Use of Ableton Live in non-idiomatic free improvisation

[Korhan]

Hello everyone,

Obviously, most music shared here is dance or beat-oriented due to the user base Ableton Live generally appeals to. I'd like to show you here how Live can be used in the totally different musical context of free improvisation, which refers to improvised music that strives to stay away from conventional musical idioms and structures, focusing more on abstract structures, textures and sound itself.

Ableton Live has been my main tool for designing and playing instruments in free improvisation, either as a solo performer or more as a player in duos, trios or larger groups. I use various controllers to play these instruments and thanks to good planning and a lot of practice, I can play my computer instruments with almost no physical interaction with the computer itself - the computer is usually located on my side or even behind me. This allows me to be more present on stage and interact with other musicians on a deeper level by avoiding the screen, which actually tells me almost nothing about the music I create on stage. This is of course a personal preference which does not have to apply to other laptop musicians.

The controllers I use are Keith McMillen's QuNeo (which has changed the way I perform fundamentally), a Wiimote-Nunchuk pair, an Akai LPK25 keyboard coupled with a Korg Nanokontrol as well as an iPad running a simple Lemur interface (which I am looking for ways to phase out).

Here are a few videos of my concerts in Turkey and Germany:

with Bob Ostertag and Tolga Tüzün: http://iqtv.tv/etkinlik/istanbul-bilgi- ... i-ii-.aspx

with Gunnar Lettow: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... pLmY5fWqVm

with Nicolas Wiese: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7dVQP7xH5o

The music contained may or may not appeal to people whose tastes are more towards rigidly structured music, such as dance music (which I also like and sometimes also produce), but I think they are representative of music that can be made using Ableton Live. During most of these performances, Live is actually not "playing". All instruments live on their own Live track and do not need the transport to be running.

Enjoy and let me know what you think.

Korhan
korhanerel.com