to “bounce” an Edirol midi track in Sonar and drag into Ableton as an orchestral ensemble for the “Slowdown” clip in the project.

A similiar approach was used for lead and harmony vocals, except it made more sense to combine the recorded takes into single tracks,  before bringing them into Ableton to create the individual audio clips. Volume recording levels of takes were adjusted at the same time using V-Vocal’s dynamics and amplitude envelope.

The V-Vocal processor was applied in automatic mode to remove minor pitch anomolies. V-Vocal works non-destructively by overlaying its clip on the original audio, which is muted. The “bounce to tracks” was from the V-Vocal audio clip, rather than a midi track with Edirol Orchestral patch applied. However, both procedures gave new audio tracks, which dragged into Ableton. It is worth noting that both these audio tracks were extended and modified in Sonar to allow for the changes made to the arrangement in Ableton, and mirrored in Guitar Pro, so that the vocals commenced at the same bar count and dropped straight into Ableton.

As vocals were not too far off pitch, the automatic pitch correction was applied to the whole track. When this is not the case, sections of a waveform can be made to conform to a musical scale or manually adjusted. Vibrato can also be edited. Vocal timing can be adjusted in a similiar manner to warping in Ableton. The latest version 7 of Sonar even has a pitch to midi converter. This allows you to sing in a tune, pitch correct it for any anomolies with V-Vocal and adjust the vocal timing, then convert those pitches to midi notes.

By using the right to left method for warping i.e. anchoring track ends and working backwards to the beginning, it was quite simple to syncronise vocals with each other and to the other scene clips. This also made the task of starting vocals on cue a lot easier. Vocal recording was not included in the course, so the four verses, with their harmonies, were recorded in the Sonar version of the Touchstone song. I look forward to recording directly into Ableton and having access to orchestral instruments, once I have my own version of Ableton that reliably creates live packs that transfer to other systems.

I feel the decision to prototype a song in Guitar Pro, Sonar and Ableton simultaneously has been well worth the effort involved, as it has shown me where Ableton would fit with these other applications and improve my music.

This screenshot shows the status of project in Session View as at 1st of June 2008. My major problem now is to reduce the number of scenes before the performance, without losing their existing musical variations.

1. Scenes progress as required except for vocals, because the 13th bar of VERSE vocals needs to continue to play with the next clip. This has now been resolved as detailed in the 1.2 Audio Clips blog.

Note VERSES 1 and 2 are identical, as are 3 and 4, but the pairs are different, so loss of two scenes is possible if the vocals for each pair of verses could play in a single scene.

2. This 13th bar is repeated in Theme and Lyrics tracks, as both mirror the melody line sung in the vocals. This is OK with a 1 bar clip following each verse, but it makes the Bridge and Riff clips different, when otherwise the number of scenes for each type could be reduced to single clips. If this had been developed In Ableton and not a sequencer programme, variations in the “bridging” type clips would have been more considered and the number of scenes reduced. Is Ableton capable of “building” a song using such bridges and riffs if these are reduced to a single scene each?
THIS PROBLEM HAS BEEN PARTLY RESOLVED AS DETAILED IN 1.2 AUDIO CLIPS BLOG.

3. Verses 1 and 2 lead vocals have been warped, but the recordings for 3 and 4 have yet to be brought into Ableton and warped. All are imported without any Sonar processing (compression) or effects (reverb).

4. The same applies to the four harmony tracks, but here I want to apply the V-Vocal utility in Sonar, to correct any notes slightly off key and reduce vibrato, and then “Bounce” the processed tracks to use in the project. This will be covered in my Area of Expertise section.

5. The four INSTRUMENTAL scenes of 6 bars could be reduced to two 12 bar scenes quite simply.

6. Similarly the four EXTENSION scenes of 8 bars can be reduced to two of 16 bars.

7. Also, the four RIDDLE scenes of 6 bars each can become two at 12 bars.

8. The LINK C scene currently uses a slide control to progressively lower the tempo of the song from 107 bpm to 90 bpm. I would prefer this automated as start and end points in the 18 bar section are important to the song.
UNDERSTAND EASY TO DO IN A SEQUENCER BUT DIFFICULT IN THE ABLETON SESSION VIEW.

9. The OK V1, V2 and V3 scenes can be reduced to one and allowed to loop as required. These were originally sequenced this way for a vocal track, which I probably will not have time to do.

10. Similiarly, the OK C1 and C2 scenes can be a single looped scene.

11. The slide control on the final FADE scene would be better than on LINK C, especially if live guitar is used at performance time, see point 16 below.

12 Sadly, I might have to abandon using Edirol Orchestral as I can not get it to work in Ableton, although it does seem to have installed corectly as a plug in. If it can’t be configured in Ableton I’ll “Bounce” a midi track with the Orchestral soft synth in Sonar and include bring into the project as audio for the Slowdown clip. I’ll include this in my Area of Expertise section. The other possibility is use of French Horns for High 2, but as the original sound of the piece has now completely changed this may no longer work.

13. Besides orchestral sounds there were several other instruments used from the Cakewalk TTS and General Midi that couldn’t be found in the Ableton libary I am using. Hopefully they may be available on a supplementary disk e.g. Koto and Shamisen.
FURTHER INSTUMENTS NOW TO HAND.

14. The only processor and effects currently applied to the project are compressor on lead vocal and chorus on the Echo track. I don’t want too many effects introduced during performance as there is already a lot of musical variation in the clips . The minimum will suffice.

15. The only keyboard controllers setup at the moment are a slide on Link C, that I would still prefer automated, and the trigger for launching the next scene.

16. My friend Dave is still up for playing guitar live on the 17th of June if we know what provision could be made – either acoustic or electric and he would be prepared to come for afternoon rehearsal.
GUITAR and AMP ONLY REQUIRED – CONNECTED VIA THE MIXING DESK.

17. I’ve had an invitation to contribute up to 3 songs to a new on line magazine being launched by a company I register for copyright reasons, closing on the 16th June. If we had a decent mp3 by then I would like submit the final Touchstone.

18. There are additional lyrics written and to write, but it’s probably too late now to make such amendments.

19. The Midi tracks from SONAR and GUITAR PRO in the first scene named “0 SONAR” need to be deleted and the clips created from them cropped to tidy up the project.

20. I have had a problem with the later version (7.0.2) of Ableton installed at home, to work in conjunction with the Sonar and Guitar Pro applications not available on the BSS machines, in that saved live sets will not load into the earlier 7.0.1 version used in the course. Graham has successfully loaded my latest live set into version 7.0.3 and has arranged for the BSS workstation I use to be upgraded. However, this has lost me a few days working on the projest and delayed submission of blogs.

Introduction

I decided to use one of the drum kits in the Ableton library for the project,  but have included a section on how to build a custom kit in Impulse using samples.

1. I had problems with drum tracks created in Guitar Pro for my project, because too many drum instruments were used in the sequences that were created and added to over a number of weeks.  On inspection there were a number of inconsistencies which required correction e.g. four or five different toms were used in the track.

2. The entire track was manually edited, e.g. to restrict toms used to two, before importing into Sonar, so both sources could be used to prepare the clips for the Ableton Session View. A copy of the original track was saved to check later if the data was completely portable over the the three applications. See my Area of Expertise section.

3. The “Big Rocker” drum kit from the Acoustic kits was chosen and the entire Sonar midi track re-mapped to the kit in Ableton to use for the Scene clips, because it was easier than editing individual exports from Guitar Pro. The device contols were adjusted for the required balance of the instruments.

Without Impulse

4. The drum kit was selected, double clicked or dragged onto a midi track header.The drum clips used in the tracks were prepared from a midi export from Guitar Pro of the scene, or from the first scene row labelled “0 Sonar”. This contains a complete drum track for the song dragged from Sonar into Ableton. The drum tracks were created from midi loops, modified in Guitar Pro with fills etc. to produce a sequence percussion track.

5. The drums had to be re-mapped for the selected drum kit, which meant it was simpler to re-map the whole track in Ableton, instead of individual scenes cut from Guitar Pro and exported as midis. As I already had the Sonar tracks loaded, most individual drum clips for the project were prepared from this Sonar master track, which would be deleted later and induividual clips cropped.

Acting Impulsively

1. The Impulse drum plug-in is dragged from the Live Devices instruments in the file browser onto the header of an empty track in the Ableton Session View.

2. In the File Browser samples of individual drums can be set up in Impulse if none of the library drum kits are suitable.

3. These drum instrument samples are selected and dragged in turn to 8 available slots in Impulse to build a custom drum kit.

4. Double click on the empty track below the Impulse header to make an empty track to record the drum pattern using the keyboard or by hand with the midi editor.

5. Any drum slots that aren’t assigned are shown empty in the clip.

6. There are three Global Controls:

Volume
Time
Transpose.

7. The other controla from left to right are:

Start: To delay the start of the instrument
Transpose: To change the pitch
Stretch: To lengthen or shorten the sample
Decay: To define the way the sound fades

8. The following screen-shot shows Impulse applied to the midi clip used in the adjacent Big Rocker track and re-mapped with the same instruments, but using samples from Live Devices browser, for comparison.

OPERATOR

Smooth Operator
1 The Operator synthesiser was dragged onto the header of an empty midi track in Session View.

2.Here a clip of chords exported as a midi file from Guitar Pro had various pads loaded to the track, either by double clicking in Live Devices or dragging onto the track. They included “Mercury Vapours” to try a replicate the Cakewalk pad called “Fantasia” used in the Sonar version of the song. The present choice “Epiano” is as close to the original Sonar instrument selectio as I could find.

3. Unlike the problematical midi drum clips from both Guitar Pro and Sonar, which had to be re-mapped in Impulse, all the other midi clips could be dragged into the Ableton midi tracks from the midi export file from Guitar Pro or directly from Sonar. Eventually it proved easier to have both Sonar and Ableton open, highlight all Sonar midi tracks and drag them into Ableton as the first scene. It was then straight-forward to isolate the bars required for clips.

4. The same chords were duplicated for use by other instruments in the same scenes to compliment and emphasise EPiano chord clips.

5. Ten of the tracks in the project use Operator.

Operator Clip Pane

1. The Operator Preset “EPiano” is displayed in the Track 6 header.

2. The Clip Pane shows a 12 bar loop for the Scene called 8 Inst 1.

3. This midi clip is from a Guitar Pro midi export.

One of the most important elements in the project is the “Echo” track. This was originally envisaged as a vocal track, a “hook” perhaps, echoing the word “touchstone”. Later in the song the track carried an instrumental, so it was important to choose the right instrument and effects. Below are Operator settings for “Switched on Bach” with the Flanger settings.

1. A Sonar recording of lead vocals for Verses 1 and 2 was dragged from the Sonar Track View into an Audio Track in Ableton’s Session View.

2. Verses 1 and 2 were recorded between bars 12 and 25 and between bars 28 and 41 respectively.

3. Warping was carried using the right to left technique, anchoring ends of the clips at grid markers 25 and 41 with warp makers and working from right to left, turning grid markers to warp markers and moving transients progressively onto the beats. This warping technique is advised for longer audio clips per the tutorial by Chad Carrier taken from the Ableton website. It is vital to note that the Complex Warp Mode must be used for audio otherwise it will sound strange after warping. The Warp Mode options are in a drop down to the left of the Loop on/off button, immediately below the half and double tempo buttons. All the screen shots show the option set to the default setting of “Beats”, before this was changed to ”Complex in the project.

4 The final bar (13th) in each verse on the word “stone” caused a problem as it needs to be heard in the next scene. It has since been resolved by deleting the Clip Stop Button in the track in the next scene and switching the Loop off. As an aid to performance the Loop End was moved forward to the end of the 12th bar, to help trigger the next scene in the 12th, and not the 13th bar. (Unfortunately, this could not be seen during the performance as the clips can not be viewed when moving through the scenes using the keyboard controller.) All midi tracks syncronised with the word “stone” required the same action with deletion of surplus bars in subsequent scenes.

5. Verses 3 and 4 and Harmony recordings were transferred and warped later in Ableton. As part of my Area of Expertise I found it was better to combine the lead vocal recordings into a single track in Sonar before dragging into Ableton. for warping into individual clips. Harmonies were treated the same way.

6. I did not experiment with Sonar “groove clips” in the end and left this for another time.

7. All harmony recordings were processed using V-Vocal, before “bouncing” to another audio track in Sonar, to apply fixes for pitch and vibrato. Again this use of V-Vocal is part of the Area of Expertise study.

To use send and return effects it is essential you have created a return track. This can be done in at least two ways. Either by right clicking in  the empty space to the left of the master track and selecting insert return track.

Also by using the drop down insert menu at the top of the Ableton screen.

Once the return track is set up the effect can be dragged directly onto the channel.

The track highlighted orange has the filter delay effect on it.   A f ilter delay unit looks like the one below.

That handles the return function we now have to send some sound to the return track.  This is done by turning on the view for the send channels to be dispayed.

The next image displays a track with the send levels set

(1)  This displays a track with the send level set, which indicates the amount of the original (dry) signal that is sent to the effects unit.  In this instance the send is set to send to return rack three which has an EQ three on it.  I have utilised the filter delay but it is set up for the performance so as i turn the dial up it sends sound to the filter delay and this gives a distorted skippy echo effect

v I have used Operator extensively in my project and below is a screen capture of its use in my project. As you can see from the capture, I have used three instances of Operator for Bass, Pads and synth effects, when I have Morphed into a house track with a tempo of 124 bpm. The other section is 115 bpm!

.

Click the above bar to see Operator in use in my project!

What is Operator

Operator is a plug-in add on synth in Ableton Live

It is essentially a four Operator FM synth.

An operator can be likened to an oscillator and Operator being as flexible as it is each operator may be a range of raw waveforms, not just Sine as were the DX range.The beauty of Operator is that it is also similar to Subtractive synthesisers of old in that it features fully resonant filters (-12 or -24 db per octave) These may be Low pass, High pass, Band pass and Notch. Just like Live itself, Operator really comes into its own when controlled in real-time.

For instance Coarse filter frequency may be controlled by note velocity. (Meaning that as we trigger notes at high Velocities the effect of the filter is great and likewise when the Velocity is low the effectiveness of the filter is greatly reduced).

Operator is comparable to Native Instruments FM 8.

Link to FM 8 pageindex.php?id=fm8

It has eight algorithms (arrangements of Operators into carriers and modulators).

A modulator is an operator which modulates a carriers frequency.

The sum of both is what you can attack with Operators Filters.

The arrangements of Carriers and Modulators are what we call Algorithms

. !

Ableton Videoableton_operator_part_1.mov

]]> http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/04/316/feed/ 2 Knighty http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/04/area-of-expertise-2/ http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/06/04/area-of-expertise-2/#comments Wed, 04 Jun 2008 13:28:27 +0000 wibblemeister http://digisound.wordpress.com/?p=258 ]]> For the project I have to choose an area of expertise.

I have chosen to do my area of expertise on creating a realistic guitar solo in MIDI. I have found that most MIDI instruments aren’t that realistic and lack important nuances of the real instrument. As the only way to recreate the instrument would be to have a massively sampled MIDI sound that incorporates all the nuances at the right levels (which for an instrument like a guitar is very difficult), doing this in Ableton cannot be about using a clean sound to do so. The only way is to mask the sound.

I found a clean sounding strat (Fender Stratocaster electric guitar) midi instrument and experimented with various effects on it. I used the Audio effects rack (3) in the Audio effects section (2) of the device browser (1).

In this there are various preset effects for different instruments. I decided that as I was heading for a solo guitar sound that an amp simulator or overdrive effect would probably sound right.

After dragging and dropping the effects onto the midi track with the strat sound on it, and playing some notes with various settings on them, I found a tube amp (or valve amp) simulator called “Guitar Tube Amp”. There are three available presets – Light, Heavy and Killer. Each one is just the same simulator with different settings to achieve popular results.

I chose to use the Killer preset, and after tweaking the settings decided it wasn’t enough. The settings comprise of

• Dry/Wet – defines how much of the effect is used compared to the uneffected sound
• Light tube – allows you to use only a small amount of the effect or act as fine control
• Heavy Tube – allows you to use a larger amount of the effect or act as a medium control
• Killer Tube – allows you to use a very large amount of the effect
• Air – allows you to have a focused mono sound or add “air” which has more of a stereo feel
• Cabinet Morph – changes the sound slightly to mimic a range in cabinet sounds *
• Verb – Is the dry/wet mix for the built in reverb effect
• Verb time – adjusts the delay of the reverb to give the feeling of different sizes of room

* I wasn’t able to find any details on this sound effect online or in the Ableton manual, and so (more specifically for the Cabinet Morph settings) only have been able to determine which control does what by listening to it. The exact explanations for the controls might be different.

To get the sound I wanted I had to turn up the tube sim to full on all controls (to get the greatest distortion and reverb) and add another 2. The sound produced is heavily distorted, with masses of feedback, and when played gives the impression of a guitar solo at a large concert, compared to the original uneffected sound which sounds very digital and “keyboard” like.

To give even more of a feel of a live instrument to the sound, I used the pitch bend wheel on the MIDI keyboard when playing, to give the impression of the guitarist “string bending” the notes or using a tremolo arm (sometimes called a “whammy bar”). The wheel adds adjustment points in the clip envelope “transpose” section.

I finally recorded a set piece (or solo) using the distorted strat sound, and the pitch bending for effect (shown below),

and finally cleaned up the pitch bends in the clip envelope transpose section by removing unnecessary points (see previous blog on “Clip View & Envelopes” for details on manipulation in the clip envelope section).

The clip was then ready for use in the piece.

This clip isn’t in any scene to be triggered, I have purposefully left it out so that it can be triggered on it’s own.

Personally I have used Reason a lot, I enjoy using ReDrum as it has an easy to use interface that allows much flexibility. However I am not too keen on Impulse although now having used it am less sceptical of it.

First of all here is ReDrum and Impulse

IMPULSE

REDRUM

On face value I think both seem fairly similar, however there are differences.

First of all the controls, Impulse in my opinion is the better instrument for controls, why? well Impulse allows the user to have control over panning, pitch, volume, start, stretch, distortion and filters, not only is that a good selection of controls but it also has global controls, which affect all drum samples within the kit allowing for even more control over your drums.

However ReDrum isn’t too shabby either, with the following individual drum controls; panning, pitch, length, start, tone, soft medium and hard hits, decay gate, volume and there are some global controls but not really the same style, more about the patterns.

Yes ReDrum uses a pattern sequencer built in, you can make a drum beat and listen to it without even arranging any MIDI at all. This is one reason I like ReDrum. However it has its disadvantages, Redrum will not allow unlimited patterns, however Ableton’s Impulse is based around MIDI and so is pretty unlimited as it doesn’t rely on the instrument to store the patterns, they can be stored as clips.

Another comparison is they both use a file for each drumkit, Impulse has presets and ReDrum has patches, this is not important however as it is just the words used for the same thing.

So how do we use these instruments? Well to make a drum pattern in each this is what you do…..

REDRUM

First of all with Redrum, set up the instrument within reason, by going into create… redrum drum computer… then from here you will see the ReDrum instrument as show earlier.

From here i can load a drumkit, known as a redrum patch. fromthe bottom left corner of the instrument.

From here your kit should load up and you can preview all the sounds available, maybe play around with the controls and see what you like.

(1) Allows you to preview sound

(2) Select that drum

Then you can use the pattern maker at the bottom to fill in the drums, for each drum you must remember to select the drum using the button labelled above(2).

Then you punch the pattern into the pads at the bottom like so:

As you can see Redrum allows you to have a soft medium or hard hit of the drum denoted by different colours, making Redrum in my opinion easier to use and get to grips with. However Redrums method of longer than 1 bar patterns is complicated, I found it really difficult to modify the amount of drums and amount of beats in the bar etc.

IMPULSE

I have already looked at impulse in a previous blog here:

http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/05/21/editing-midi/

However within Impulse, this is much easier to understand, here is a simple beat created using Impulse:

(1) Headphone icon allows you to preview sounds when lit

(2) Keys when headphone is lit preview sounds

(3) Timeline shows the drum pattern timeline

I feel that the timeline is a much easier to understand in the ableton drum machine, it is all based around MIDI however which i am not too keen on but it does allow you to see all drums inputs at the same time.

Another point I noted with ReDrum is the ability to split each drum channel up and put seperate effects and processors on these by accessing the wiring at the back.

This is a good feature and Ableton does not give Impulse this ability.

However Reason can be rewired into ableton which would slightly solve this problem.

So in conclusion, I would say that I personally like both, I prefer the look of ReDrum but i still appreciate Impulse’s versatility.

• Redrum is better for singling out drums for added creativity
• Impulse is good if you can easily use MIDI for editing and recording purposes
• Both are equally easy to pick up but also have challenging aspects
• Both have the ability to transfer samples into them from anywhere

In the clip view you have a section called the sample, where you can add different variation , wraping and loop in the clip view window, it also give you the option to transpose/pitch bend, volume, pan, link and unlink in the evevople section.

In the clip view there is a launch section where you can launch certain parts of your project by using the follow action or tigger with the mouse. I’ve decided to trigger mine with the mouse. Below in the clip view for my bass sample, I played the bass again in through midi to give it a better bass pattern. I also put the loop button on and had the link button turn on in the envelopes with a mixer and track volume on. In launch mode I set it to trigger and kept the quantization at ‘global’. I also turned the pitch half way, and kept the volume the same. The diagram below shows you where to find the clip view, launch , notes and envelopes section that i have used in my track.

First I decided to Automate a delay, this is where the delay will automatically happen without any control from my MIDI Keyboard. I chose to use a simple delay to minimise the change of the effect on my psychedelic synth, this would still space out the sound but not too much if added correctly.

I already had a return track setup however if i didn’t i would just go to the space and right click then select insert return track. I know Delay to be an effect and therefore needed to be assigned in this way because it has a wet and dry control and also it can be changed over time.

Step one is to find(1) the desired effect in this case the delay and assign it to the return channel as shown below(2).

Once you have your effected set up you have two options, first the option I used for my simple delay. This was an automated effect used on the melody. You need to use the envelope in order to do this.

So first I set the effect as fully on using the send control relevant to the effect i was automating.

Once this has been set I needed to go into the envelope and automate the effect. This done by clicking on the clip you wish to automate the effect of, going into the envelope settings and finding the relevant control.

Then i was taken to the envelope screen where i could set the automation for this control. Either using the pencil or double clicking to move the line and set points where there would be changes. Here is an example of this.

However there is another option that can be utilised. I have assigned an effect to a MIDI keyboard control, this is useful for adding live effects to a clip or master track, I have used another delay, this time a ping pong delay on the melody to make this more psychedelic.

I did this by selecting the control within ableton as shown below(A) and assigning it to the midi control of my choice, as shown below. (B)

Now I can control the effect on this clip using the keyboard control I have assigned this control to.

Another point to consider with effects is that we can check that the effect is sending out purely the effected sound, a good thing to check also is the wet and dry control must be 100% wet as a general rule.

(1) This is where the effected sound volume is, showing that the effected sound is coming out

(2) Check the wet and dry control here

The first thing I have to do is find the first kick drum and turn the loop button on, then set the loop start position to 1 and the end point position to 2 on the section I want to loop. This will give me a 1 bar loop that can fall in to time with all the other audio variations that I have in my project and also when I warp a track it wraps to the master tempo, so all the audio plays at the same speed.

In my screen grab it shows you that I have used the warp mode button and my ‘in’ point at 1 (begining of the loop) and my ‘out’ point at 2 (end of loop) to give me the sample i wanted from begining to end. It also shows you that i have the loop button on, to loop my sample over and over , so when i trigger the section it is in, it plays it automatically.

This is where a MIDI controller keyboard is useful. The one I will be using for the performance has lots of extra controls on it. It is an Evolution MK-249C2 USB MIDI controller keyboard.

It has a section of rotary encoders (knobs) (1) that are all assignable to controls in Ableton.

I am going to use at least one for a volume control on an instrument, and another for a filter on a drum kit.

I will also use the normal keys to trigger scenes and clips, to stop instrument tracks, and to toggle the filter on and off so that I can select it and adjust it, as well as turn it off to get the normal unfiltered sound.

The way to assign the keys and knobs to functions in Ableton is very easy. With the relavent controls on the screen in Ableton, click on the midi button in the top right hand part of the screen (shown below) -

which then highlights in purple all controls in Ableton that are MIDI assignable.

To assign a control, click the function on the screen that you want to control, then tap the key or turn the knob that you want to use to control the function. From the screen grab below you can see that most of the assignable functions are un-assigned, and that the ones that are like a clip (1) and a track volume (2), have a code on them in a white box. This code not only shows that the function is assigned, but shows which key or knob it is assigned to.

Any parameters that limit the function can also be set. So, for example, a track volume isn’t controlled over it’s full extent but limited to a predefined range. This is done by clicking on the arrow (3) on the left part of the screen (whilst in MIDI assign mode) to reveal the mapping browser. It shows all the assignments, and the ranges of the variable ones (4).

For my piece, I have assigned all the scenes, track stops, a filter toggle and the solo guitar clip to keys on the keyboard. I have also assigned a track volume to a knob, and the filter frequency on a drum kit (toggled by a key) to another.

I initially tried assigning only three keys to the scenes – up scene, down scene and play scene. But in practice I found this method of selecting the scenes I want fiddly, and it’s much easier to assign the sections of the piece in patterns of scenes on the keyboard.

1) For simplicities sake we will create a new project.

2) go to the Live devices part of Ableton and choose Impulse fom the options!

3) drag and drop the instance of Impulse to the session view which looks like this:-

4) Now you have dragged and dropped Impulse to the session part of Live it should look like this!

Impulse is now ready for loading drum samples!

5) to load a drum sound into Impulse you merely drag and drop a wav file to Impulses’ pads and things should be sounding nice!

This concludes this entry,

most plug-ins in Live follow the drag and drop way of working, even external plug-ins such as the Native Instruments collection.

I realise that plug-ins is a big subject but I am sure it can be narrowed down in time!

Native instruments is a company which specialise in software instruments!

To Find out more click the  link!

index.php?id=home&L=1

I started by having a simple drum sound with a slow and uncomplicated rhythm, and a simple bass line not doing much more than the drums in one scene (this is the first scene at the top of the above screen shot – the drums in the olive coloured clip in the first track, and the bass in the red scene in the third track). This section of the piece is like a downbeat introduction (A), which merely adds a couple of extra sounds so elaborate it before bridging to the next section. The drums get slightly more busy in the following scenes, but not much, before using the last scene of the first section to break down to allow a transition to the next section.

The second section (B) goes to double time drums that are very “dance” or “techno” in style. But I have used this as a “deceptive teaser section” before breaking down again (using the last scene of the first section) and heading into the main section (C) which is as slow as the first section but extremely driving.

I then have a heavily distorted guitar riff/lead clip with masses of feedback on it as a sound to be triggered at any time in the piece.

I have also removed various stop buttons (3) from the scenes (4) to allow for switching between scenes without stopping the clips I want to continue. This for instance allows the more involved melodies in the last section keep playing whilst the drums break down (using the drums in the first section without having to trigger individual stop and start clip buttons).

This lets me trigger a long clip (F) (unlinked over more than 10 bars for instance – shown in the shot below – (G) shows the clip is unlinked and (H) shows the volume change in the evelope window) so that the clip can play across scenes without interruption. It also lets me break down the beat of a more involved section without loosing the instruments in that section.

With this set in place I have been able to create a simple transistion between scenes that also has a sample that increases in volume over a number of bars to create a build in mood.

All of these things allow me to play various sections more than once but with slightly varied drums or sounds so making it interesting but simple.

For no other reason than it was “availableton” I opted to use a FCB1010 midi foot controller, a decision I almost regretted when I started to try and programme it. I decided that I wanted to program it to trigger the scenes in Ableton Live. The FCB1010 can send or receive any midi message. After reading the manual I decided to program the FCB1010 to send a midi note from each foot switch. This means assigning a note to each foot switch on each bank. I will not go into detail on how it’s done however, bank 01 footswitch 01 sends note G0, bank 01 footswitch 02 sends note G#0 each footswitch programmed to send a note ascending chromatically. For this project all messages are on channel 1.

FCB1010 Midi Foot Controller Tascam USB Audio/MIDI Interface.

The FCB1010 now needs to be connected to the computer. This has to be via a Audio/MIDI Interface which enables the foot controller to ‘talk’ to Ableton Live. Now to assign MIDI foot controller messages to Ableton live. Turn on Midi Map Mode Switch (as shown) highlight the control you want activate – in this case scene 1 Intro. Now press the button on the foot controller that you wish to assign in this case Bank 01 Button 01. This now shows as 1/G0.

Then i have to find the appropriate effect on down drop list of effect. The one circled in red and numbered number three is the one i have selected, (filter delay).

- The next thing i have to do is to create a return channel, where my effect is to be controlled. Right clicking on the track title bar, then selecting insert return truck will open a new return channel.

When the return channel has been created, i just need to click on the name of the selected instrument and drug to the return channel.

After a return channel has been created now i can send any audio channel on my project to this return effect instrument; by just turning on the send button on any audio channel.

Double clicking on truck list over the return channel will display the device which is to be set accordingly by clicking on the button to vary the sound.

For next week i expect making more break down on my project so that different tune can be mixed and play together.

(see arrows)

In the compressor I check the envelope from a peak in the second Bass to an opto to give a different feeling to the Bass from the first Bassline that I am using for my main bass.

Also in the compressor i changed the attack and the release switches, I changed the attack switch to 3.16ms and the Release to 70.6ms and i also changed the model to FB to give the of the bass a pushing back and fort feeling as this bass would be underneath my main bass.

I also used two EQ three with the compressor

I used the EQ to give a more heavy sound to my bass, the way i did this is that i changed the gain low and the hi grain switch. the first EQ I used i changed the low grain to 6.00db and the mid grain to -6.70db, I also changed the hi and low freq to give that pan feeling from speaker to speaker.

The next EQ I changed all the gain different from the first one, this gave me a tumbing sound as i changed the low and hi freq to 670hz and 250khz

To start with, a return track is needed. This is acheived merely by right clicking in empty track space and selecting “Insert Return Track”.

Once created I went into the Live Devices menu (1) on the left of the screen, and found the effect (2) I wanted in the new return track. Then I dragged it into the return track (3).

This assigns the return track with the effect dropped on it, and all audio and midi tracks will automatically have a send control assigned to the return track.

The example below shows a reverb effect assigned to the “A” return track (4). It also shows the send controls for the reverb (5), which have been adjusted for the tracks that I decided needed reverb.

The Reverb effect (once placed in a return track) is then also available as a control in the clip envelope (like the transpose function in the previous blog) so that it can be adjusted automatically through the loop as it is played, and not just set for the whole track and therefore all the clips in it.

I also added “Beat Repeat” and “Simple Delay” as return tracks. I use the reverb extensively as it can soften any particularly harsh sounds, and “fill” out the sound. Delay can be used in small doses to fill out further the reverb, or to create an echo effect. I have used a lot of beat repeat and delay on the main drum section to create a more rhythmic feel to the beat without using more drum hits. The delay is also a stereo effect, and the “echo” effect from it pans left and right whilst decaying, which adds a nice dynamic feel to the beat.

I researched into psytrance music to see what effects and processors, bass and other usual traits psytrance had, i found that a lot of psytrance djs make good use of the EQ processor, cutting out high and/or low frequencies to vary the music.

I had already been briefed about the need to keep my performance interesting, so i felt this processor would be a good idea.

I decided this processor would work best as something that could be changed live, but needed to be on the main master track so it would affect all channels. In order to do this I clicked on the master track enabling me to drag the EQ into the audio effects pane(1).

I could now change the overall feel of the track, leaving maybe just the bass in, or maybe taking it all out using the two controls highlighted below. This i found easy to do and it can be very useful.

All the instruments are found in the live devices area under instruments, in the file browser(1).

IMPULSE

Above is the Impulse instrument, with 8 drum slots(A), individual drum controls(C) and also global controls(B).

Within my project i used a preset from Ableton as my drums, the preset could be found within the instruments(E), after coming to document my project i found that the Impulse instrument was not named, this meant i did not know what my preset was, however all was not lost as I found the hot swap (D) tool allowed me to find my presets with ease.

I then used this preset to record MIDI drum beat by drawing in using the pencil tool. As you can see the drums are assigned to MIDI Keys(F), these can be recorded in using the MIDI controller keyboard or just drawn in as i prefer to do.

ANALOG

I also used Analog which a synthesiser that comes with Ableton, I used a preset within this from the sound effects area. This was the Car Alarm preset.

I decided on the car alarm preset because after some experimentation with the preset i found it was good to build up with a steady change of release(2).

Also you can make your own presets with the actual synthesiser controls(1)

Within my project i did have a go at create my own sounds using analog but found it time consuming and not the best degree of accuracy when creating suitable sounds, so i personally recommend using the presets, they are good quality sounds and easy to modify.

In keeping with my preset sounds, i decided to use more presets from the instrument rack, this enabled me to quickly experiment more with creating variations and combining them concentrating on the performance side of things and my chosen area of expertise.

For this I copied the clip that already existed into a new clip space ready for manipulation (Click and hold on the clip to be copied (1), and whilst holding down the control key, drag it to a new space (2), then let go).

Then, by double clicking on the copied clip, I brought up the clip view.

Within the envelope settings it is possible to adjust many different variables that change the way the clip is played. It is also possible to make the variables act over a larger timescale than the clip itself, and as the looped sample I used loops every beat, and I want it to change in pitch over a number of bars, the clip envelope is the perfect tool for the job.

The clip envelope settings are brought up in the clip view by clicking on the little “E” button (3) at the bottom left hand corner of the clip view. Within the envelope settings there is a Region/Loop “Linked” button (4) that when clicked deselects and becomes “Unlinked”. This is the switch to enable you to adjust the envelope over a greater time than the loop. The envelope window changes to show the beats and bars the loop will then loop over, in which can be set the transposition changes I want on the clip.

I then clicked on the transpose button ( 5 ), and the window then showed a straight red line ( 6 ) across the middle of the envelope window. This shows the transpose setting for the length of the defined envelope. As a flat line it shows no deviation in pitch across the envelope. But before adjusting the line, the start and end loop flags ( 7 ) needed adjusting to the length that I want it to play the loop and vary it. The flags were dragged out to 5 (meaning 4 bars in all) and then I used the pencil tool ( 8 ) to create the variations in pitch over the 4 bars that I wanted.

The sample was adjusted to follow the change in bass line over 2 bars, and I made a minor variation over the following two bars to create a four bar loop.

This image displays an audioclip clip i created. Double clicking on this clip takes you from session view, into clip view as displayed below.

Looking in further detail at the clip below I have highlighted parameters, they are as follows.

(1) Start of Loop Brace Marker: This is the point at which the audio clip will start to loop (if the loop section option is selected)

(2) Start Marker: This is the point at which the audio clip will start play from

(3) End of Loop Brace Marker: This defines the point at which the loop (if selected) will play to, then travel back to the start of loop point and continue to loop for a pre-defined time.

(4)End marker: This point indicates the end of the sample and where play stops (unless a loop setting is otherwise selected)

(5) Loop Brace: This indicates and defines the length of a looped section

(6) Loop indicator: This indicates whether a clip is loop enabled. When selected, this option will allow the clip to loop a section from between the start of loop (1) and end of loop (3) markers. If this loop indicator is not enabled the sample will play once from start (2) to end (4).

This is a variation on the above clip. I have utilized the loop section function (1), changed the loop length (2) from 1 bar in length to 2, and moved the start and end of loop points. I have also changed the start marker so that the clip starts from a different point in time (5).

The start marker has been placed at the start of bar two (5). This was done to make the bass sound fit in time with the beat better. The bass sound seemed to be slightly off beat when set at 1.4.3 where the note starts. The note now starts on the same beat as where the kick drum sounds are found in my drum patterns and loops for 1 bar in length (3) –(4).

The loop marker has been reduced in length so that it loops for 1 bar instead of two. The point at which it now starts looping is a lower tone note and fits nicely with the drum pattern.

The way to make variations in Ableton is seemingly endless. Aside from the technique mentioned above you can change the launch setting ie how it starts and plays, reversing audio clips, pitch shifting and warping. All these many options can be contained and controlled by Ableton’s powerful clip envelopes. I will explain more about this detail while discussing another variation of one of my clips.

The above image is of one the audio clips I have created. In clip view in its original form it appears as below.

I used lots of different techniques to make the recorded audio part fit and work within my project.

(1) I have turned the (time) warp feature on this allowed me to stretch time around the audio in the clip.

(2) Inside the circle at point (2) is point I chose for the start marker. Beat 1 is highlighted green showing the clip has now been warped. I have circled the other warp markers. These were placed strategically to alter the rhythm of my recorded vocal and keep it in time.

(3) Shows the loop section is turned on.

(4) This is where I placed the start loop marker.

(5) This is where I placed the end of loop marker, the section now loops continuously for half a bar around the section from (4) – (5).

I also utilsed clip envelopes to provide yet more variety.

(1) Inside of this box I have selected unlinked, this means that the envelope can have its own characteristics which are unlinked to the clip ie it will play the clip as I have selected and loop the section I selected , but it will have characteristics that are apllied for x amount of time etc, without affecting the others settings.

(2) This is the envelope loop section. the envelope will loop for the length of time I have selected, in this case two bars.

(3) This is the envelope type, envelopes can be created on almost setting. I have used an envelope on the mixer . controlling the track volume. It is possible to use envelopes on the clip itself or any effects attached to a track.

(4) The envelope settngs are on track volume I have the volume either on or off (100% or 0%) this was used so particular words were used while not so desirable ones were silenced. This was done to give a stuttering effect. A common occurence in the style of music I am trying to create.

You may want to edit a loop in Live this is accomplished by using the arrows at left and right top of the waveform as shown

But by far the most effective way I have seen of editing audio is unlinking the audio and adding a change in the audio by controlling the Envelope by clicking on the E in the bottom left of Live as shown

Furthermore if you create an envelope it looks like this and lets you create longer variation sections:-

To add variations and hence keep your sound fluid, clips may be edited to provide variations!

The are many ways to edit clips. Clips can be reversed Filter changed in pitch and a whole host of other processes.

One particular method is using effects as shown in my project!

if you are feeling particulrly adventerous you may use the custom effects @ Smart Electronix

Another example of a variation that I made use of was to change the pitch of the main loop!

for example you might want to reverse the clip, if so merely click on reverse!

To make new sounds and material I developed an understanding of M.I.D.I (musical.instrument.digital.interface) and the ability to use midi via a controller keyboard or the computer keyboard to play Ableton’s software synthesisers

Ableton’s software Synthesiser’s and instruments are listed as below (shown in Ableton’s device browser).

For the new sounds created thus far I have favoured the 3 following Synth’s

Operator

Operator A FM (frequency modulation) synthesiser

Analog

Analog A physically-modelled analog synthesiser

Simpler

Simpler Is for Chromatic play of one sound via an attached midi controller keyboard of use of the computer keyboard

Pay attention to the simpler above you may notice it is in offline mode. No sounds will be heard from simpler in this state. Any Sample can be loaded into simpler in this mode (drop sample here). Once a sample is loaded you can commence play with Simpler.

Notice in the simpler above a sample has been loaded.

This sample has been used in simpler

In keeping with my project plan this is a new sound I had produced using Reason, this was then exported into Sony’s Sound Forge 8 Audio editing software, cut, tweaked and then saved. It was then loaded back into Ableton’s Simpler. All of the parameters can be adjusted to play as much of the sample as you require, the sample can also looped allowing sample to play the sound as a long note. I used simpler with the above sound whilst attempting to create a warm resonant bass sound for use in my project Creating a new sound and then creating a bassline played via the keyboard has been fun and an effective way to produce new material.

For my performance and final project I intend to make a “jackin’” house set produced almost entirely from new material, pre-recorded samples will be kept to a minimum, where they are used, the samples will be manipulated so that they are unrecognisable.  My interest in electronic dance music comes from my passion for “DJ’ing”.  I am influenced by the US house sound particularly Chicago style “Deep House” and also the minimal “Tech” House sound that comes from the UK and Europe.

In order to create new material I will have to become familiar with Ableton’s built in software Synthesisers and instruments.  I will also need to gain a good knowledge and understanding of M.I.D.I (Musical Instrument.Digital.Interface).

This is a midi chanel In order to play and record midi the chanel needs to be armed to receive note data

The second image shows the same midi chanel this time displaying a red light which signifies midi is enabled,you will no be able to play and record midi data.

Once a track is midi enabled you can play an attached (keyboard) controller or use the computer keyboard to play in melodies, bass-lines and patterns.  This will happen inside a midi clip.  Simply arm the track and play to your hearts content.

Double clicking on this midi clip from the session view will take you inside of the clip to display the note editor in the clip view as displayed below.

Highlighting the notes and right clicking will give you options relating to the midi clip, such as deactivate note, or quantise (push in time to nearest beat/minim/quaver) . In the clip view it is also possible to change the note length and velocity (how loud it is played).

External Instruments and devices such as audio effects and synths can be used in Ableton. They are known as ‘plug-ins’ or ‘virtual studio technology’ (VST). Available devices are listed in the Plug-in Device Browser at the left side of the session view. Drag and drop the device into the required track.  I opted to use the Dimension LE because I was looking for a cello sound which was not available in the intstruments in my Ableton Live.

Plug-In Browser	VST Instrument Dimension LE
Some of the loops/samples I used in this project were in the wrong key. To fit the project they had to be transposed. To do this, double-click the clip that needs to be transposed. This will bring-up the Clip View. In the Sample Section of the Clip View highlight the Transpose knob and adjust transposition to the required key/pitch.

1. The loop buttom change the size by percenge to an 100%  to give you the whole sample. I change it to 76.2% this let it miss out the begining point of the loop and give me the middle part of the loop.

2. the lenght plays from the begining to the end  this show as an 100% in the sample window  by the arrow in the dark green section of the wave form.

3. The frequency is where i used the filter on and the type to LP12 to give it that deep bass and get rid of the tinny sound before in the sample , i then put the frequency contral half way .

I have not been able to complete Assessment 1.5 blog today as I have had to concentrate on exporting the midi tracks from the song I’ve prepared in Guitar Pro 5 ready to load as scenes into the Ableton Session View. There has been a problem with the drum clips, as explained above in the Impulse section, which means I will have to edit manually the percussion elements in more than 30 clips. The midi drum tracks imported directly into Sonar without problems, so the need to remap/move some of the instruments using the midi editor was unexpected.

On the 22nd of May I hope to record more audio for the project, directly into Ableton this time, and also record some midi using a keyboard. I will then be able to complete the blog for assessment 1.5, with screenshots from the project. Hopefully, over the weekend I will be able to finish off all midi clips required for the scenes.

These are the following step for warping

- Double click on this file browser icon will display the list of samplers.

- Once all samplers and clips have been displayed now I can drug and drop it into session view.

- Clicking on this arrow will play the clip.

- Clicking here will display the scene in clip view

- Locate the start and the end of the clip

- Place the mark locater at the start of clip

- Turn on the metronome by clicking on it

- Find the end of the clip and place mark locator to the end.

I did this by randomly playing songs on my iPod til I found a clean and interesting intro to a song that seemed to be usefull. Once I had found one, I recorded it into the computer using Sony Sound Forge to get a rough sample (meaning longer than required to enable me to mess with it to find the right bit).

The sample was a rhythmic guitar and drums intro to a metal song. I chose it because it had open chords with no mix of rhythms in it. It sounded like something I could get a simple sound out of without extensive warping.

I then brought the sample into Ableton by finding it in the file browser on the left hand side of the screen (1), and dragged it into an empty part of the track section of the screen (2). This created a new audio track and placed the sample into a new clip. With the clip double clicked on, the clip view is then visable to see the sample waveform at the bottom of the screen (3).

I then listened to the sample all the way through to gauge which part of it I wanted to use.

I experimented with moving the start and end loop flags (4) whilst the warp button (5) was off. This let me hear the selection in real time without being stretched by the warp function. I tried using a complete guitar riff as a loop, but it didn’t sound quite right. I eventually looped part of an open chord to create rhythm out of the loop.

Once I was satisfied with the section I’d found I activated the warp button and the metronome (6), and adjusted the warp flags (7) (by double clicking to activate – then drag to adjust) til the sample was in time with the metronome and sounded right. I used the warp function to make the sampled section of sound loop in time – the whole process was pretty much intuitive, and based on trial and error than aiming for an exact sound.

I then saved the clip by draging the clip back into the file browser.

The one sample I used by this method was a section of crunchy guitar that has a very driving feel to it. Once warped it gives the feel of a dance sampled metal guitar – crunchy but with a definite beat to it.

For my overall idea for my final project, I would like to produce a underground grime cross Bassline track. For my final proformance I would like to do a pre organised DJ set with different loop,sample,vocal and drum patten, this will be pre-arranged in ableton in to scene’s

The first step I need to is find the right right R&B drum sample, that is in wave so i can crop the drum sample and take the piece i need and make three different arrangement of it by crop the wave form, like below. Also in my project I would like to use a two-step garage loop so I can mix it with the cross fader on the midi keyboard into one of my friend bassline track called I’m so restless by 1born production and alongside a grime track made out of a bassline sample that i will play again into a midi keyboard, I will also use different other sample that will fit in to the track and put whole thiing into scene that will fit.

I experimented with some midi instruments by copying them into an unused Midi track-

• I looked in the Live device browser on the left of the Ableton screen (1), opened up the Instrument rack by clicking on the arrow next to it (2), and dragged the relevant instrument sound into the top of the Midi track (3).

I discovered a double bass midi instrument that seemed to suit it, so I dragged it in and started to improvise a simple bass line. Once I had an idea of what I wanted to record I recorded it into a fresh clip in the Midi track.

• To record the midi notes from the midi keyboard, I clicked on the record enable button on the midi track (4). This turned all the stop buttons on the track (5) into record buttons (6). I then started the drums playing by starting the drums clip (7), and when I was ready clicked on a record button in the midi track to start recording. Once the notes were played I stopped it recording by clicking the record button on the new clip again.

Then by double clicking on the clip I’d just recorded the clip view was shown. I then selected all the notes I’d played, and by typing “Ctrl U” I quantised all the notes. This was done to 1/16th of a beat and quantising both start and end of the notes.

What I had recorded wasn’t that far off and this just brought any slightly out of time note into perfect time.

So far the bass was a good match for the beat, and would only need editing for clip variations to either increase the rhythm for “speeding” the piece up or decrease it for drops or breaks in the overall piece.

I was happy with what I’d achieved, so moved on to adding a sound sample.

For recording in MIDI, I first setup a MIDI track(1), this is done by right clicking in the empty track space and clicking create MIDI track.

When your MIDI track is set up you can then drag onto this MIDI track your desired instrument, I myself will show an Impulse instrument for this example.

The drums will be automatically assigned to the keyboard and then you record enable track so that you can then either draw in the notes or record on the keyboard.

It is also usually a good idea to use the metronome to help you play in time this is located at the top of the ableton window

Once the notes are played in, (if recorded) you can then quantize(4) and edit the notes in ableton, you do this in the MIDI editor at the bottom. You quantize by highlighting the notes you wish to quantize and press ctrl + u, this is shown below. Various settings are available for instance time signatures of 1/16, 1/8 and more.

From this area you can also use the pencil or double click to draw in and delete notes.

MIDI was not one of my strong points but it was something i wanted to improve on as i have mainly used the matrix and redrum machines in Reason to create music before, also i was sort of interested to see what instruments using MIDI I could use and in comparison to Reason how easy it was.

Using Ableton Live to bring together a collection of loops/samples both ‘aquired’ and ‘homemade’ that i have been working with in Sonar. I think that Ableton Live will give more flexibility when making and putting loops and samples together using the ‘warp’ control (unique to Ableton i think).

My Goal.

I would like to make a project that is listenable, entertaining and perhaps thought provoking, which will demonstrate an ability and understanding of Ableton Live.

Readiness.

Although i have all the samples i need for this project work is needed to make them blend seamlessly.

]]> http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/05/21/61/feed/ 1 swin1955 http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/05/21/43/ http://digisound.wordpress.com/2008/05/21/43/#comments Wed, 21 May 2008 12:20:58 +0000 robertlknight http://digisound.wordpress.com/?p=43 ]]> Now I am clearer on my area of expertise, which I now know will be Operater . Operator is Abletons own plug re-creation of an analogue synth! I was going to do it on Kore 2 but to keep things simple I am now working on PC (@ Beaumont Street) and at home on my IMAC. Home is for working things out and Beaumont Street for project work.

–

My performance should be about five minutes, however it may be longer or shorter Now I am using only one sample the Nelly Furtado sample!

Sorry the Operator is an FM synth, simmalar to the Yamaha DX 100 in its use of four Operatorsl. However the carrier and modulator are other waveforms than Sine!

Operator may also use analogue style filters.

BEFORE

First I copied the clip by hold down ctrl and dragging into a new slot then renaming it(1). Then i could click on the new clip and edit it as i wished, making the changes to create my variation. For this particular variation I changed the loop points(2), enabling the clip to start as normal but then loop the end of the clip to sort of bring a feel of build up and anticipation for the next bit of the bass.

AFTER

I could have also added more variations to this clip, I could have gone into the envelope settings at the bottom left and changed the pitch gradually over say an 16 bar period within the end loop, this would have been done by unlinking the pitch(3) within the envelope and draqgging the loop and end markers out to include more bars than the original clip as shown below. You can then draw in the gradual pitch change(4).

I only changed the loop points on this variation, this was to keep my changes simple but effective, i felt that too much would draw attention away from the music.

Another Variation i used in contrast to this was an automated modulation on the release of a clip(A), I used this to allow for a steady build up within the intro scene. Shown below. The automation is drawn in on the right(B).

This was done by finding the control on the instrument, in this case on the analog and then right clicking on the control and selecting the option show modulation, which would bring you to the above screen where you can edit the modulation on the control.

I would like to make a combination of Rumba, Salsa and reggae music.

Techniques.

1) Using Ableton Live, I expect editing all:

-Drum sets,

-Breaks and beats from impulse sampler on Midi clip editor or Midi keyboard.

2) I expect importing some audio sampler from different CDs on my project so that they can be edited and mixed with my own creativity.

3) Live vocal and instrument is to be played in this project. Eg: Acoustic guitar and electric guitar.

Instruments

Midi keyboard

Electric and acoustic guitar

Ableton live program on my computer for editing and arrangement of all my music.

Live studio recording will be needed for vocal recording.

Ableton processor and effect will be used for the rest of the proct.

I am willing to be ready two weeks before the performance date to be able to get used to all arrangement made.

This course coincides with the completion of an album of songs in collaboration with another song writer. In order to progress I need to move to a more intuitive and creative means of composing further songs, that is far less time consuming than the present method. I’ve specially written a song called ‘Touchstone’ that lends itself to prototyping using the Ableton Live approach with scenes in the session view to develop it from the preliminary midi draft that should be completed this week. There are some lyrics to finish & audio to record in Sonar on the 15th of May.

By de-constructing the draft sequences and re-using/editing in Ableton with additional material I should be able to assess how effective the software will be as a composition and arranging tool.

Project goals

1. Completion of the midi song in Guitar Pro with vocals and guitars etc. recorded in Sonar by 20th of May.  It will be neccessary to confirm the Sonar audio clips are compatible with Ableton, and if not, these will be re-recorded in Ableton. I have already confirmed the Guitar Pro midi export will import into Ableton. If the Ableton instruments can’t provide a required orchestral sounds then the Sonar midi tracks will be bounced to audio.

2. Completion of all the audio and midi clips needed for Ableton Session View scenes by the 27th of May. It is likely the transfer to Ableton will require additional midi and audio data as the project develops. As there will be many longer than normal clips I may need some input/further study into how these can be prepared e.g. editing in Sound Forge and warping.

3. Completion of the Session View scenes with all required effects and processors applied by 3rd of June. I will need help with the scenes where there are lengthy clips to incorporate. Dummy clips and Legato use?

4. Setting up and practice performance using the controller keyboard to be completed by 11th of June ready for performance on the 12th of June. I have already covered the live guitar playing, if needed.

Preparation

I don’t anticipate any problems completing the draft song ready for developing in Ableton and I don’t expect to use any other recorded material or samples. I will use the midi guitar and keyboard at home for additional midi and can also record any extra audio to either Sonar or Ableton on my DAW. I’m proceeding on the basis my song-writing collaborator will play lead guitar live during the performance, but this will depend on how the song progresses over the next fortnight.

Other Project Ideas

The performance should last between 4 and 5 minutes, depending on the duration of any live playing. Style of what I regard as a fairly conventional (retro?) song will need a second opinion, so I’ll get one. Throughout the project I’ll be looking to use whatever techniques, processors and effects needed to improve my mixing and mastering skills. Hopefully, this will be the first of many songs created with Ableton. I will need to look into the instrument aspects as I havn’t yet discovered what is available in Ableton. I’ll want to use the Edirol Orchestral plug in on Sonar, as I understand there is no Ableton equivalent I can use.

Areas of Expertise

I want to concentrate of those areas which will improve my composition, arranging, recording & production of songs quickly and in a collaborative manner. A key part of this is playing midi and audio live, instead of having to labourously enter music into a midi or staff editor, which inhibits the creative process.  I see the ability to quickly edit such midi and audio data into scenes to “perform” songs as the most important skill I can improve through this project.

The aim of this project being to personally learn about newer styles of music and production techniques. I have been inspired by watching Kraftwerk, Vangelis and JM Jarre on You Tube. I realise that I will have to work hard to keep my work organised and there may be problem interfacing between home and Beaumont Street where I haven’t got the money for Ableton Suite, but as they say necessity is the mother of all invention.

Preparation.

The Music tech level 3 course has a final project performance attached at the end for which we must prepare. I don’t normally prepare for creating music, and the style and everything associated comes as it comes. (If you see what I mean). So, although I have a plan on style etc, I fully expect to veer off at a tangent when inspiration strikes.

I have in mind creating an industrial sound scape that changes mood. I am influenced and inspired by Nine Inch Nails , who have done an instrumental cd to accompany a computer game.

Each level has it’s own atmospheric sound and theme to create mood. Each mood of my piece will have sound effects to enhance it, and effects that change the existing sounds and instruments.

I will have to first of all hunt down a drum kit i want to use, or some samples that I can turn into a drum beat using impulse (which I think will be my area of expertise). I will attempt to attach reverb and delay to individual drums.

I will try to fashion all the instruments and sound effects around the beats, to create a piece at least 5 minutes long, and I will attempt to have it all done in time =o)

(EDIT)

Ah… yes… timescale. I did have a set of deadlines written down, but got lost on the way to final post.

My intentions were/are to have found all the samples and instrument sounds required, and to have them edited and warped by the 21st May.

I intend to have a number of scenes ready to form the structure of the piece by the 28th May, and to have all sound effects and improvised “adjustments” ready and mapped to start practicing the piece by the 4th June.

Goal 1: Is to write some lyrics for 20/05/08

Goal2: Record the lyrics for 28/05/08

Goal 3: Create the sounds in Ableton for 04/06/08

To get this project started I will need to write some lyrics and record them. I expect my project to be 10 mins long at the most. 3mins for the song, 4 mins for the tune, 3 mins for the final song. I will be focusindg on recording the vocals and there will need to be a large amount of time spent on creating the music and sound using abletons in built syntesisers. The audio i may need to use will be created personally as will the vocals.

I have heard much psytrance and techno music played over the last few years and a lot of it has used delays and filters, so i would like also to experiment with effects to find something adds to the psychedelic feel to the performance.

Goal 1- So for my first deadline i need to collect all samples and gather them in an organised file structure which i will store on my external hard drive. This to be done by 20/05/08

I will inbetween stick to the blog deadlines, as to not lose any 3.33%’s of marks in my final grade:

Blog Deadline 1 21st May – Two Entries

Blog Deadline 2 28th May – Two Entries

Blog Deadline 3 4th June – Two Entries

Final Goal- I will have all my project completed and ready to practice with maybe a few minor edits to be done by the 04/06/2008 this means i can practice my performance to get an idea of where it will be going on the night.