Building a live set: fixed channels, different instruments?

[pinkj]

Hi,

I'd like to be able to use Live to play loop based material continuously for an extended period of time. Ideally, I wouldn't need to use my mouse or keyboard; coming from a DJ background, I like to have a DJ mixer in the centre of my setup with an Allen & Heath Xone:2D and Xone:1D respectively on each side.

I started off this afternoon, and thought it'd be logical to have 8 channels on screen, to match my 8 'channel strips' on my controllers. I put a Drum Rack for beats on channel 1, an Analogue for bass on channel 2, an Electric on channel 3, etc etc. My plan is to spend time preparing many different loops over different scenes so that when I come to play, I can work through the scenes in order to give the music structure. I'd then use the 2 or 3 extra controls on each 'channel strip' on the controllers to adjust parameters in each channel. Let's assume I attempt to keep the parameters being controller simple.

Now, it's all very well creating many different loops with different melodies, chord patterns, basslines, etc but before long the actual sound (i.e. one individual configuration of a Live instrument) will get boring and I'd want to change the sounds over time. Just like when DJing and I mix from one record to another, it's natural for the sounds to be different.

My question is how to best achieve this. I'd rather not have more than 8 on screen channels so I'm hoping it's a sensible decision to not add all the many channels I'd ever need across the way, so that all my clips essentially move down and across over time. Ideally, there'd be some easy way of recalling different presets for each MIDI channel, just like when you sit at a an electronic keyboard and choose one of the many different sounds. Perhaps 'preset 1' might be a Piano, then 'preset 2' would be an electric piano, 'preset 3' might be a bass guitar, etc.

I appreciate that one simple solution might be to render everything in advance to audio clips, but where possible, I'd really like to keep the live element so that I'm free to change the parameters of the instrument and even the notes that are being played in real time.

Any suggestions whatsoever would be massively appreciated, thank you in advance!

Kind regards,

Justin

[bosonHavoc]

maybe think about doing a bit of both..
render to audio as much as possible
and think about what parameters you tweak
you could just add them as effects.
like if you drop and auto filter you will have your filter and lfo.
other effects and sends can really shape your sound
and me give more freedom of expression too.

but for bits you want to play you can use a synth or create a rack of synths on 1 track
and drop a looper or something like that.
map out the controls and go.. view it as a hardware synth except you only have the controls you need so it is even better.

in my set i never touch the computer
and i have my main 8 tracks which is in view and all samples.
then i have my singers group (vox,keys,vst synths)
and my group (bass,vox,vst synths, battery)
all closed up and out of view because they are all mapped to controllers and i don't need to see them.

i actually do not have to look at the computer allot.. it will be even less when i get my own apc-40 (instead of the occasional borrow)


just keep tinkering with it because your the only one that will be able to find your perfect work flow.. after 3 years i feel like i'm almost their hehe... but i always tweak on my set ups (even when i was just a bass player).. always have always will.

[pinkj]

Cheers Boson!

I thought I'd check in with you and let you know how I've been getting on so far. I wanted to try what some other people have been saying on some other threads and I've been racking up different synths and using the chain selector to select the appropriate sound for a tune. The other advantage of this is that I can map the two knobs per channel on my controller to say Macro 1 and Macro 2 of the top most Instrument Rack and then map each of those to specific parameters in each chain's instrument/effects parameters. This way, my MIDI map doesn't get too crowded.

So far it's working out all right, and I haven't ruled out your suggestion of rendering as much as possible yet, I'm just hoping not to have to as it'd save a lot of work and allow for more potential.

At the moment, I'm using the rotary encoders at the top of my controllers to adjust each channel's chain selector, that way I can switch them individually. What I think I really want though is the ability to sync the changes to when clips are triggered.

Another option I still have is to use some software I wrote in C# which simply does the appropriate translation, I'm just also hoping to avoid this too, not because it's hard but because it introduces something else to go wrong.

Cheers for your suggestions though so far, I'll keep this thread updated when I can.

Justin

[bosonHavoc]

for the sync thing you could create a midi loop back bus using midi yoke (pc) or audio midi set up (mac)

how this would work is you set up an empty midi track and route the midi out the virtual midi cable which is then routed back into ableton via ableton preferences.

this way you can assign midi clips which can be quantized and scene launched that will be able to control things in ableton.

[pinkj]

yup I'm with you. Been doing that with an external MIDI cable, is Yoke totally stable then?

Cheers again, Justin

[bosonHavoc]

ya, i have never had any issues with it