Push2 and Keyboard playing same instrument? How?

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lionellite
Posts: 2
Joined: Mon Feb 11, 2019 3:33 pm

Push2 and Keyboard playing same instrument? How?

Post by lionellite » Mon Feb 11, 2019 3:40 pm

Hi

I want to be able to play one instrument (say a synth) on the Push 2 and the midi keyboard.

Or - to play the same drum rack on the Push 2 on my drum pad.

I've tried the "MIDI From" section of each track - but can only assign one MIDI controller to each track. This would work fine, except Push 2 sends signals on Ch. 10 - 16, and I can only set my keyboard to send on one channel (eg, 10) - so if I set MIDI From to "All Ins" and only to Ch 10, only one row of Push 2 controls are received.

Help!
- Ableton Live 10
- Push 2
- Akai MPK249 midi keyboard
- Roland SPD-SX drum pad
- Scarlet 18i8

wayne.rudd
Posts: 19
Joined: Thu Nov 17, 2011 10:33 pm

Re: Push2 and Keyboard playing same instrument? How?

Post by wayne.rudd » Fri Feb 15, 2019 10:15 pm

I do this by having the instrument on the track with the midi keyboard as In , then have Push 2 as In on another midi track and set the Midi To pointing to the instrument Track In.

Arm both tracks. Make sure exclusive arm is turned off in settings.

jestermgee
Posts: 4500
Joined: Mon Apr 26, 2010 6:38 am

Re: Push2 and Keyboard playing same instrument? How?

Post by jestermgee » Fri Feb 15, 2019 10:25 pm

wayne.rudd wrote:
Fri Feb 15, 2019 10:15 pm
Arm both tracks. Make sure exclusive arm is turned off in settings.
Or just hold CTRL while arming tracks to arm multiples

wayne.rudd
Posts: 19
Joined: Thu Nov 17, 2011 10:33 pm

Re: Push2 and Keyboard playing same instrument? How?

Post by wayne.rudd » Fri Feb 15, 2019 10:31 pm

jestermgee wrote:
Fri Feb 15, 2019 10:25 pm
wayne.rudd wrote:
Fri Feb 15, 2019 10:15 pm
Arm both tracks. Make sure exclusive arm is turned off in settings.
Or just hold CTRL while arming tracks to arm multiples
my Push doesn't have CTRL key

jestermgee
Posts: 4500
Joined: Mon Apr 26, 2010 6:38 am

Re: Push2 and Keyboard playing same instrument? How?

Post by jestermgee » Fri Feb 15, 2019 10:44 pm

Sorry, should have explained it better :wink:

If you need to only touch Push then yes, you need to disable exclusive arm then you can hold the track select button to arm a track.

However, if you don't like to have the exclusive arm feature messed with but just need to arm several tracks for a reason quickly and you are able to reach for your computer keyboard, then you can simply hold CTRL (windows) or CMD (Mac) while pressing the tracks record arm button with your mouse to rec arm multiple tracks.

wayne.rudd
Posts: 19
Joined: Thu Nov 17, 2011 10:33 pm

Re: Push2 and Keyboard playing same instrument? How?

Post by wayne.rudd » Fri Feb 15, 2019 11:28 pm

ha ha no prob just being silly

actually in my particular setup there is no room for exclusive arm as I have 4 keyboards permanently armed to different tracks/synths (korg microKEY 25, 37 and 61 + QuNexus - yes, I have a problem) and 4 partner tracks for the Push 2 I can arm/disarm from Push to take control as necessary.

lionellite
Posts: 2
Joined: Mon Feb 11, 2019 3:33 pm

Re: Push2 and Keyboard playing same instrument? How?

Post by lionellite » Fri Feb 22, 2019 12:08 pm

Thanks for the help - this gets me part of the way there but still having trouble doing what I want.

I'm new to Ableton so let me explain what I want to do, and perhaps you can help with the how!

I want to record a whole song into various clips - drums, bass, vocals, guitar - the lot.

Rather than simply launching clips when playing the song live, I want to be able to actually play some of the parts live (on guitar, vocals, whatever).

For example, see this guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPX9h--CKl8

So ideally, play 4 bars of drums, and then launch drum clips for the rest of the song. Then play 4 bars of the bass line, then trigger my pre-recorded bass line thereafter. If I feel like playing more of the baseline, then when I launch the next scene, I want to be able to stop the bass clip for that scene and and play it myself. I don't want to record a bass clip live and then loop it (too much chance of messing it up), but to be able to switch between pre-recorded and live.

How do I do this?

For some more specific questions:

1. when audio/MIDI is recorded to a track, can I launch the clip and also play live on the same track? Or do I need to duplicate the track (ie, two drum racks - one for launching pre-recorded clips and one for playing live)? Doesn't this kill your CPU?

2. how do I do this with arming the tracks / setting the monitoring? If I record arm the track, then I can't use Push 2 to stop the track (since each 'blank' clip is red waiting for record, not a stop button)

3. is there any way to have different settings for clips in the same track? Let's say I have a bass synth in a track, and two clips in that track. Can I add reverb (for example) on the second clip but not the first? Or if I add a device to a track (like a reverb), does that 'apply' to all clips in that track? Would I need two separate tracks to do this?

4. if I want to use my midi keyboard to play (for example) bass for a bit, and then lead for a bit, and then to trigger some samples, how do I do this on the fly? How do I switch between tracks (this is similar to Q2). For another example, let's say I'm playing guitar (a physical guitar) thru an audio track. I want to trigger a scene which has (for example) no chorus, and then the next scene when I'm playing the guitar, I want chorus. How do I do this? (there's probably enough time to hit the launch button for the next scene, but not enough to dis-arm one guitar track and arm another)

5. (unrelated) is there some way on Live to see what note a MIDI device triggers? For example, if I hit C3 on my keyboard, can I see C3 anywhere on Live? How about for chords, if I play a c maj chord, can Live tell me it's C maj? This is very easy on Logic.

Thanks so much!!!
- Ableton Live 10
- Push 2
- Akai MPK249 midi keyboard
- Roland SPD-SX drum pad
- Scarlet 18i8

jestermgee
Posts: 4500
Joined: Mon Apr 26, 2010 6:38 am

Re: Push2 and Keyboard playing same instrument? How?

Post by jestermgee » Fri Feb 22, 2019 10:40 pm

Best advice would be to step back a moment and simplify things. I know some people like to solve every problem and contingency but first I would recommend rather than trying to invent your own way of putting things together to spend time to figure out how things actually work and then trying to fit within those constraints. It will make everything else much easier once you know a bit more about the way Live works.

A few quick answers:

1. Yes you can play along on a track that also has a playing clip. This can be done without recording to the track (overdub off) or when you enable overdub you can then layer notes within the clip. If you want to record a completely new clip while playing the other clip and keep the 2 separate you need another track which you can then send the MIDI from track 2 to 1 to trigger the same instrument but keep the clips separate (good for zoned instruments)

2. Push auto-arms a tracks MIDI input when you select it and sets the clip slots to REC so as you see, the clips are now rec enabled and not able to stop a track however there is a "Stop Clip" button on push. if you quickly press it that stops the clip on the selected track. Hold it and it will now latch (flash red) then you can press the track select buttons at the top of push to stop clips on any track.

3. No. Think of clips as just the input to the instrument. Each clip just holds the musical info for the instrument and plays that back. The track holds the effects and sends etc. However, if you wanted to complicate and confuse yourself you could setup FX racks and chains within your track that you could automate a chain selector with each clip to switch on a certain effect so each clip could activate effects when launched. I'll just suggest that idea, you need to figure how that is done for homework (hint: youtube Ableton chain selectors).

4. If you use Push you should be able to switch. Personally I would much rather focus on one track at a time when constructing clips and then move to the next. You have to experiment how the flow would work for you yourself there I think.

5. If you open the piano roll for a track it shows the notes you play. It does not tell you the chords (would be great if it did) and there is no global display of incoming midi notes/data tho again, would be great if there was a feature for this also.

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