Interrupt a loop with a one shot

[benirose]

I'm having a problem getting a track set up for proper live performance. Basically, I have a drum loop that I want to continuously play, and I want to interrupt with some one shot samples. I want it so that when I'm done triggering that one shot, I can pick the loop back up where it would've been if I had never interrupted it.

I've tried two ideas, both involving clips all on the same track. I have the loop at the top and the one shots on clips below it. If I make them all legato, it doesnt seem to work correctly because the one shots don't trigger from the beginning. However if I just have the loop on legato, the one shots will trigger correctly but the loop will pick back up where it stopped rather than where it wouldve been if the one shots werent triggered.

Any ideas? One I just thought of is to try putting the loop on a channel with a gate it that's sidechainned to another channel which has the one shots on it. The only problem is I might want to cut the loop longer than the one shot plays, but I can probably use the mute button in those cases.

Any other ideas are appreciated!

[LithiuMind]

Hey Benirose!

It's funny because I was literally going through the EXACT SAME thought process yesterday. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a setting where you can have a sample be interrupted and then play on from where it would have been had the other clip not interrupted it. This would be a great feature in the launch settings, in addition to an "end of clip" timing for follow actions...but anyways.

Here's what I wound up doing...

Put the one shot and the loop on two separate audio tracks. Have a key or midi command mapped to both the one shot clip, and the track on/off button for the audio track with the loop. You can invert the midi/key mapping on the track on/off so that when you play back the one shot, it mutes the audio track with the loop. The only problem with this is that if you have your one shot synced to quantization (like 1 bar, 1/4 bar, etc.) then you can get the audio from the one shot and the loop overlapping if you take your finger off the key even a microsecond before the end of the unit of quantization. The loop's audio track unmutes before the one shot has finished playing. To get around this, you can use dummy clips sending the "mute/unmute" messages via IAC. This way your one shot and your muting dummy clip can have the same settings and will respond exactly the same to your commands, which should result in perfect synchronization and no audio overlap.

For more info on how dummy clips and IAC routing work, I recommend checking out Tom Cosm's videos. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIjzcW_du3s is a good starting point if you're unfamiliar with using IAC routing.

[AceLuby]

This is really super easy to accomplish. Set up two tracks and put your continuous loop on one track and your one shot on another track. Set one track to crossfader A and the other to B and have both clips continuously playing. Now when you crossfade to A you'll have your drum loop and on B you'll have your one shot.

For a little more control you could not have the one shot continuously playing, but instead trigger it while you crossfade and set the quantization of the clip to 'none'.

[benirose]

Nice guys!! These are both great ideas and were both posted so quickly!! I'm also surprised it's not an available clip setting. I'd imagine it's something they've thought of but just have more important features to program in, especially since there are pretty acceptable work arounds. I don't actually mind if the loop cuts back in when I let go of the sample button, so that's not a huge deal. I will probably try both of these ideas and see which one works best. Thanks again!

[benirose]

Hmm, looks like none of the approaches are working, at least within my knowledge, maybe there's something I just don't know how to do.

For one, I couldn't get the flip mode in the gate to work when sidechained. Bummer.

For two, I can't use my launchpad because you can't assign the pads as momentary buttons unless you're using the Automap Server instead of the default launchpad functionality, which I desperately need for the rest of the performance of this song.

But even so, when I use the launchpad (or my iPhone in this case) as an Automap device and assign the buttons to momentary, it still doesn't work out for me, because I can't seem to assign more than one message to the mute or crossfader. If I try to assign it across all the "pads" I just assigned to the one shot clips, it moves to the new button each time I press a new button. Maybe I just don't know how to use the MIDI Mappings section of Ableton that well, but as far as I could tell, you can only assign one midi message to the mute or the crossfader.

I tried assigning a different button to the mute of the loop track, but I was too slow at pressing it as well as the one shot button I wanted. I might try it with the crossfader on my Nocturn, but I have a feeling it will have similar results.

I guess I'm back to the drawing board unless someone can help me figure out how to assign each button to a one shot AND the mute button. Or unless someone has a better solution. LithiuMind, you said you had just done this, how did you assign each one shot button to the mute, or did you only have 1 one shot you wanted to fire?

Thanks for the help though guys!

[benirose]

I did think of an idea right as I was going to sleep last night, and it's pretty obscure. What I can do is put all my one shots on a drum rack in a midi channel. I can put each one shot on it's on midi clip (just a single long note triggering the sample from a simpler on a drum rack). And in each midi clip I will also put in a CC note with a value of 0 for the entirety of the clip. I can then use IAC to route that CC back in to be assigned to the mute of the loop channel. Then I put all the one shot midi clips on to gate mode so that when I press the pad I've assigned to them they only are on while I'm holding them down.

The only thing I haven't figured out is how to get the CC back to a value of 127 when I lift up the key. I was thinking of using a follow action, but just realized they're all measure based (who's freaking idea was that!?) instead of activated when the clip is done. Worst comes to worst, I can time the one shots so they always cut out loop for the same amount of time and not use gate mode.

Anyways, if you guys have more ideas, it's appreciated. I'm still interested in trying to get the side-chain flip mode gate working.

[AceLuby]

Look at crossfading the two and having one on 'A' and one on 'B' is what you're looking for. This should be fairly simple. Check out the below video.

http://www.5min.com/Video/How-to-Use-th ... -169952977

[benirose]

I can't see the video on my phone but I imagine that would require me to have enough skill to move the crossfader at the exact moment I hit the one shot buttons and move it back when I'm done. Unfortunately I don't have this skill. I would love to set it up so each of my one shot buttons moves this cross fader but it seems like you can only assign one button to this parameter. Maybe the video details that though, I will check it when I get home. Thanks!

[benirose]

Yeah, I watched the video and that didn't really detail what I need to know, unless I suddenly got really good at using the crossfader. But thanks. I'm going to start a new thread about this midi problem I'm having in particular. Thanks!

[AceLuby]

I think you can midi map the cross fader to a button so it goes back and forth when you press it. Then it's just practicing w/ the timing, or set your one shot clip to no quantize, then it's just pressing the clip launch and midimapped button at the same time, then press that button again to go back.

[dentaku]

Yes, you can midi map the left and right positions of the crossfader to buttons.

[benirose]

Yeah, it sounds easy in theory, but pressing both buttons at the same time is actually a little difficult. I wish I could make all of my one shot buttons to also trigger the mute buttons. Maybe I can use some external midi thing to do that.

[S4racen]

I'd look into bomes if you can't get the sidechained gate to work, I don't see why it shouldn't though?

Cheers
D