MIDI controller ignored when recording to Arrangement

[mikeyboy75]

Hi, I'm not sure if I'm doing something completely stupid here but this is driving me crazy.

If I am playing a clip on a MIDI track, I can play alongside that track with my MIDI controller - eg add new notes or change the filter cutoff etc. If I want to record that to an audio track, I click the Arrangement Record Button (with both tracks armed), and then for some reason it ignores all my MIDI input (notes and controller data). Is this expected?

(Edit)
Ok I made a video showing the issue:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMryrm4DBN4

I'm pressing the high Bb key randomly, and the clip has a C3 note playing in quarter notes.
As you can see, as soon as I click the Arrangement Record Button my MIDI notes are ignored, if I then switch the button off you can hear it again.

I basically want to do what this guy is doing. But when he goes to record, he can still input his MIDI controller data.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__dWX-85KtA

Any idea what's going on? (I'm using a Launchkey 37 Mk3 but I don't think that's important.)

[mikeyboy75]

Just found out that if I record to an audio clip it works fine, I can still enter MIDI data on top of what is being played in the MIDI clip. But I have no idea why it doesn't work in the Arrangement view...??

I've also realised that in the YouTube video he's not using clips - he's copied them to the arrangement view and is in overdub mode.
I really don't want to do this - I want to stay using the clips. Is this really not possible? I'd have thought this was an extremely common use of Ableton but I'd starting to believe there's no way to do this..

[[jur]]

Weird, this should work.
Are you sure you have the Automation Record option enabled?

[mikeyboy75]

Weird, this should work.
Are you sure you have the Automation Record option enabled?

Cheers for the reply jur.

Yes, Automation Record is enabled. It's not just controller data, even they actual MIDI keys are ignored too.

I've been doing loads of searches and I can't find any video or example of anyone actually doing this - making me think this is maybe how Ableton is supposed to work, which seems staggering. I would have thought this would be a common thing to do.

Ok I made a video showing the issue:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMryrm4DBN4

I'm pressing the high Bb key randomly, and the clip has a C3 note playing in quarter notes.
As you can see, as soon as I click the Arrangement Record Button my MIDI notes are ignored, if I then switch the button off you can hear it again.

(Note that clicking the Session Record Button does allow me to hear my MIDI notes, but they are recorded to the clip which isn't what I want)

[yur2die4]

Yeah. I think I noticed this behavior a while back and I find it kind of frustrating that it won’t let me record myself Playing while also have a clip playing, when recording in Arrangement View.

I swear that I was able to do this in the past. But maybe I was doing something else.

It could be something that broke when they implemented the Session Record button.

Today I tried a variety of methods, with Overdub engaged. I tried monitoring to In and to Auto. And there were even a few rare inconsistencies. I was in a rush so I don’t remember the exact quirks I experienced, but I tried variations of In and Auto for Arming. Clip playing and not playing etc. overall though, there was no way to simply have a clip playing while simultaneously having myself playing keyboard going and being recorded.

[[jur]]

Strange... I did a quick test from my laptop, recording midi from the computer keyboard and tweaking parameters with the mouse, and in the mean time it was resampling correctly in an audio track

[yur2die4]

I am referring to a midi / instrument channel.

Play midi clip in Session, and simultaneously play notes from external device. It doesn’t allow you to merge them. Which is strange since it probably allows you to merge automation.

[mikeyboy75]

Yeah. I think I noticed this behavior a while back and I find it kind of frustrating that it won’t let me record myself Playing while also have a clip playing, when recording in Arrangement View.

I swear that I was able to do this in the past. But maybe I was doing something else.

It could be something that broke when they implemented the Session Record button.

Cheers for trying this.
Yes you'd imagine this would be fairly basic behaviour for Ableton, but weirdly (to me) I can't find many examples of anyone doing it, and haven't seen any posts about people having issues with it.

In fact this video is about the only one where I see anyone doing it - she's using a controller to do some automation while recording. It's Ableton 11 and all seems to be working as expected.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpmcRXHdAwo&t=318s

And yes I found some slightly inconsistent behaviour too. One time it all worked as expected, but I haven't been able to repeat that. I'm not sure if I did something different or Ableton is just playing silly buggers.

I have emailed Ableton tech support, so let's see what they say.

[mikeyboy75]

Strange... I did a quick test from my laptop, recording midi from the computer keyboard and tweaking parameters with the mouse, and in the mean time it was resampling correctly in an audio track

Hmm, were you playing a clip on that channel too? That's normally the issue - when doing the arrangement record it will only use the clip MIDI, unless you set monitor to In, but then the clip MIDI is muted.

[pottering]

You need Session Record enabled as well (the other smaller record button).

[mikeyboy75]

You need Session Record enabled as well (the other smaller record button).

Cheers, but that's actually the opposite of what I want to do. I want to play alongside the clips, not have my playing recorded in the clips and continually looped.
That's surely the whole point of session view - you can perform live and save that whole performance to the arrangement view.

[pottering]

Then I think you need a 2nd MIDI Track (armed or set to In) routed directly to the instrument (not Track In) in the 1st track.

[[jur]]

Ok I made a video showing the issue:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMryrm4DBN4

Sorry I didn't watch your video before, and I thought you were doing everything from Arrangement.
I can reproduce the behavior you're demonstrating, and I'm not sure why it should be this way but I'm tempted to think that it's not a bug but rather a design made to prevent some weird conflicts.
BUT, if you also activate Session Record then everything's correctly record as you expect in Arrangement... the (possible) downside, though, is that the midi overdub is also recorded in your looping Session midi clip.

[[jur]]

BUT, if you also activate Session Record then everything's correctly record as you expect in Arrangement... the (possible) downside, though, is that the midi overdub is also recorded in your looping Session midi clip.

Sorry again, I didn't notice that Pottering already mentioned this...

I'll forward this topic, but you should definitely ask and see what support@ableton.com has to say about this.

[mikeyboy75]

Then I think you need a 2nd MIDI Track (armed or set to In) routed directly to the instrument (not Track In) in the 1st track.

Yep, that works. It means I have to plan this in advance, I can't just jump onto instruments as I feel like it, but at least it works. Cheers.